The Rescue of Mary Morin
A husband succeeds in reclaiming his wife from the House of the Good Shepherd after her brief elopement.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
Mary Morin, a 16-year-old girl who eloped from her husband in Tacoma about a month ago, is now on her way to Mission, B.C., in company with her father, mother, and husband. Following the girl's elopement with a tailor named De Rosa, her mother had persuaded her to go to the House of the Good Shepherd until her husband could arrange a home for her. De Rosa attempted to secure her release through a writ of habeas corpus, but the attempt failed. Judge Osborn, after determining the husband was 28 years old, made an order releasing the girl. Morin and his wife's parents then visited the House of the Good Shepherd, where a reconciliation was effected, and the girl agreed to return home. Mr. Morin, a cook and rancher, denied his wife was forced into their marriage and vowed to protect her from any further interference by De Rosa.
“If he should dare to follow my wife up to where we live I shall fix him, however.”
While this 1893 story centers on a young woman's agency being filtered through the legal authority of husbands and institutions, the geography of the 'House of the Good Shepherd'—long a fixture in Seattle's institutional history—recalls a time when private moral enforcement frequently intersected with local courtrooms.
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