The Hatchet-Wielding Cook Who Saved Her Pastor
An Episcopal clergyman’s tendency to deliver fiery lectures almost led to a bloody end until his cook intervened with a carving knife.
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.
One of the most kind, benign, benevolent and fatherly of the Episcopal clergymen in Washington has no idea of how near he came to death the other day. He is in the habit of making calls on his parishioners and giving them strong, old-fashioned lectures on their religious duties and backsliding. These lectures rise on occasions to the dignity of good round scoldings, in which he talks to the erring member like a Dutch uncle. His voice rises, and from without, a very wordy battle seems to be in progress.
There is one beautiful young lady, red-haired and charming, whose very minor sins of omission cut the good pastor to the quick. Calling on her recently, he gave her a lecture of unusual strength and vehemence, which she received with becoming meekness and contrition. A slight disturbance at the door leading into the dining room caused her to look up. There, with both eyes fixed on the unconscious lecturer, was Lucy, the new cook. In one hand she carried a hatchet, in the other a formidable carving knife. Catching the young lady's eye, she made frantic motions which seemed to indicate a desire for the young lady to run, and a most intense hostility and belligerent disposition toward the pastor.
The good man had finished, however, and took his departure without witnessing the forward manifestation. When the young lady's mother entered, Lucy was in the middle of the parlor, still brandishing her arsenal and declaming: 'How de Lawd you come in time, heerd dat ole rillin' goin' on an' jawin' at all our Bertha clar down in de kitchen. I knowed hit warn't right, an' I tuk de kyarrin' knife an' de hatchet an' sid right up to de parlor door. What right he got talkin' dat way to dat po' chile? None! An' I done made up my mine' ef he put his finger on dat ar little gal I jump right in dat room and split his d—n head open. 'Fore Gawd, I would!'
“I done made up my mine' ef he put his finger on dat ar little gal I jump right in dat room and split his d—n head open.”
While the domestic dynamics of 1889 were vastly different, the protective 'mama bear' energy remains a timeless fixture of human interest reporting. It serves as a stark reminder of the social power dynamics once wielded by clergy in the domestic sphere of early Seattle.
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