Mindy Withrow

How White Male Privilege Dictated the Outcome of a Lesbian Murder Trial in 1892

It’s a typical story. Girl meets girl. Girl falls in love with girl. Girl slashes girl’s throat when she refuses to defy her family and run away with her—in the south, over a century ago. Okay, so it’s not so typical.

One of the most intriguing books I’ve read in the last year is Alexis Coe’s narrative true crime Alice + Freda Forever: A Murder in Memphis. Coe tells the story of the 1892 murder of 17-year-old Freda Ward by her one-time fiancee, 19-year-old Alice Mitchell. The two young women planned to leave Memphis in secret, with Alice posing as a man so they could marry. But when the relationship was discovered by their families, they were forbidden to see each other again. Freda eventually moved on to a male suitor, but Alice didn’t, and attacked her in public with her father’s stolen razor. Freda bled out right there on the street, and Alice was arrested and tried for murder.

Despite the sensational nature of the crime, it’s the trial itself, and what it reveals of late nineteenth-century social mores, that’s the most interesting part of the story.

Alice was clearly a killer. The attack occurred on a public street, in daylight, with plenty of witnesses. A working-class man almost certainly would have been hanged for it. But Alice was neither a man nor poor. And the same sex relationship proved another thing, the court argued: Alice was obviously insane. Why else would she take a woman to her bed? Had she killed a male lover, her crime might have been motivated by jealousy or anger. But her “sexual deviance” was just proof of her insanity.

And not hers alone. Alice’s “deviance” was traced back to her “hysterical” mother, who had clearly failed to raise her well. So Alice and, just as directly, her mother and Freda’s, were all on trial in the court of public opinion.

The maternal figures were treated with little regard, or worse: they were often depicted as teetering on the edge of insanity. Though their supposed instability was sometimes explained by the stress of the murder, more often than not, the women were portrayed as being plagued by long-term “hysterical” tendencies. Which is to say, the murder itself was tacitly blamed on the folly and feminine ineptitude of the women who should have been responsible.

(In case you’re wondering, yes, Alice had a father, and yes, he was present in her life and during the proceedings. But no, he obviously had nothing to do with how she turned out. Even though the women were inept, and the men knew they were inept, it was clearly the women’s fault. The prosecution rests, your honor.)

In light of the unusual nature of the case (victim, perpetrator, and witnesses all being female), the judge made an exception and allowed these “hysterical” women and their hysterical friends to attend the court proceedings. But here their behavior was a matter of constant scrutiny as well.

Judge DuBose himself took the lead on that front, constantly reminding the women, lest they forget, that their continued attendance in the courtroom was at his discretion, and he could easily have them removed. But behind these displays of white male authority was a distinct anxiety ABOUT white male authority; the press and the judge made a point of asserting their power precisely because they were unnerved by the prospect of women watching courtroom proceedings and drawing their own conclusions. Alternate domesticities, such as two women coupling and sharing a home—and even the general notion of females expressing passion—were considered inappropriate for the “fairer sex,” especially for ladies of the higher classes.

Coe does a great job of presenting the facts of the case while allowing the court transcripts and newspaper articles to demonstrate the dominant cultural injustices. One of the more fascinating asides in the book is the parallel Coe draws between public reactions to the Alice Mitchell trial and another major story of the time: the anti-lynching campaign of the African-American investigative journalist Ida B. Wells.

What do a white woman murderer and a black woman activist in Memphis have in common?

Both women undermined, challenged, and disregarded while male authority in very different ways—and the reactions they garnered, and the treatment they received, had far more to do with their respective races than the transgression itself. White men threatened to kill Wells for what she wrote, whereas no one wanted to see Alice, who actually committed murder, hanged for her crime.

So while Ida Wells was buying a pistol for self-protection, the all-male jury found Alice Mitchell insane and committed her to an asylum. (No, that’s not a spoiler. But you may be surprised by what happens later…)

Coe’s use of original source documents gives the story rich detail and anchors the narrative in authenticity. The clever illustrations—many of which are based on original court sketches and newspaper illustrations—alone make it worth picking up the book, as does the appendix of letters between Alice and Freda.

This is true crime at its freshest and most readable, revealing along the way how far we’ve come—and how far we have yet to go—toward true gender, sexual, and racial equality.

14. September 2015 by Mindy
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