Robbins: The murder trial of actress Julia Morrison

Frank Leidenheimer

Chattanoogans saw many lively performances in the New Opera House at the corner of Sixth and Market streets. None matched what happened on the night of Sept. 22, 1899. Just before the curtain rose on the roadshow comedy, "Mr. Plaster of Paris," lead actress Julia Morrison shot and killed Frank Leiden, the stage manager/lead actor.

The New York Times reported that Miss Morrison and Mr. Leiden had been quarreling for some time over her alleged bad acting, and she threatened to leave the company. At rehearsal, Leiden, so she said, reprimanded her before the entire company for bad acting, whereupon she slapped his face. Just before the rise of the curtain, he made an insulting remark to her in a stage whisper. She ran to the wings for her revolver and returned to shoot him three times in the head. At first, the audience thought all this part of the play, but "the sight of blood caused a panic and there was wild excitement." The police retrieved a blue-steel .32 caliber Smith & Wesson revolver. Morrison was charged with murder, arraigned and taken to the county jail.

News accounts described how Mayor and Mrs. Edmund Watkins and a number of "prominent society ladies" called to express their sympathy and brighten Morrison's dingy cell with large bouquets of flowers as well as sweetmeats and notes of condolence. "The motherless girl, charged with murder, sobbing out her remorse and grief on the bosom of one of the best women of this city, and it called tears to the eyes of all bystanders, men and women."

The trial in January 1900 continued the spectacle. Stage manager W.J. Patterson testified that he heard the first two shots and turned to see Morrison fire the third. (According to The Chattanooga Times, she was "a large, robust and exceedingly handsome woman, weighing perhaps 180 pounds. She was a decided blonde, with heavy waving hair and large deep blue eyes." Before coming to Chattanooga, she had modeled cloaks for Levi Jeans in the New York City area.)

The actress testified that Leiden kicked her in the abdomen and slapped her at the rehearsal. Just before the performance, she sat in the ladies room vomiting when Leiden knocked on the door and entered. He said "Come sweetheart" and felt under her dress up to her knees. She pushed him out the door. He slapped her violently. The next thing she recalled was a policeman bending over her.

Most fellow actors disputed her version of the day's events and defended the 38-year-old Leiden, who was a 22-year veteran of show business. Morrison, they said, was an amateur and a constant source of trouble. They stated that her virtue was in no danger from Leiden, who made it a point to stay away from her. Her husband, Frederick Henry James, continually aggravated the situation by egging her to disobey stage direction and argue with Leiden.

The Chattanooga Times reported that Attorney Joe V. Williams made a splendid and forceful speech in defending Morrison:

"This sad trial has brought to my mind more vividly than I have even seen before the frailties and uncertainties of a human being. We have witnessed how thin is the thread that lies between joyless life and sleepless death; how in one moment a human heart can be attuned to the animated and brilliant surroundings of a stage of comedy and in the next lie pulseless in the tomb of tragedy.

"In pleading the defense of this unhappy woman I feel that I am not alone contending for her vindication but for a vindication of womanhood. Emotional insanity is generally caused by one who believes he is being persecuted. The defendant's early life, the fact that she was brought up by foster parents, that she was treated cruelly, and that this has a tendency to take from her the sunshine and gentle influences, so necessary for the proper development as a child."

Williams pleaded self-defense, temporary insanity and justification of the act. After less than five minutes' deliberation, the jury found Julia Morrison not guilty.

The Mobile Register earlier editorialized that "such a fuss" almost ensured her liberation "even though she is possibly a murderess." The Chattanooga News disclosed that Morrison "has shaken the dust of Chattanooga from her shoes" after the trial and gone with her husband on a lecture tour.

Frank "Mickey" Robbins, a grandson of Joe V. Williams, is an investment adviser with Patten and Patten. For more, visit the Public Library's Local History Department or chattahistoricalassoc.org.