The Mock Wedding Scandal

A divorce suit filed yesterday by Mary Mudgett against Alfred W. Mudgett, on the grounds of desertion and failure to support, is the sequel to a breezy scandal that was made public last June. Mudgett was formerly employed as a conductor on the North Seattle electric line. He had for some time been paying his attention to Miss Mary Groves, who lived with her mother in Queen Anne town. On May 10 he induced the girl to consent to a clandestine marriage with him at Victoria. Not long afterward, Miss Groves, or Mrs. Mudgett, discovered that Mudgett was very attentive to Mrs. Emma Debbie, a widow with whom he boarded on West street. It then came out that the girl had been deceived by Mudgett with a mock marriage. On June 15 Miss Groves' mother secured a marriage license for her daughter and Mudgett. Justice Von Tobel was summoned. There, in the presence of a constable, Charles Robinson, and a deputy sheriff, Mudgett became an unwilling bridegroom. Just before the ceremony, a very exciting scene was caused by an attempt on the part of Miss Groves to shoot Mudgett. The disclosure of Mudgett's transactions called forth the wrath of Mrs. Debbie, and a few days after his marriage he disappeared from the city. In her complaint Mrs. Mudgett alleges that she has never been known by her husband's name and has never passed as his wife. She asks the court to restore her to her maiden name of Mary Groves.