Love Letters and Lunacy Charges
A wealthy Eastern Washington rancher faces a lunacy trial sparked by a long-standing family feud involving forged love letters.
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.
The trial of R. B. Hately on a charge of lunacy treated the people of Whitman County to a breezy sensation. Hately is one of the wealthiest ranchers in Eastern Washington. The trial developed that a long-standing family quarrel was at the bottom of the charges. Hately's daughter married J. E. Kendall, who lived on Hately's farm; the father objected to the marriage and persisted in violent abuse of his son-in-law. Kendall eventually swore out a warrant for Hately's arrest. During the trial, evidence revealed that Hately and his wife had long accused each other of infidelity. They had devised a convoluted scheme to test one another by writing fake love letters to suspected paramours in Colorado. When the letters arrived, Hately grabbed his own, and his wife captured hers. The resulting fight over these letters—described as 'racy enough for Barnum’s dime museum'—led to the arrest. The court found Hately to be sane, and the couple reconciled in the courtroom, weeping and embracing before returning home.
“The letters were introduced in court and were racy enough for Barnum's dime museum.”
This bizarre legal dispute over 'racy' letters highlights the extreme lengths to which domestic conflict was publicly aired in the late 19th century. It serves as a reminder of how private family feuds often escalated into civil proceedings.
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