The Ghost Crime of the Head of the Bay
A man turned himself into the sheriff for a murder that happened only in his own whiskey-soaked mind.
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.
John Sturm, formerly a fireman in this city belonging to No. 1 Engine Company, who has been working in a brewery near the head of the bay for several months past, came into Seattle late Monday evening, went to the jail and inquired for Sheriff McGraw. The jailer told him that Mr. McGraw was downtown. Sturm found the officer and went on to tell him a long-winded story, the substance of which was that he had got into trouble with a woman near the head of the bay and had shot her twice, and had walked into town to give himself up. His story seemed very plausible, and after ordering him locked up, the sheriff took a team and drove hastily to the head of the bay. After making diligent inquiry, he found that Sturm had been on a protracted drunk, and the shooting of the woman existed only in the imagination of the inflamed and whiskey-maddened brain of the poor victim, who really believed that he had committed the terrible crime of murder. A reporter called on Sturm at the jail yesterday afternoon. The man appeared nervous and penitent. When asked what he was doing in jail he replied: 'I am here for my own good. While drunk I committed a terrible crime, and I came in and gave myself up.' The reporter assured him several times that he was mistaken—that he had not shot or killed any woman. 'Are you sure of that?' asked the great strong man, as the big tears rolled down his face. 'Yes, I am sure of it,' replied the reporter. 'Oh, I am so glad,' replied the trembling man; 'that relieves me of a very heavy load. When I get out of jail I will go to the mountains, to hide from the disgrace that this affair will bring upon me when it gets into the newspapers.'
“The shooting of the woman existed only in the imagination of the inflamed and whiskey-maddened brain of the poor victim.”
This story highlights the era's brutal intersection of alcoholism and the lack of mental health resources, where the only place to 'sleep it off' was the county jail. The man's genuine terror at the thought of the newspaper reporting his 'crime' reflects the social stigma attached to public drunkenness and violence in 1880s Seattle.
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