A Church Scandal Erupts in a Seattle Libel Trial

Judge Humes' courtroom was taxed to its utmost yesterday to hold the men and women drawn there by morbid curiosity and an appetite for the salacious. The attraction was the trial of M. H. Nichols on the charge of criminally libeling Presiding Elder Rev. T. B. Ford of the Methodist Episcopal Church. The state opened its case, and the defense, through Winsor, made its opening argument, setting forth what it proposed to prove in support of the allegations in Nichols' circular. The defense occupied the entire day with witnesses, beginning at 9:30 in the morning and, except for a lunch recess, not stopping until 6:15, when Judge Humes adjourned until 9:30 this morning.

The evidence was more voluminous than practical. The expected sensation in the testimony of Rev. D. W. Calfee of California failed to materialize; his testimony turned out to be hearsay. The animus behind his feelings against Dr. Ford came out in a cross-examination lasting two hours. It was shown to be a brooding over the loss of $50, which he claimed to have been defrauded of by the Arkansas conference and which Ford could have prevented. Calfee said he had been entitled to $100 for the year's work, but was allowed only $70, making him short $30, which he needed badly to complete his studies. The reverend gentleman harped on this a number of times and grew much excited whenever he did so. As a rule he was deliberate in making replies, but created no small amount of merriment when, closely pressed by Mr. Ronald, he said that the stalwart Democrat's stentorian voice annoyed him exceedingly.

Nichols, the defendant, was put on the stand at 4 o'clock, and his cross-examination was not concluded when court adjourned. He utterly failed to substantiate any of his allegations, which he admitted were all hearsay. Of his own knowledge he knew nothing.

R. A. Ford, brother of Dr. T. B. Ford, was the first witness in the morning. He lived on a farm with his father in Arkansas and was an assistant to the preacher at the North Fork circuit in 1872. During that time he received apportionments of church money from Elder Hammett. Finding he could not both attend the university and study for the ministry, he resigned at the end of the year. His brother, T. B. Ford, was a member of the cabinet of the church conference in 1872.

Rev. W. B. McMullen, Rev. S. Davis, and Rev. T. W. Butler, the last a Congregational minister at Everett, were put on the stand to show that Dr. T. B. Ford's administration as presiding elder warranted dissatisfaction and discord to such an extent that it created public talk. Judge Humes ruled them all out, holding that the evidence would be altogether out of place in the present case. He ruled the same when the defense attempted to introduce evidence showing that Dr. Ford would remove ministers for differing with him.

Rev. H. Allen, a Congregational minister formerly of the M. E. church in Seattle, related his grievances: when an M. E. preacher at Ballard, Dr. Ford withheld $50 coming to him from the missionary fund. On cross-examination he said he had not complained to the conference because Dr. Ford was too strong for him. He denied being a moral coward, but said that as the loss was personal he preferred to bear it rather than endanger his family's support and his peace of mind by a fight with Dr. Ford. He admitted signing receipts in full settlement of church money, but said he did so through policy, not moral cowardice.

Rev. D. W. Calfee was next called, and his advent created a stir. He said he was a minister stationed in California. He entered the ministry at the age of 19 in Arkansas and had known Dr. Ford since earlier years. He knew J. R. Burke, who was reported to be Mrs. Ford's former husband. In 1869 the witness was the successor of T. B. Ford in Arkansas and was introduced to Burke by Ford. Burke came from Louisiana with a letter of recommendation, and they became well acquainted. The witness said it was understood that Dr. Ford was engaged to the Widow Ivey. The father of the Widow Ivey had a conversation with the witness and told him he was dissatisfied with the manner in which Dr. Ford had treated his daughter, and talked of preferring charges.

The witness was present at the marriage of Burke and Mrs. Ivey in Arkansas. He did not know why she was not married at her father's house. Burke had said that if they went with him to town he would get the witness a suit of clothes. The witness did not know at the time that they were to be married. Burke did not get the clothes, but got a bottle of whiskey, which Mrs. Ivey took and hid in the roadway. They were married by a justice of the peace. Mrs. Burke never told the witness, after Burke had left her, the cause of his leaving; she had told him that she had seen Burke sitting on the edge of the bed with a revolver pointed at his head.

Regarding the arrest of Hammett's character in Arkansas in 1875, the witness said: 'The long and short of it is that I didn't get the money, although I had earned it and it was justly due to me.' He stated that he told them to bring the matter before the conference, but that the president, shaking his fist under the witness's nose, had threatened that if he dared tell Hammett's character he would have him thrown out of the church. At the conference the appointment of a committee to investigate the accounts of Dr. Ford and Mr. Hammett was proposed, but as the witness was not a member of the conference it was never called together.

The attorneys had a long argument over the right of Calfee to testify to rumors concerning matters of which he had no personal knowledge. Judge Humes granted an exceptional amount of latitude to witnesses, at the same time cautioning the jury that they should not consider any evidence given as mere rumors.

On the reassembling of the court after noon at 2 o'clock, Mr. Calfee's testimony was resumed. In substance, he said: 'As the successor of T. B. Ford at the Ozark district, I heard of a scandal in circulation in regard to T. B. Ford and the smoke house interview. I communicated it to the father of the woman, now Mrs. Ford. Unfortunately, I communicated these rumors to the defendant in California.' Asked what the report was, the question was objected to and the objection sustained.

Every answer of Calfee's was given after long pauses that finally became annoying. After one of these waits, Ronald asked the witness why he hesitated so long in making his replies. Calfee said petulantly: 'My reason for so is that your voice is so loud that it annoys me. You talk as if you thought I was deaf.' This created a hearty laugh at Ronald's expense. He blushed somewhat and promised not to annoy the witness more than possible if he would answer more promptly and to the point.

Asked whether there was not a great deal of feeling between himself and Dr. Ford, Calfee said after long hesitancy: 'Not enough to do him any injustice.' He admitted talking many times with Mrs. Ford, then Mrs. Ivey, before her marriage to Burke. He said that after Burke told him what he did, he had spoken to her of Ford in uncomplimentary terms. He believed her to be a good, pure woman. He never advised her not to marry Burke, because he considered Burke a villain. He remembered the marriage between Burke and Mrs. Ivey. He was not authorized at that time to solemnize marriages. He did not know they were going to the justice of the peace, or he would not have gone with them. They were all together in a wagon, and they could have been married by another minister there.

At this point the witness, becoming nettled at the avalanche of questions and evidently scenting a trap, refused to answer except by saying: 'I don't remember.' He kept this up until Ronald assured him he wanted only facts. The witness then pulled out a card containing memoranda. Ronald asked for it. The card was Dr. E. G. Johnson's card. Calfee said he had been introduced to Dr. Johnson the other day and was asked to come to his office, but did not go. He had talked with him today, but not specially about the case. Ronald attempted to have the card admitted in evidence, but was overruled.

Calfee said the marriage of Burke and Mrs. Ivey occurred during the conference year. When pressed for more definite replies, he said he could not answer questions that had been buried for twenty years. Asked why he had not left them buried instead of resurrecting them six years ago, he said: 'That was a sad mistake, I admit.'

Relative to the smoke house incident, the witness hesitated. He said: 'This smoke house incident does not relate to any seduction, if I must tell it.' Asked what it did relate to, he said he did not want to tell it. Asked whether it reflected on Mrs. Ford's character, he did not answer, but after a long pause turned to Judge Humes and asked: 'Shall I tell it, judge?' 'Tell it,' was the peremptory order. After squirming in his chair and moving his stick from one hand to the other, he said: 'It was in this smoke house on Ford creek, near Ozark, where I understood that Ford and Mrs. Ivey were seen together.' Calfee then described the attitude of familiarity in which the couple were said to have been. As he did so, the gentleman said he blushed and hid his face in his hands. The statement created a stir and buzzing among the spectators, and the sheriff was called to make order.

Calfee said: 'I related this to her father and he said that they were engaged and might have been a little indiscreet. No one was present but the father and I. He was a good, indulgent man. I went to him as a friend. Nichols and I were talking about Ford's conduct in California six years ago, and it was then brought up. It came up in the course of our conversation.' He added that he did believe Mrs. Ford was a good pure woman. Asked whether he would swear that a woman is good, pure and true who was guilty of such conduct, he said: 'Rumors come and go and so it is.' The question was repeated and insisted on, but Judge Humes came to his relief.

On a further question relative to his connection with the marriage, Calfee became indignant and, raising his voice and stamping the platform with his cane, said vehemently: 'I swear that I did not know that that villain was going to marry her that day or I should not have gone with them to save my life.' He did not remember calling out the justice of the peace and asking him to marry the couple in the middle of the road. The first he knew of the contemplated marriage was when they got to Stetson's. When they were married he became a witness to the marriage, though he believed Burke was a villain. Within ten minutes after the marriage Burke came to him and told him to drive away 'the mob,' as he wanted to go to bed. The justice of the peace was a good man and a member of his church, and if he did not marry them somebody else would have done so. Calfee made her father's house his home. After the marriage he believed he went to the home of the Burkes. She still remained a member of his church.

The trouble about his losing the missionary money at a conference at Little Rock in 1872 was the next point. Ford, he said, was responsible for his losing this money, because he stood by and allowed him to be made the loser. The witness again became obdurate and again said that Mr. Ronald's voice annoyed him exceedingly. As Ronald piled him with pointed questions he became nettled and burst out: 'You must be crazy. I never said anything of the kind.' This brought a laugh from the audience. At a conference in 1875 Calfee had a committee appointed to investigate Dr. Ford's accounts. Asked whether Ford ever had any of his money, the witness squirmed to evade a square answer, but finally said: 'No, he never did, but I believe he could have saved me my $50, which I never got and which is still due.'

He saw Nichols in California at Pacific Grove and in talking over old times told him what he knew and what he had heard of Ford. Nichols asked him if he ever got his $50, and that opened the floodgate of his grievances against Ford, and he talked to Nichols freely. Considerable merriment was created by the witness occasionally calling Ronald 'Brother Shanklin,' and each time the veteran attorney and ex-mayor bowed his acknowledgment to the honor. Asked for the name of the person who told him about the interview in the smoke house, Calfee was staggered and after a long pause and an appealing but useless look at the judge answered: 'I cannot.'

On re-direct he said: 'After being told of the smoke house incident by several people, I did not specially look it up, except to communicate it to the father. The report originated with a little girl who claimed she saw it and told her mother.' The latter part of the reply was stricken out. Asked whether, in view of communications made to him, he considered Burke a better man than Ford, the objection was sustained, and the witness said in an audible stage whisper: 'Bless the Lord.'

N. Newton was put on the stand to impeach Dr. Ford's testimony at the examination, where it was alleged Ford said he married his wife as 'a girl' at her father's home. The term was objected to, as such a question had not been put to Dr. Ford at the preliminary examination. Ford was called and denied using such a term about his wife, who had already been twice married. Attorney Wiley introduced a certified copy of the plea of divorce of Mrs. Burke from her husband Burke, and certified copies of the certificates of the marriages of James R. Ivy to Mary C. Ivy, J. B. Burke and Millie C. Ivie, and T. B. Ford to Mary Ivy.

Nichols, the defendant, was the next witness. He had been on the Sound about four years in various parts of the state and had known Dr. Ford since 1872, first meeting him at the Seattle conference in 1873. Relative to the 'arrest' of Hammett's character, Nichols wanted to tell a long story and was checked by Winsor, who said: 'The trouble with you Methodist preachers is that you all want to preach a sermon.' Nichols then told the old story, already published, of his motion at the conference to arrest the character of Hammett for embezzling missionary moneys. He never learned that Ford was connected with these embezzlements until five years ago, when he heard it from 'Brother' Calfee at Pacific Grove. He explained a 'paper appointment' as the appointment of men to charges that have no possible future. He did not learn anything definitely about the misappropriation of missionary money; all his knowledge was hearsay. He knew of many paper appointments where missionary money had been appropriated in Dr. Ford's district. Such appropriations were detrimental to the missionary fund and to church work, and increased the revenue of the presiding elder, as it was the custom for him to have 5 per cent.

Nichols' object in publishing his charges against Dr. Ford was to bring about an investigation at the conference that took place shortly after. That was his only object when he handed Bishop Joyce a copy of the charges. The annual conference appointed a committee of five persons to investigate these and other rumors. Nichols was called before that committee, but it was a 'star chamber' investigation and he was never questioned as to the charges he made against Ford. On cross-examination he said he was not a church member now, having severed his connection shortly after coming here. He could not remember a conversation in Olympia with a Congregational minister named Dibbens about Ford's character. An effort was made by the defense to exclude this admission, which tended to show that Nichols had other motives than merely to have Ford's character investigated by the conference.

Nichols took the same charges to Dr. Johnson, who had been expelled from the First M. E. church. He put them in Johnson's hands in order to let him know what a man Ford was. Shortly after writing the charges he gave them to Dr. Johnson and authorized him to make use of the facts. He put them in Johnson's hands because he knew Johnson had a grievance against the church and Ford. He told of these charges to other people, including the wife of Rev. Mr. Ford of Ballard, all for the purpose of exposing Ford. At a Free Methodist camp meeting in Ballard he talked to people about the charges. He wanted to show the corruption of the Methodist Episcopal church through its 'episcopacy,' or administration of its board, which he said was 'made up of scoundrels.' As a rumor he stated that Ford had been drunk. He had a talk with Mrs. Campbell and Mr. Carr in South Seattle, to whom he said that this was only the beginning of a 'clean out of the conference.' He admitted communicating these charges to other people not members of the M. E. church. He did not know of his own knowledge the truth of any of the charges in his circular.

Attorney Ronald had difficulty confining Nichols to 'yes' and 'no' answers to direct questions about direct knowledge of each allegation. All his answers were 'I don't know of my own knowledge.' He could give no good reason why he had not brought the charges years earlier, but showed his animus to the Arkansas conference, which had appointed him to the 'meanest appointment in the states of Arkansas and Texas.' These appointments, he said, were made 'by the meanest conference in the world and by the bishop of the state.' Ronald showed that Nichols was a generally dissatisfied preacher who never remained in any one of the charges to which he was appointed. Nichols explained the changes on the ground that the places given him were too objectionable for a man of his standing to entertain. At 6:15 p.m. the court adjourned to 9:30 this morning, at which time Nichols' cross-examination will be resumed.