Domestic Violence and the 'Whisky' Dispute
A woman seeks a warrant for her husband after he allegedly hit her with a rocking chair over money for alcohol.
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. Kinnigan, wife of Barney Kinnigan, a Yesler Avenue shoemaker, applied to Deputy Prosecuting Attorney Winstock yesterday for a warrant, charging her husband with assault and battery. She claims that on Sunday her son earned $1 and Mr. Kinnigan wanted it to spend for whisky. She objected, whereupon her lord and master hit her on the head with a rocking chair. Incidentally, she told Mr. Winstock that Kinnigan had squandered $400 in three years.
“She objected, whereupon her lord and master hit her on the head with a rocking chair.”
Violence against women in the home was often treated as a private matter or fodder for lurid local news reports in the 1890s. The struggle for domestic safety and economic autonomy remains a profound, ongoing civic challenge.
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