A Deadly Jealousy in South Seattle
After shooting a neighbor in a long-standing dispute, a woman’s husband argues that years of mental illness, not malice, drove her to violence.
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.
Mrs. Ella Allen, who shot Mrs. Laura Graham at South Seattle Monday evening, inflicting a wound from which the victim died, is believed by her husband, Robert Allen, to be insane. He states that for twenty years his wife has shown symptoms of insanity whenever she was worried about anything. He admits that Mrs. Allen has been violently jealous of Mrs. Graham for several years, but denies that any cause for the feeling existed. Mrs. Allen lies in a stupor at the county jail. She does not and perhaps cannot talk intelligibly to anybody. Her husband, Robert Allen, was found at his wife's house on Stewart street, and talked freely concerning his relations with Mrs. Allen. The two were married more than twenty years ago in Minnesota, but have lived in Seattle most of the time since 1885. Mr. Allen states that his wife's mind became affected shortly after the birth of the first child, and that she has intermittently shown signs of emotional insanity ever since. Regarding the shooting, Allen noted that the Grahams were neighbors in South Seattle. When Mr. Graham left, Mrs. Graham had a hard time. Allen continued to give her credit at his store, which provoked his wife's jealousy. Despite moving to Salem, Oregon to escape the tension, the couple returned to Seattle, where the conflict culminated in the shooting.
“My wife began to object to my giving Mrs. Graham so much credit. I told her that we could not see the woman starve.”
This case highlights the archaic 'insanity defense' and how marital disputes and access to credit/resources were frequently framed through the lens of 'jealousy' in the early 20th century. It also points to the lack of mental health resources at the time, leaving families to struggle with chronic crises in isolation.
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