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Show I A CHILD OF TRAGEDY fl "h'h.e sins of the fattier shall be B ln kisited upon'the children." IGver B so bften there occus some tragic in- fl i cirient which seems, to bear out the B terrible Biblical threat. The .latest B H the death by starvation of Loraine B llollis, the daughter of the unfor- B tunjnte Laura D. Fair. who. killed B Alexander Crittenden, says the San B Fninelsco Town Talk. It almost H seems In such cases that blood guilti- B jieHS carries an hereditary curse; that H a talentless nemesis pursues the off- B pi in? of the murderer himself. This H is one of the mysteries ' ' life for B whit h even the theologian has an ln- H adequate explanation; one of the B ptnblems of heredity which no eugon- H 1st, may hope to solve. Was Loraine B I loll Is overwhelmed by hardships H whit h came to lur as they might come H to another, through sin or weakness HH or misfortune'' Or was rhe the prey HB of .4 destiny which wreaked itself H upon her for hor mother's crime? B Wlm shall say? Bj Loraine IIollls was a baby-In-arnis H -when her mother killed Judge Crlt- H tenden. It has even been said that H she was Judge Crittenden's daughter. H Luna D. Fair's inlimncy with Crit- , tenden had extended over a period of seven years when she killed him In IS 70. Laura D. Fair was beautiful, and ns a child Laura as she was then called gave promise of the loveliness which afterwords blossomed. blos-somed. After her acquittal Mrs. Fair supported her daughter as a lodging house keeper and later as a book agent. Her beauty attracted much attention, and she won the dangerous crown for pulchritude in a newspaper contest. She wont East to go on the stage but did not stay long. She came back to Ha-a Francisco and played at the old Bijou theater in Market street, appearing in "The Clemonceau Case" and other plays. Then she went on the road, and later v$Br ft member of Augustln Dnly's company. She had many ups and down, drifting drift-ing out of sight for long periods. She had not been heard of for years when she was found Uoad of starvation in an actors' boarding house in New York. The surname she bore told of the romance In her life. It was the name of the husband she married for pure love. He was a poor plumber plumb-er and Loraine Fair was as poor as he, but they married in spite of that. She diod a cruel death. Tho vengeance ven-geance wreaked upon her by a mysterious mys-terious fate can only oxcite our pity. The killing of Judge Crittenden by Laura D. Fair was a cause celobrae of early San Fianclsco. Few cases of the kind have excited so much interest. in-terest. The whole state was divided into camps, and feeling ran strong for and against the accused woman. Mark Twain and Charles Dudley Warner who sympathised with her in the (murder trial, put a version of it into "The Gilded Age" with the beautiful Laura, as: tho. harolnel Laura D. Fall was a native of M'aslssrppi, I find from Captain Duke's -notes in his ''Celebrated Crlm- jinal CfflBOS. of America." At the age J of sixteen she married a man named Stone who died ahout one yeiir aftor- iward. " She "then marrlod a 'Ttibmas a .Gracienrof"New Orleans,- but-a divoVce iwas obtamed-after six moihhsT In ,1869 she married Colonel W. B. Fair J who was at that time .SJxeciff of . bhasta county. Tjiey mo.ved to this city, and owing to trpjuble vi,th his lwle he committed. filicide in Decem;- 'bei;, 1S01. For a while , a-f t,r his, ' death aMr. Fair conducted the T,hoe House In Virginia City. During the. war her sympathies wore (wjtk the South to such an extent that she; took a shot at a (Northern soldlqr, Jut as .hey aim was very bad she. was never punished. On another occasion a t.:tht liuss House slfe shot a man who, she said, had m&de disparaging remark aliwut her, -but argaln she escaped. prosecution,- Mrs. ; Fair had some lability as a"gwaotrej apd apjpeft.red at the Metcoola-n. tliatr;in Stcm- mento as Lady Teazle in "The School for Standal.'.' -This w & in J8.03, and it was shortly afterwards that she met Judge Crittsnden. Alexander Crittenden was born in Lexington, Kentucky, In 18 1C. Andrew Jackson was a close friend of his family, and obtained the boy an apt-polntmenf apt-polntmenf to West Point. He graduated grad-uated with Genoral Sherm&n, bu,t only remained about one year in the army. At the age of twenty-two he married and went to Texas where he was admitted to. the bar. In 1862 he came to this city and associated himself him-self in the practice of law with S. M. Wilson. Crittenden and Wilson was one of tho most prominent law firms in tho city. J"udge Crittenden was in the habit of sending his wife and family East o pleasure- trips -at frequent intervals. inter-vals. During thoir absence he spent a great deal of time with Laura D. Fair. The family went East in September, Sep-tember, 1870. A month before Laura D. Fair had contracted a fourth marriage. mar-riage. She married Jesse Snyder, but a divorce followed In juot two months, shortly before the shooting. Judge Crittenden went across the bay on November 3, 1370, to meet his returning re-turning family. He mot them at the pier and they all started back together to-gether on tho El Cnpltan. The story goes that Laura D. Fall was so infatuated in-fatuated with Crlttended thnt she had exacted a promise from him that he would not kiss his wife when he met her. But he broke the promise on the pier. Mrs. Fair was shadowing him and saw the embrace. From the moment of the leunlon Parker Crittenden, Crit-tenden, the judge's son, noticed a woman dressed In black and heavily veiled who seemed to be watching their Actions v.ery closely.' When the family wore sealed on the boat she hurried toward them and suddenly whipping- out a pistol, shot Judge Crittenden In the chest. She was im-medjutoly im-medjutoly place-1 under arrest. She acted strangely and when a stimulant wns given to her In a glass of water she bit a piece out Of tho glass. Two "days later Crittenden died; his funeral-was One of the largest ever held In -this city. Liura D. Fair wns fourd guilty of murder.nod. sentenced to be hanged. But .she QbtBiped a new trial and thla time was acanitted - on . the plea of emQtloonJ insanity. t. suppose most pepple , Ulo.ught that Laura D. Fair was dead .until they read Iff the "papers thdC she had attampHedj' to lflil VerJielf'On the receipt re-ceipt of tho news of hor daughter's mlserablo end. She had dropped from sight for several years. In the old days after her acquittal she lived in Hayes Valley but afterwards moved to tho Mission district. Her face was n familiar one, and people used to point her out on tho streets. No doubt the desire to escape this irk- I some notice induced hor to make her I home across tho bay in Richmond. |