A Cook's Desperate Pursuit—and a Wife Who Wanted Out
Louis Pesardi followed his estranged wife from Seattle to Port Townsend, then shot himself when she refused to return—a domestic tragedy reported as a love story.
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.
PORT TOWNSEND, Aug. 31. — [Special.] — Louis Pesardi, a French cook lately employed at the Rainier Club and at the Grand hotel in Seattle, while laboring under a fit of temporary jealous despondency attempted suicide at 5 o'clock this afternoon in the Central hotel. Pesardi came down from Seattle last night in search of his wife. He found her today and she positively refused to live with him. He went up to room 17 in the Central hotel and fired a bullet through his left side. The wound is not necessarily fatal, although there is some danger of blood poisoning.
When seen by the Post-Intelligencer correspondent tonight he said he attempted to take his life because of an unconquerable passion of love for his wife. He said that he loved her better than his life, and that since she had refused to live with him he wanted to die.
Mrs. Pesardi came down from Seattle August 4, unaccompanied, and endeavored to secure employment. She said that her husband had repeatedly beaten and otherwise ill-treated her on numerous occasions and that she wanted to leave him and earn her own living. They had been living at No. 1,316 Fourth street, Seattle, with Mrs. Kuhle. On July 8, after being brutally treated, she came to Port Townsend. She denied that she left Seattle with another man, as alleged in a Seattle paper at the time.
Pesardi was employed at the Esmond house in Portland four years ago, when they were married. The couple went to Victoria, where they remained a year, and then went to Seattle.
Pesardi insisted that he would die, and all for his wife's sake. She was in attendance at his bed and administered acts of kindness to her husband tonight, who was loudly proclaiming his love for her. His life is in no immediate danger.
“He said that he loved her better than his life, and that since she had refused to live with him he wanted to die.”
This is a story of domestic violence and a woman trying to leave, told through the husband's self-pity. Today Washington has stronger protection orders and shelters, but the pattern—abuse, separation, and a lethal final attempt at control—remains recognizable.
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