Local woman meets her stalker, 1870s style
Parents, daily warned in news reports about the perils of
allowing their children free access to the Internet, are not facing
anything new. Stalking a hapless female via the written word was
alive and well, here in Gilroy, over a century and a quarter
ago.
Local woman meets her stalker, 1870s style
Parents, daily warned in news reports about the perils of allowing their children free access to the Internet, are not facing anything new. Stalking a hapless female via the written word was alive and well, here in Gilroy, over a century and a quarter ago.
Although the 22-year-old woman’s name was never made public, by the time her story made statewide headlines, folks in town seemed to know plenty about her. She was perceived, before then, as a quiet, modest girl. After an overly heated public imagination caught her nearly in flagrante delicto, the misadventure brought her to the gates of ruin.
The story held all the trappings of a hapless female role in a melodrama. The young lady had been orphaned at an early age. She was taken in by kindly neighbors who raised her, and later brought her with them when they moved to Gilroy. To support herself, she took in sewing and was apparently well liked by her many customers.
In May 1873, through a vague series of events, some acquaintances introduced her, via the U.S. Mail, to a gentleman living in Grass Valley. The correspondence continued for about three months, during which time the lady became convinced that her suitor friend was a man of some means. He was refined, attentive to her letters, and claimed to own a nice home, which he maintained with a comfortable income. Comfortable enough, he indicated, to keep a wife in style. At last, with little persuasion, she became engaged to him, still sight unseen, and in August that year, she decided to journey to Grass Valley to meet him.
Portents for a successful outcome were already clouded when, en route to her rendezvous, the lady’s stage was held up by highwaymen. After a thorough shakedown, and in an agitated state from being relieved of their funds, she and her fellow passengers were allowed to get back on board and continue on to Grass Valley.
The moment she alighted from the stage, still upset over the robbery, the young lady was met by her fiance, who propitiously had arranged to have the parson, and a group of friends, on hand for a hasty wedding. Before she had time to take a gander at her intended, much less wash her hands and arrange her hair, the woman found the vows pronounced, a ring on her finger, and congratulations bestowed.
The newlyweds retired to their room. There, instead of the comfortably appointed furnishings she’d been led to expect, the sudden bride found she was to spend her wedding night in a filthy room on disheveled, squalid sheets, so vile they appeared not to have been laundered in a year.
It was then, alone with her new husband, she finally got a good look at him. Her intended of the flowery correspondence and charming phrases was not the man of dreams. Instead, he was a slovenly creature, of neither education nor refinement. Definitely not husband material for a nice girl. Even the suit he wore at the wedding, she discovered, was a borrowed one. And the lovely written missives she’d been receiving for three months? All penned by someone else. Indeed, the very room in the house she had suddenly found herself in was not his: it was merely a rented hovel. For support, the man could offer but a pittance, from the daily wages he earned working in the mines. The bulk of his income went to support an ex-wife and a passel of kids.
After learning the dirty details, especially before she’d even changed into her nightgown, the bride freaked out. At dawn, she was waiting at the stage stop, still clad in the previous day’s traveling clothes. When she got back to Gilroy, exhausted and never feeling more alone and abandoned, she quickly headed for Mrs. Eigleberry’s house, where she rented an isolated upstairs room and retreated behind closed doors. For two weeks, in shame and solitude, she remained in seclusion.
Meantime, in town, wagging tongues went to work. Scandal mongers, gossip vultures, even folks who had never met her, spread word of her humiliating Grass Valley calamity.
Not having seen her for several days, a concerned Mrs. Eigleberry went upstairs to the girl’s room and cautiously knocked on the door. When no one answered, she turned the knob. As soon as the door opened, the strong and choking odor of fumes wafted out. There, on the bed, lay the girl, a chloroform-soaked handkerchief covering her face, breathing her last. Hurriedly, Dr. Munson was called, then Dr. Morey. The physicians set to work on the girl, trying to bring life back into her pale form. Mr. Eigleberry was so upset at the incident, he nearly collapsed at the scene, and required medical treatment as well.
Little by little, the girl was brought around and her life was restored. But the news of her humiliating elopement escapade, and subsequent suicide attempt, did not go away quietly. After word quickly spread across the state, the Nevada newspapers made hay out of the escapade. In Gilroy, the local editor used the incident as a morality lesson for both parents and their charges. Given the current furor over teens and their Myspace.com access, the editor’s words are just as applicable today.
“The custom now so prevalent among young ladies and even mere girls, to open correspondence with entire strangers whom they have never seen, or at best have slight acquaintance with, is getting to be deprecated.”
It just goes to show, then and now, that a girl can’t be too careful.
