The Girl on the Velvet Swing

by Simon Baatz

  But Evelyn was incredulous that Harry could be so nonchalant about his changed circumstances. The chief physician, Amos Baker, had greeted her at the main entrance, escorting her along the central corridor to a room adjacent to the observation ward, and everywhere she had observed the patients mumbling to themselves, one man furiously scratching himself, another waving his arms frantically to no purpose, a third standing motionless against a wall, a fourth, his face twisted in rage, mouthing silent curses. Other inmates shuffled aimlessly in their slippers, clutching protectively at their blue flannel gowns, casting suspicious looks in her direction, evidently unaccustomed to the sight of an attractive woman in their midst. Even the young patients, the men in their twenties, Evelyn thought, seemed forlorn, hopelessly lost to their afflictions, their vacant expressions signaling their mental deterioration.

  Amos Baker chatted politely with Daniel O’Reilly while Evelyn continued to talk with her husband; and then, as she turned away, indicating that she was ready to leave, Baker offered to show his visitors around the women’s wards. Most of the female patients suffered from dementia praecox, and the medical staff, Baker said with obvious pride, had succeeded in curing several women, enabling them to return to their families. Baker continued to talk as they made their way through the wards, occasionally pausing to exchange words with the nurses. He stopped before a heavy metal door and waited as an attendant searched for the key to the lock. “When we enter the next ward,” Baker warned, “keep directly behind me as we walk down the center of the room…. Don’t be frightened.”8

  They entered a long rectangular room, stepping onto a strip of carpet that ran from one end to the other. There was a stirring in the half light and Evelyn suddenly realized that several dozen women, some in blue flannel gowns, a few entirely naked, were chained to the floor on either side of the windowless room. An unpleasant odor hung in the air, and Evelyn could see that one or two women had soiled themselves. There was no furniture, no tables or chairs, nothing on which the women could sit or rest, and the gray, grubby walls were bare, without any decoration. An attendant led the way, walking along the strip of carpet toward a second metal door at the far end, and the women, awakened by their entrance, shuffled across the floor toward them, screaming and cursing, lunging at them, only to be held back by the chains. Soon the visitors passed safely through the second metal door.9

  It had been a terrifying experience, made more disquieting by the impression that the physician seemed to regard her obvious discomfort with amusement. It was an episode that reinforced Evelyn’s determination that Harry should be freed from the asylum as soon as possible. The lawyers were disinclined to act, counseling patience, but Evelyn was alarmed, fearing that the conditions of Harry’s incarceration would cause his mental deterioration. “What a terrible place!” she exclaimed to the reporters waiting at the asylum entrance. “I would be crazy myself if I stayed here for a week. I hope never to look again upon the sights that I saw to-day. All around my husband were grinning men, some of them counting their fingers, some of them murmuring endless tales to themselves. It is not right that he should be confined in such a place.”10

  Mary Thaw had not yet visited her son, but she too believed that it was unjust to compel Harry to live with the criminal lunatics at Matteawan. If the authorities would not release him, she remarked to reporters, they should either allow the family to pay for his care in a private sanatorium or transfer him to a state hospital with a more tolerant regimen. “I don’t care where he is sent,” she stated, “just so we are permitted to aid in his recovery. I only know that Matteawan means slow but certain death to my son.”11

  But the superintendent, Robert Lamb, had no intention of signing a certificate of recovery to allow Thaw to leave the asylum. Lamb, thirty-eight years old, had worked in the state asylums since his graduation from the Albany Medical College in 1891. It had been an opportune time for a young doctor who hoped to establish his career in the treatment of the criminal insane: the Matteawan State Hospital had opened in 1892 and a second asylum, the Dannemora State Hospital, had opened in 1900. Robert Lamb had first worked at Matteawan, initially as a junior physician, subsequently as the chief medical officer, leaving the asylum in 1900 for an appointment as the superintendent at Dannemora. It was a challenging assignment: the Dannemora asylum held those prisoners convicted of a felony, and the inmates, almost all of whom had committed violent crimes, were relentlessly disruptive, attacking the staff and attempting to escape. Lamb nevertheless proved to be an able administrator, managing an impossible task well, and in 1904 he returned to the Matteawan State Hospital to serve as superintendent there.12

  Lamb had established his reputation within the state asylums and had no wish to harm his career by allowing Harry Thaw his freedom. The newspapers would whip up a storm of protest against Thaw’s release; the public would believe that Thaw had cheated justice on account of his wealth; and condemnation would fall exclusively on the shoulders of that individual who had permitted Thaw his liberty.

  There would be the suspicion that the Thaw family had bribed Lamb to sign a certificate of recovery. It might never be proved that there had been a bribe; there might never be any evidence to support the accusation, and Lamb could claim that he had signed the certificate in good faith; but no one would believe him, and he, Lamb, could never prove that he had not accepted a bribe. There was, in short, no good reason why the superintendent would be so foolish as to allow Harry Thaw to leave the asylum.

  Lamb might refuse to sign a certificate of recovery, but according to Thaw’s attorneys, an application for a writ of habeas corpus, requiring the state to show the grounds for Thaw’s incarceration, was more likely to succeed. The New York newspapers would kick up a fuss, of course, but who would contest the writ? There was little likelihood, for instance, that any of Stanford White’s relatives or acquaintances would challenge an application for habeas corpus. Stanford White’s widow, Bessie, now lived abroad, only occasionally returning to the United States, and she could hardly be expected to return from Europe to oppose the petition.

  Dutchess County would oppose Thaw’s petition, challenging his release from the asylum; but Mary Thaw had already instructed her lawyers that she was willing to spend any amount necessary to secure her son’s freedom. She would underwrite the campaign with her money, even petitioning for successive writs until she had won Harry’s freedom. Would Dutchess County be willing to devote its limited resources to keeping Thaw in the asylum? Could the county sustain the expense of a prolonged legal battle, one that might last for years?

  The initiative to free Thaw began on April 20, when Joseph Morschauser, a judge on the Supreme Court of New York, allowed the request by Thaw’s lawyer, James Graham, to apply for a writ of habeas corpus. There was no basis, Graham claimed in his application, for Thaw’s continued detention at Matteawan. The jury in the second trial had acquitted Thaw because of his insanity at the time of the murder. But there had never been any inquiry into Thaw’s present mental condition, and the judge, Victor Dowling, had not considered any evidence that might have demonstrated that Thaw was now sane. “He stands before the court,” Graham declared, “an innocent man, with no charge against him and with no adjudication of insanity.”13

  It seemed quixotic to claim that Thaw had recovered his sanity. His attorneys during the second trial, less than three months before, had maintained that Thaw had been mentally unbalanced since infancy, and it appeared far-fetched to assert that he had already recovered. Nevertheless, the judge issued the writ of habeas corpus, saying that he would hold a hearing in Poughkeepsie the following month.

  Most observers predicted that the hearing would last several weeks. Francis Garvan, the assistant district attorney, expected it to last at least a month, perhaps longer, and claimed that it would be ruinous for the taxpayers of Dutchess County. The expense of a hearing would likely amount to $30,000, and other asylum inmates, moreover, might follow the precedent set by Thaw in demanding a writ of h
abeas corpus. The county would soon be forced into bankruptcy as a consequence. “How would the people of this county like it,” Garvan inquired, “if under this new precedent every one of them insisted on a hearing here?”14

  The hearing opened on May 14 but, remarkably, lasted only four days. Thaw’s attorney, James Graham, had too little acquaintance with the details of the case, and he came ill-prepared. Travers Jerome had the advantage of long experience with Harry Thaw, and Jerome, moreover, could present one witness whose testimony seemed incontrovertible. Amos Baker, the chief medical officer at Matteawan, had observed Thaw since his arrival at the asylum, often talking with him about the murder of Stanford White. Thaw’s behavior, according to Baker, had been consistently eccentric. On one occasion he had ordered two hundred chocolate éclairs from a local bakery, saying that he had bought them for the hospital attendants, and on another occasion Thaw had announced his intention to decorate the wards with Easter lilies. He frequently violated the regulations, smoking cigars on the ward, refusing to permit the physicians to examine him, and demanding that the staff allow him to drink whiskey with his meals.

  “Did you,” Jerome asked, “regard his conduct, appearance and language as abnormal?”

  “I did,” Baker replied.

  “Is it in your experience that lunatics often show a subtle cunning?”

  “It is.”

  “Do you regard him as insane at this time?”

  “I do.”

  “Do you think he has a form of insanity which would make him dangerous and a menace if released?”

  “I certainly do,” Baker answered.

  Later that month Morschauser dismissed the writ of habeas corpus, ruling that Thaw would remain in the asylum. “I am satisfied,” the judge declared, “that the mental condition of Harry K. Thaw has not changed…. The safety of the public is better insured by his remaining in custody and under observation until he has recovered or until such time as it has been reasonably certain that there is no danger of a recurrent attack…. I find that he is now insane, and that it is so manifest as to make it unsafe for him to be at large.”15

  Mary Thaw had failed to anticipate that Morschauser would deny the writ, and she now realized, for the first time, that the struggle to free Harry might not end quickly. There would be a second attempt, of course, but it could not be done in haste. Her lawyers would need time to prepare.

  She had never reconciled herself to her son’s marriage to Evelyn Nesbit, and now she began to prepare the groundwork for their divorce. She had always believed her daughter-in-law to be the cause of Harry’s troubles. Evelyn had entrapped her son, gradually casting a spell over him, luring him to his doom. Harry would have had no reason, other than his infatuation with Evelyn, to kill Stanford White, and there would have been no scandal if he had never met her.

  It mattered not at all to Mary Thaw that Evelyn had testified on her son’s behalf in 1907, and again in 1908, and that she had thereby saved Harry from the electric chair. It mattered not one jot that Evelyn had sacrificed her reputation for Harry’s sake, telling the world about her scandalous liaison with a married man three times her age. Mary Thaw regarded Evelyn Nesbit as no better than a strumpet who had played her part on the Broadway stage, and she now bitterly regretted that she had ever allowed her son to marry a cocotte.

  She had tolerated her daughter-in-law these past eighteen months solely because Evelyn had been so willing to testify in Harry’s defense; but Evelyn’s testimony was no longer needed. It was now necessary only for the psychiatrists to demonstrate that he had recovered his sanity, and it would serve no purpose for Evelyn to tell her story again.

  Private detectives had shadowed Evelyn for several months, surreptitiously watching her, taking notes on her acquaintances, sending weekly reports to Mary Thaw on her movements. In 1907 Evelyn had moved, at Harry’s expense, from the Hotel Lorraine to a house on Park Avenue between Fifty-sixth and Fifty-seventh Streets, and detectives watched the entrance night and day, secretly recording her visitors.

  There was little to report, but Mary Thaw felt nevertheless that she had sufficient information to provide Harry with a dossier listing those occasions when her detectives had seen Evelyn with a male companion. The New York newspapers, breathlessly reporting Evelyn’s movements about town, also played their part in stirring Harry’s jealousy into a frenzy; and soon the breach between Harry and his wife had become irreparable.16

  Attorneys for the Thaw family were quick to propose a settlement: Evelyn would file for an annulment of the marriage, telling the newspapers that she alone was responsible for the initiative. She would receive an immediate payment of $15,000 in cash and an annual payment for life of $12,000. She would agree to abandon any other claims on Harry for support, and she would make no request for alimony.

  It was a happy end to an unpleasant situation—but Evelyn soon learned that her adversary had attempted to deceive her. She had received three checks from Mary Thaw, each for $5,000, drawn on the Union National Bank of Pittsburgh, but the bank had refused payment, saying that there were insufficient funds in the account. It had all been a despicable trick, and Evelyn withdrew her lawsuit on May 26, telling the court that she no longer wished to have the marriage annulled.17

  From time to time Harry sent her small amounts of money, fifty dollars one week, seventy-five the next, but she knew that his generosity might end peremptorily, without any warning. His payments on the rent for the Park Avenue house stopped that summer, and Evelyn moved to a studio apartment at 31 West Thirty-third Street, behind the Waldorf Hotel. She lived a bohemian existence, seeing friends from her Broadway days, taking the occasional literature course at Columbia University, going to Pittsburgh once a year to visit her mother; but she made no plans for the future, not even attempting her return to the stage.18

  Harry Thaw renewed his application for a writ of habeas corpus in 1909, but his second attempt seemed no more likely to succeed than the first. Isaac Mills, a judge on the Supreme Court for the Ninth Judicial District, granted the application, scheduling the hearing to begin on July 13 in White Plains, a village in Westchester County, just north of New York City. The attorneys for the state, having heard of the rift between Evelyn and her husband’s family, issued a subpoena for her appearance, but she proved a reluctant witness.

  Evelyn, wearing a blue serge jacket and holding a gold mesh pocketbook, appeared in court on the first day of the hearing. She seemed relaxed, almost languid, as if she had become accustomed to testifying under oath; but her outward appearance masked an inner turmoil. She was alone, without any allies, without even any legal counsel who could give her advice. Her mother-in-law, Mary Thaw, seated directly behind the attorneys, was indignant that Evelyn should testify against her son, and her face was tense with rage and anger. Harry’s sisters, Alice and Margaret, sat next to their mother, their distress written in their expressions, their hostility toward Evelyn evident in every glance. Harry alone seemed to bear her no ill will, and he regarded his wife almost dispassionately, as if her testimony could have no effect on his campaign to win his freedom.19

  The deputy attorney general, Roger Clarke, stepped to the front of the courtroom, standing directly before the witness. Clarke had heard rumors that Harry Thaw had threatened his wife, but he knew nothing more substantial, and he had had no opportunity to talk beforehand with Evelyn Nesbit about her testimony.

  “Your full name?” Clarke asked.

  “Evelyn Nesbit Thaw.”

  “You are the wife of Harry K. Thaw?”

  “I am.”

  “You recall Mr. Thaw’s commitment to Matteawan?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did you go there and see him?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you recall an occasion when you went there some months ago with Mr. Daniel O’Reilly?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did Harry K. Thaw on that occasion say anything to you in the nature of a threat to kill you, Mrs. Thaw?”

  �
�I don’t wish to answer—I don’t want to answer.”

  Clarke turned to address the judge. There was no reason, he said, why the witness should refuse to answer his questions. She had not claimed that her answers would incriminate her. There was a subpoena compelling her to testify, and she would otherwise be in contempt of court.

  “Your Honor,” Clarke stated, “as Mrs. Thaw does not claim any privilege, I must ask that she be instructed to answer.”

  “Unless you claim a privilege, madam,” warned Mills, “it is your duty to answer.”20

  “When you visited Mr. Harry K. Thaw shortly after his commitment to the Matteawan State Hospital,” Clarke continued, “did you hear Harry Thaw say ‘When I get out of here I shall have to kill you?’”

  Evelyn turned pleadingly to the judge. “Now I’ve got to answer that question?” she asked. She could not, she would not, testify against her husband. She knew too well his vindictive nature; she knew too well that he would harbor a grudge against her, and she was fearful of the consequences if she should be the cause of his continued imprisonment in the Matteawan asylum.

  “You must answer it, madam,” Mills insisted.

  “But Your Honor, you see I am here under a subpoena from the State. I came here against my will.” Evelyn spoke frantically, her words coming in rapid bursts as if the urgency of her speech might force the judge to acknowledge her dilemma. “I’m frightened and terribly afraid of him. If I answer I’ll earn Thaw’s everlasting enmity and hatred…. He will refuse to support me any more and I can’t live without anything. And besides, I’m still married to him.”

  “I appreciate your position thoroughly,” Mills answered. He spoke with a gentleness that reflected the sympathy he felt for her. “It is a very distressing situation, but I don’t see what I can do. What you have said makes no difference in the eye of the law, and you must answer.”