Murdering Holiness: The Trials of Franz Creffield and George Mitchell

We are used to hearing about religious cults led by one charismatic individual. Our times have no monopoly on such cults, of course; our nation's tradition of freedom of worship encourages them, and we look toward economic or societal means to subdue the most flagrant ones, since the law cannot touch them if they are merely worshipping in some sort of erroneous way. _Murdering Holiness: The Trials of Franz Creffield and George Mitchell_ (University of British Columbia Press) by Jim Phillips and Rosemary Gartner resurrects a forgotten case which is part of our nation's history of cults, religious freedom, vigilantism, and the insanity defense. Phillips and Gartner, professors in law and criminology at the University of Toronto, have produced a detailed and closely researched history of the incident, and an entertaining one as well.Franz Creffield was an itinerant preacher who arrived in Corvallis, Oregon, in 1902, and drew almost all its Salvation Army members into his "Army of Holiness," though they were also known as "Holy Rollers," the first time that pejorative was every applied. He taught that the world was about to end, that wealth was bad, and that he could perform sexual purification of female converts. This got him tarred and feathered and run out of town. He was imprisoned for two years for adultery, and after his release, he was in Seattle in May 1906 when George Mitchell, a young laborer from Corvallis, walked up behind him and shot him in the neck on a busy Seattle street. Mitchell was acting to avenge the seduction and deflowering of his sister Esther, although she would have denied such a thing had happened. A temporary insanity defense was mounted, but the newspapers and most legal authorities agreed that Mitchell had done the manly thing. Mitchell was acquitted, and his sister Esther and Creffield's widow started talking about getting revenge. Days after the acquittal, at an ostensible meeting to make peace, Esther shot and killed her brother George at the train depot; she was eventually to say that God had commanded the act. The second murder caused an even bigger sensation, but the press seemed to think that honor killings were what men should do for women, not vice versa. An insanity commission arranged for her to go to the asylum rather than the penitentiary, and she was released after some years to return to her family. She seemed happy, she married in April 1914, and she killed herself by poison in August. It is a strange end to a strange story. Creffield had pursued his religious vision with passion and sincerity; George Mitchell killed him, risking his own life on the scaffold because of what society thought was a virtuous defense of his sister; Esther Mitchell's faith was strong enough that she could kill even her brother. The authors have included many insights into religious, legal, social, and psychological history of the times in a fascinating and dispassionate case study.