On January 31, 1865, Adoniram Judson Burroughs, a clerk working in the U.S. Treasury building in Washington, D.C., was leaving for home with another co-worker when a woman stopped him. As witnesses later reported, Burroughs exited his office where the woman was waiting and spoke with her briefly. It was then that the woman, twenty-two-year-old Mary Harris, pulled out the gun she was carrying and shot Burroughs at close range. Realizing that he was dead, she then walked off in a perfectly business-like manner and did not attempt to resist when a watchman stopped her before she even exited the building. She was arrested and charged with a murder that same day.
When police asked Harris about her reason for shooting Burroughs, the story she told would soon propel her into one of the most sensational trials of the decade. In her statement to police, she said that she was born in Burlington, Iowa, and met Burroughs while working in a hat-making shop. She was only nine years old, and he was more than twice her age, but they soon fell in love. He provided her with money to continue her education, but he also taught her how to pass in high society to become the cultured wife he wanted.
When Mary turned thirteen, Burroughs asked her to go with him to start a new job in Chicago, but she declined. Instead, they began a seven-year correspondence during which Burroughs made repeated promises of marriage (no word on what Mary's immigrant parents likely thought of all this).
In 1863, when Mary was twenty years old, she decided that she was ready and moved to Chicago to be with Burroughs, though the promised wedding never materialized. Soon afterward, Burroughs announced that he had found a new job as a clerk in the U.S. Treasury Department, and he promptly moved to Washington, D.C . Again, Mary was left to wait, though she believed Burroughs' promise that he would send for her.
Not long after the move, Burroughs’ letters stopped. Also, around this time, Mary received two letters from someone who only gave his name as J.P. Greenwood. Though she had no idea who wrote the letters, they asked Harris to meet him at a house of assignation (an old name for brothel). When Mary showed the letters to her then-employer Louisa Devlin, Devlin concluded that Burroughs had written them as part of a bizarre scheme to blacken Mary's reputation and call off the wedding. Though she didn't want to believe that Burroughs would do this, she soon learned that he was engaged to another woman.
According to what Mary would later tell her doctors, the shock of this betrayal led her to develop severe mood swings and violent episodes of hysteria. She also bought a gun though she was unclear whether she planned to use it on Burroughs or herself. In January of the following year, Mary went to the railway station and purchased a ticket to Washington, D.C., apparently without even bothering to bring any luggage. Immediately after arriving in D.C., she went straight to the Treasury building to confront the man she thought she would marry. She reportedly shot Burroughs as soon as he confirmed that he was engaged to another woman.
While waiting for the case to come to trial, two prominent lawyers, Joseph Haversham Bradley and Daniel Voorhees, offered her defense services. While Mary had no money to pay them, they agreed to work pro bono on her behalf. Though there was no question about her shooting Burroughs, her lawyers had her plead not guilty because of temporary insanity. To build their case, the lawyers read many of Burroughs' letters to Mary in open court so the jury could hear about his declarations of affection and promises to marry her. They also read the letters from “J.P. Greenwood” along with presenting Louisa Devlin, who testified on Mary's behalf.
The lawyers also brought in different medical experts who testified for the defense, including Dr. Charles Nichols, Superintendent of Government Hospital and later president of the American Psychiatric Association. It was Dr. Nichols who testified that Mary had been insane at the time of the killing due to being "crossed in love" as well as suffering from "painful dysmenorrhea"(menstrual problems). Another doctor testifying on the role that Mary's "female troubles" played in her crime was Dr. Calvin Fitch. After confirming the dysmenorrhea diagnosis, Dr. Fitch added that "uterine irritability is one of the most frequent causes of insanity."
But the prosecution remained skeptical about Mary's presumed insanity. Not only did she have a clear motive for the killing, but she also demonstrated premeditation by purchasing the gun before meeting Burroughs. The prosecution also brought in their experts, including Frederick May, M.D., Past Chair of Surgery, Columbia College.
It was May who testified that Mary had shot Burroughs while she "labored under a deranged intellect, paroxysmally deranged, produced by moral causes." Also appearing for the prosecution was William P. Johnston, M.D., Professor of Obstetrics and Diseases of Woman and Children, Columbia College, who stated: "We consider an individual suffering from hysteria as irresponsible for any act which she might commit." While they questioned the dysmenorrhea diagnosis, the doctors did little to sway the jury, and it was hardly a surprise that the jury only needed five minutes to declare Mary not guilty.
Despite her acquittal, Mary Harris had to deal with the notoriety from the trial. Not only was she forced to travel under an assumed name as she returned to her hometown, but she also had to deal with rumors about her relationship with her defense lawyer Joseph Bradley (despite his being twice her age). Not only had she openly kissed Bradley after the verdict, but he carried her out of the courtroom since she was too overcome to walk on her own. One reporter wrote that Bradley would be in imminent danger of being shot himself if he refused to marry his client.
Whether due to the adverse publicity or the guilt of killing Burroughs, Mary soon returned to Washington and became an inmate at Saint Elizabeth's Hospital. She would remain for over twelve years. Though no records remain from her time in the hospital, the few newspaper stories covering her post-acquittal life suggest that she wasn't under any real constraint and was considered a low-risk inmate. She was even allowed to leave the hospital for months at a time, often visiting family or staying at nearby resorts. It likely helped that both of her lawyers were politically prominent and took a keen interest in her welfare.
Finally, Joseph Bradley, who had become a judge by that time, managed to secure Mary's release from the hospital. It probably came as a surprise to his friends and colleagues (not to mention the children from his first marriage) that Bradley married his former client not long after her release. Despite the age difference (he was eighty and she was forty) and Bradley’s poor health, the marriage was apparently a successful one, and they remained together until he died in 1887. Little seems to be known of what happened to Mary Harris Bradley after that.
So why was Mary Harris able to escape being convicted for Adoniram Judson Burrough's murder? For that matter, why was the plea of temporary insanity accepted by a jury who might have otherwise been justifiably suspicious of medical experts invoking terminology such as "painful dysmenorrhea"?
Though the insanity defense continues to be controversial even today, it was especially controversial during the late nineteenth century as courts tried to grapple with the M'Naghten decision in the U.K. and how it might apply in the American justice system. Though there were numerous cases in which the insanity defense was used, almost all of them involved male defendants who were more easily dealt with by the courts.
Given that Mary faced the death penalty for her crime, being a woman may have well worked in her favor, especially considering that the U.S. federal government had never executed a woman before (and the crime being committed in Washington, D.C. gave it federal jurisdiction).
Considering the reluctance of the court to hang Mary Harris, there is a certain irony that the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln took place while her case was still coming to trial. Soon afterward, Mary Suratt went on trial for her role in the assassination conspiracy. But there was no reprieve for her, and Surratt was hanged just days before Mary Harris' acquittal.
Perhaps Mary Suratt's lawyers should have gone with the dysmenorrhea defense...
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