The Man Accused of Starting the Great Seattle Fire Gets a New Trial—and Denies He Did It
J. W. Tollman, convicted of robbing a butcher, wins a new trial; he also confronts the old rumor that he knocked over the glue pot that burned Seattle in 1889.
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.
Judge Bellinger yesterday granted a new trial to J. W. Tollman, who was recently convicted of sandbagging and robbing Ferdinand Topferte, a butcher. The evidence of his guilt, in the opinion of Judge Bellinger, was too slight to warrant conviction, and he so expressed himself in granting a new trial.
The fact that J. W. Tollman worked at one time in the carpenter's shop where the conflagration of June 6, 1889, started gave rise to the story that Tollman was the man who tipped over the glue pot that started the fire. When seen last night at the county jail he said: 'No, I was not the man. Some of my tools and my bench were there, but I was at work on Bill Murphy's house on Lake Washington, near the foot of Jackson Street, and did not know what was going on until 6 o'clock that evening. Sometimes people who know that I had done work in the shop joked me about being the man who burned down Seattle. I believe that C. J. Stahl was in the shop when the fire started.'
According to a report of the fire printed June 7, the point of origin was in James McGough's paint shop, under Smith's boot and shoe store, at the corner of Front and Madison streets. When seen last evening McGough said: 'The fire did not start in my shop, but in the second basement, one story below my shop. I do not remember the name of the man who ran the carpenter's shop or the name of the man who tipped over the glue pot, but I am sure Tollman was not the man.'
“No, I was not the man. ... Sometimes people who know that I had done work in the shop joked me about being the man who burned down Seattle.”
The Great Seattle Fire of 1889 leveled the young city's commercial core and reshaped its future; for years afterward, rumors about its origin attached to ordinary workers. Tollman's new trial shows how a criminal case could become tangled with civic memory and a city's need for someone to blame.
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