The Strange Confession of Henry Lattimore
After the murder of C. Grant in a Tacoma boarding house, a 19-year-old drifter with a 'straightforward' story was captured by rail workers and police.
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.
Henry Lattimore, the young man who murdered C. Grant in the Franklin House at Tacoma last Friday morning, was captured on the Northern Pacific train coming toward Portland and turned over to the sheriff of Cowlitz County upon arrival at Kalama. When the train stopped at a small station near Tacoma, a strange young man got aboard. His manner was so peculiar that the brakemen suspected something was wrong. When the train reached Tenino, the brakeman turned the back of the man's seat over so they could see him at all times. A brakeman struck up a conversation, and the young man turned the talk to the Tacoma murder, saying that if the police couldn't find money on him, they couldn't prove anything. The conductor was notified, and they matched him to the description provided by the Tacoma police. At Kalama, the sheriff arrested him. Lattimore claimed he killed Grant in self-defense, alleging that Grant had insisted he accompany him to a house of ill fame and that Grant struck him first. Lattimore is a young man, apparently about 19 years old, who tells his story in a straightforward manner. He is about 5 feet tall, weighs 115 pounds, and is very delicate.
“If they don't find any money on him when he is caught they can't prove anything on him.”
Boarding house murders were common in the transient, early days of Tacoma, often revolving around the tense social dynamics of 'tenderloin' districts. Today, the headlines have shifted from boarding house violence to the structural crises of the housing market, yet the vulnerability of the young and unhoused remains a haunting constant in the city's narrative.
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