The Disturbing & Chilling Case of Laura Fair

Brief Case

The case that cuased so much media interest in 1870's USA  Brief Case is a True Crime Channel focusing on old or lost cases that have been forgotten to history. If you have any recommendations for future cases that you would like to bring to light, feel free to reach out to me to: briefcaseuk@gmail.com  Music by CO.AG Music - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VwZB4l43iTw&t=105s Music by Myuu -https://www.youtube.com/user/myuuji Music by Kevin Macleod - https://incompetech.com  #LauraFair #TrueCrime #BriefCase  Sources:- http://www.crimemagazine.com/laura-fair-woman-scorned https://www.sfexaminer.com/news/fury-of-a-woman-scorned/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laura_Fair http://www.murderbygaslight.com/2013/04/the-woman-in-black.html https://repository.library.georgetown.edu/handle/10822/1051402

Transcript

00:07Laura Hunt was born on the 22nd of June 1837 in the small town of Holly Springs in Mississippi.

00:17Her family moved around a lot as Laura's father did not have a steady job and would travel to

00:23wherever he could find work. Eventually they ended up in New Orleans. She was a very pretty girl,

00:29with a charming nature and in 1853 when she was 16 years old she married a gentleman named William

00:37Stone who worked as an alcohol dealer. He was 20 years older than Laura but a year later in 1854

00:45he died leaving Laura a 17 year old widow. Following her husband's death Laura enrolled in a school to

00:54train to become a teacher. Before she finished her studies she married again, this time to a man

01:01named Thomas Grayson. However he proved to be a poor choice of husband. He would often drink and was

01:08sometimes violent. Within six months of getting married Laura had had enough and started divorce

01:15proceedings. Along with her mother she left Mississippi and set up home in California,

01:21settling in San Francisco. They stayed there for a short time before moving on to Shasta where

01:28Laura met the county sheriff named William Fair. Again he was significantly older than her but he was

01:35a very respectable and charming gentleman who worked as an attorney. They married and Laura gave birth to a

01:42daughter who they named Lillian Lorraine. William decided it would be better for his wife and child

01:48if they all lived in San Francisco. They moved to the city but life there was not quite as easy

01:55as he

01:55had imagined. He found it hard to establish his practice. His income diminished and it became increasingly

02:02more difficult to provide for his family. William Fair committed suicide in December 1861.

02:09Laura was now 24 years old and had been married three times, twice widowed and once divorced.

02:17William did not leave a fortune in his will but with the money she inherited she moved to Sacramento

02:23where she purchased a boarding house which she planned to run with the assistance of her mother.

02:29Unbeknown to Laura, Sacramento did not have many visitors at the time as the state government was in

02:35recess. She struggled to make any money and faced with large debts. She was left with little choice

02:42other than to find a job. She landed a role as an actress at the Maguire Opera House in San

02:48Francisco.

02:49She was by all accounts a very good actress but when the production finished she decided not to

02:56continue with her acting career and instead left California and headed to Nevada where she opened a

03:03boarding house in Virginia City. Her arrival coincided with a large discovery of silver ore located under

03:11the eastern slope of Mount Davidson close to Virginia City. This was the first major discovery of silver

03:18ore in the United States and sparked a silver rush of prospectors to the area all trying to stake their

03:24claims. As the mining camp started to grow the city became a bustling commercial center. Laura and her

03:32mother owned the 37 room Tahoe House Hotel. Business boomed and Laura with her youthful looks and elegant

03:40manner became a well-known and well-liked figure in the city. One of the many people who traveled to

03:47Virginia City to try and make some quick money was a 47 year old San Francisco lawyer and a former

03:54California state legislator named Alexander Crittenden. He was originally from Lexington in Kentucky

04:00and had graduated from the West Point Military Academy. He remained in the army for about a year before he

04:07left and started to work in the railroad business. He married and moved to Texas where he studied to

04:14become an attorney. Alexander was from a wealthy and well-connected family so he was soon admitted to the

04:21bar and then in 1852 he moved to California. Success seemed to come easily for him. He started his own

04:30law

04:30firm and was elected to the state legislature on which he served for four years eventually becoming

04:37the chairman of the judiciary committee. After he finished his political career he returned to San

04:43Francisco and carried on working in his law firm. But now with seven children and the thoughts of the

04:50large amounts of money that the silver mines were generating Alexander Crittenden decided that he would

04:56very much benefit financially if he went to Virginia City and set up his own law practice. He arrived in

05:041864 and rented a room at the very nice Tahoe House Hotel owned by Mrs Laura Fair. He was tall,

05:13handsome and

05:14articulate and the young free-spirited Laura paid him a lot of attention. Soon they started to spend evenings

05:22together and then nights. Other hotel residents would whisper that Alexander Crittenden was a very

05:29special guest and within a few months of first meeting Laura and Alexander would walk around the

05:36city streets together and declare that they were both very much in love. Laura had been married three

05:42times and was very keen that the new man in her life make her his wife. She pressured Alexander into

05:49marrying her constantly asking him when they would legally marry. At the time society drew a sharp

05:56distinction between married and unmarried women and Laura was keen that she preserved her good reputation.

06:03Alexander agreed to marry her but put off any wedding dates. He would tell her that he just had a

06:09few

06:09things to sort out first and try to buy himself a few more weeks before she would bring the subject

06:15up again.

06:15His practice started to prosper. He would travel back to California to visit his family but life suddenly

06:23changed when in early 1865 his wife named Clara insisted that she and the children join him in Nevada.

06:31Now he had a problem as his mistress and his wife were going to be living in the same city.

06:38This was not San Francisco with a population of 150,000 where it would have been easier to keep

06:45secrets from Clara. Virginia City was a lot smaller. The population was 25,000 and both he and Laura had

06:53become well-known residents and had never disguised their feelings for each other. He had no choice but

07:00to tell Laura that he was married and that his wife and children would be joining him in Virginia City.

07:06Laura was very upset by the revelation. She had wondered if Alexander had been entirely truthful with her

07:12but she had been so infatuated with him she took him at his word. He insisted that he wanted to

07:18be with

07:19her and promised to get a divorce. However, when Clara arrived he rented a nice house for all his family

07:27to live in and also kept his room at the hotel. When his wife questioned him as to why he

07:33needed to keep

07:34the room. He told her that it was very important to do so for business reasons. He would now spend

07:40his days with Laura and his evenings with his wife. He became very adept at moving between the hotel and

07:47the house and would tell both ladies exactly what they wanted to hear. He was reluctant to give up Laura

07:53and kept on promising to divorce his wife but he had young children, a successful company and a very good

08:00reputation. He was very well aware that abandoning his wife and children to become the fourth husband

08:06of Laura Fair would be very much frowned upon by the prominent social circle he operated in and would

08:13only have a detrimental effect on his business. For the next five years Alexander managed to keep his

08:20mistress and his wife apart. While Laura would keep on asking when he was going to divorce and marry her,

08:27it seemed that Clara Crittenden was unaware of her husband's infidelity. Alexander was a skilled

08:34attorney. He had many clients which included wealthy individuals and relatively large companies. As his

08:41Virginia City law firm had become established, he started to spend time working at his principal law

08:47practice back in San Francisco. During his time when he was traveling between both cities,

08:53rumors started to surface that he had a mistress. In an attempt to end all the speculation, he insisted

09:01that Laura Fair was nothing more than an acquaintance that he had known for a number of years, as she

09:08was

09:08the owner of the Tahoe House Hotel. It soon became very apparent that if Alexander wanted to operate a law

09:16practice in both Nevada and California, he would not be able to keep his wife and a mistress.

09:23Eventually, he gave in to Laura's demands and told her that he would divorce Clara. He said he would do

09:29this in Indiana, as the courts were more lenient there. He instructed her to travel to New York,

09:35where he would meet her so they could travel together to Indiana. As usual, Laura believed his every word

09:42and waited for him. But Alexander never arrived, and eventually Laura received a letter telling her

09:50that a financial issue had meant that he was unable to travel. She was incensed, but a few weeks later,

09:57he persuaded her to meet him in the beautiful and very fashionable town of White Sulfur Springs.

10:03Here they again announced their undying love for each other. The relationship continued. Laura moved

10:10back to San Francisco along with her mother and daughter. Alexander would visit her and still tell

10:16her that he would eventually divorce Clara. But by 1870, Laura had grown tired of his empty promises.

10:23The couple argued more frequently, and she wondered if she had wasted the last six years with a man who

10:30had

10:30deceived her. She was now 33 years old, and was still often approached by gentlemen, very keen to

10:37court her, one of whom was a very elegant man named Jesse Snyder. They had a brief relationship before he

10:45became her fourth husband. On learning that Laura had married, Alexander was distraught. He wrote her a

10:53string of letters, proclaiming his love. In one letter he wrote, I am wretched, insufferably,

11:01infinitely wretched. I have no heart or mind for anything. I can think of nothing but you. When he

11:08met her again, they agreed that they had to be together, and both promised to get a divorce. Laura's

11:15divorce was finalised on the 5th of October 1870, and now she was convinced that at last she would be

11:23with

11:23a man she loved. She sold some of her furniture, and prepared herself to move to Alexander's house.

11:30She was aware that his wife Clara and the children had been sent east, and she presumed that that was

11:36in order for her to come to terms with the divorce. But Alexander Crittedon was not going to divorce his

11:42wife. In fact, he had not even discussed any such thing with her, and when Laura learnt that Clara would

11:49soon be returning from her trip and her husband was going to meet her, she was enraged. She went to

11:55Kearney Street and asked a gunsmith to exchange of a Colt revolver she owned for a smaller and more

12:02modern four-barrel pistol, one that could easily be concealed in a lady's bag. She learned that Clara

12:10and the three children who had accompanied her on the trip would be returning on November 3rd,

12:15and arriving at the railway station in Oakland. When the day came, Laura dressed herself completely

12:23in black, including a veil to cover her face, and slipped the newly acquired pistol into her bag.

12:30She then took her boat to Oakland, where she patiently waited for the train to arrive.

12:35She noticed Alexander sitting nearby. If he saw her, he would have no idea of who this mysterious

12:43lady was. She did not look out of place, as at the time many women who had been recently widowed

12:49would wear black dresses, and a full-length black veil when out in public places.

12:56When the train pulled up at the station, Clara Crittedon and the three children disembarked,

13:01and Alexander walked towards them. Laura noticed that everything seemed normal. Clara took his arm,

13:09and they made their way to Oakland Pier, to board the ferry boat to take them back to San Francisco.

13:15Obscured behind her veil, Laura sat close by, and carefully observed the couple. Then suddenly,

13:23just as the boat was leaving the port, she walked over to Alexander. When he saw the strange veiled lady

13:30approach, he stood up. As she got closer, she took the pistol from her bag, and shot him once in

13:37the

13:37chest. Then, she calmly walked away. Alexander fell to the floor. The crew of the boat rushed to his aid.

13:46Another went to Laura, who was by now sitting down, and was quite still, and not making a sound.

13:52The crew member disarmed her, and when the boat arrived in San Francisco, Laura Fair was placed under

14:00arrest. She did not deny shooting the unarmed gentleman on the boat. She simply said that the

14:07man had ruined her life, and the life of her daughter, and she had intended to kill him. Alexander Crittedon

14:14was not in fact dead. He was taken to his home, where he lived for another 48 hours, before eventually

14:22succumbing to his injuries. On the day of his funeral, the federal, state and municipal courts adjourned,

14:29and it was at the time one of the largest funerals ever held in San Francisco.

14:34Laura Fair's trial began on March 27th, 1871, and proved to be a sensation. As the crime had been

14:44reported in all the newspapers, it had come to the attention of many prominent campaigners in the

14:50movement for women's rights, and they tried to make it more of a question about 19th century American

14:57society and morality, and less about the actual fact that Laura Fair had shot Alexander Crittedon.

15:06Laura's attorneys claimed that at the time of the incident, she was not in fact sane,

15:12and had suffered partial intellectual insanity and partial moral insanity.

15:17They eloquently described a charming, caring lady whose state of mind had been corrupted by years

15:24of emotional abuse from the victim. Laura herself told the court that she had no memory of what she

15:30had done. The prosecution painted a very different picture of a defendant. They said that she had no

15:37history of mental instability, and had meticulously planned her crime. She had purchased a new gun,

15:43gone to the train station, followed her victim onto the boat, and shot him. It was a crime that was

15:50obviously planned by a very logically thinking person. Other witnesses said that Laura pursued

15:56men of a certain financial and social status, and that money was the motivator behind all the men she

16:02courted. One witness described her as a loose woman, while Clara Crittedon innocently informed the court

16:09that she was a selfless loving wife, and Laura Fair was a calculating and manipulative woman who for

16:18years had tried to persuade her husband to leave her and break up their family. When the trial ended,

16:25the jury retired to deliberate. It was thought that this may take some time, as the trial had been going

16:31on for nearly a month, but in fact the jury returned in less than an hour, and delivered the verdict

16:37of

16:38guilty. Laura was sentenced to be hanged on July 28th. There was a mixed reaction in San Francisco,

16:46but the majority of people thought the verdict was just. The defence lodged an appeal, and while it was

16:53being considered, Laura's execution date was suspended. Eventually the verdict was overturned on technicalities.

17:01and a new trial was ordered, which commenced in September 1872. Laura attended court every day,

17:09dressed entirely in black, and wore a black veil. When the trial ended, she was found not guilty,

17:18due to temporary insanity. The verdict caused a sensation in San Francisco. Most people seem to think

17:26that even if Laura didn't hang for her crime, she should at least serve a relatively long time in

17:32prison. There were those, however, who thought the verdict was just, and that Laura's mind had been

17:39so unfairly corrupted by a man who had acted very dishonorably towards her. Now a free woman, Laura

17:46continued to live in San Francisco, and as time passed, she became a far less prominent figure,

17:53and could walk into the city without being noticed. She died on the 19th of October, 1919, aged 82.

18:04Hello everyone, some of you may have noticed that today's video didn't have an introduction,

18:11or the boom sound, when going from different parts of the story, such as when transitioning from the

18:17background to the crime. I get lots of comments on the boom sound. Some say they really like it,

18:25but other people say they consider it unnecessary. Any comments you may have on the format of today's

18:32video, or whether you'd like me to bring back the boom, really would be appreciated. Thank you so much

18:38for listening, and I hope to see you in the next Brief Case.

18:457.

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