A Tacoma Nurse Shot a Stenographer, Then Drank Carbolic Acid
Grant fired on Miss Thorp as she came home, fled to his sister’s house at 8320 South M Street, and died before the ambulance arrived. Miss Thorp was wounded in the shoulder.
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.
“We can die together.”
With the other hand he shoved a .32-caliber revolver in her face and fired twice. Neither shot struck her, but she was blinded and burned by the flash of the revolver. With a desperate wrench she freed herself from her assailant’s grasp and ran toward her home. As she ran, Grant fired again, the bullet striking Miss Thorp in the right shoulder and embedding itself there.
As Miss Thorp fell limply into the arms of her elder brother, Elmer, who had come to the door to call her to supper, Grant turned and fled to the home of his sister, Mrs. August Sjolander, 8320 South M St. The young man hurried upstairs, and, opening a four-ounce phial of carbolic acid, drank the entire contents.
Walking downstairs again, he explained to his sister that he had taken poison and that he would die from it. Almost before the words had been uttered, he sank to the floor.
The auto-ambulance was summoned, but Grant had expired before he could be taken to St. Joseph’s hospital. The remains were removed to the undertaking parlors of Buckley & King.
Grant was the son of Mr. and Mrs. August Grant, 1210 South 27th St., and was a graduate trained nurse. He has been engaged at St. Joseph’s hospital, the county hospital, and the Northern Pacific hospital. He has been idle for the past month.
Miss Thorp is employed as stenographer for the Tacoma Biscuit Candy company.
““We can die together.””
The clipping reads as a sudden crime of passion, but its addresses place it in a Tacoma neighborhood and its details—a trained nurse, a stenographer, a family doorstep—make the loss specific. Modern coverage of domestic and gender-based violence still struggles with the same question: when does a private tragedy become a public failure?
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