[INDEXED as:  “Parental Love That Laughs at Court Decree,” Anonymous, syndicated: Jun. 11, 1910, Evening Press (Sheboygen, Wi.)]

DECREE granted! It Is all over! They are parted by the law. No more unhappiness through living together, mismated! The whole affair is settled. Settled? No, for there are the children. The custody of the children! That must be decided and the court arranges it as he sees fit. But even then the matter is far from being settled. No court can banish mother-love or father-love! The little ones may be allotted to either parent, in accordance with the evidence, but that comes far from settling the question forever.

The woman may hear the decree of the court giving her wee ones to her former husband, and may leave the court room with a defiant smile. But in a little while the old love for her own comes over her, and then –

Then she must see them, must have them in her arms, must cuddle and caress them. The mother-love must be gratified at any cost. And in gratifying this love, many a mother does the most astounding things—goes through the most terrible ordeals. “Kidnaping” her own is often her only means of obtaining them, and she will resort to any method to accomplish this, according to a writer in the New York World.

There was Grace Matthews of Brooklyn, who had sued for separate maintenance and alimony. Pending trial of the case Mr. Matthews took the three little children to Heart Lake, Pa., believing he could keep them without their mother finding out where he had gone. But Mrs. Matthews was alert, and when the mother-love in her became so overpowering that she could resist it no longer, she sought to reclaim her babies. Mr. Matthews, however, though the court finally awarded them to Mrs. Matthews, would not surrender the children, and put them in school at Montrose. Pa. One day, in March, Mrs. Matthews went to Montrose, disguised in poor clothes. She engaged a room in the little hotel facing the school, and one morning saw her husband bring the children to the school and then drive away. At noon Mrs. Matthews went to the school, took her children out, and, carrying two of them who were too little to walk, she hurried across the fields to the nearer railroad station beyond the town.

Baffled Her Pursuers.

She caught a train and had to change at a station a few miles away. There she saw a man who had been despatched by her husband to head her off, but she eluded him and got on board the cars. Now she was aware that her husband was on her trail, and divined that he must have telegraphed ahead to have her stopped, so she left the train after a few stations and drove fifteen miles across country in a buggy. Reaching another railroad she took a train and doubled on her trail. Then she caught still another train and, at Sayres, Pa., took the trolley to Waverly, N Y. Then she rode on the Erie to Binghamton, and remained there two days. By this time Mrs. Matthews bad made a complete circle about Montrose, but, still fearing pursuit, she changed cars again when she arrived at Albany, to keep out of Pennsylvania, and came to New York on the New York Central. She had covered hundreds of miles, but the fact that she had recovered her three little children was sufficient compensation.

One day last fall there was almost a panic in an uptown vaudeville theater in New York city through a mother’s efforts to kidnap her own little girl. The young mother was Mrs. Seldner, and her child, Eleanor, was in the possession of her mother-in-law, Mrs. Tallman, pending trial of a suit for separation. Mrs. Seldner used often to go to see Eleanor, and this afternoon she went with Mrs. Tallman and the little girl to the vaudeville performance. Somehow the mother-craving seized hold of her. She must have the child to herself. During a “dark scene” she said to Mrs. Tallman:

“Eleanor is afraid of the dark. I will take her outside until the lights go up.”

Mrs. Tallman suspected nothing, and the mother and child went up the aisle. In a few minutes, however, Mrs. Tallman grew worried and went to look for her charge. The little girl and her mother were gone! Mrs. Tallman rushed out to the street, exclaiming loudly, and the audience hearing her, thought that something had happened. People rose and started for the doors, crying. The lights were turned up and the stage manager quieted the audience. Mrs. Tallman reached the sidewalk just in time to see Mrs. Seldner leap into a taxicab with the little girl. The mother-in-law called to a policeman to stop Mrs. Seldner, and a merry chase began. Down Broadway nearly to Fiftieth street the mounted policeman pursued the fleeing taxi, finally overtaking it. The mother was arrested, but after the magistrate heard her story he decided to let her go on the promise that she would not try to kidnap her baby again.

Determined to Have Child.

A mother’s love impelled Mrs. Frederick Story Forest, who had divorced her first husband, H. B. Nichols of New York, to carry out a most thrilling kidnapping. To Mr. Nichols had been awarded the custody of their daughter, Catherine, for nine of the twelve months In the year. The three months that Catherine was hers had satisfied the mother up to that time, but finally she felt that she must have her for all the time, and set about to get her.

The father, perhaps fearing this act on the mother’s part, had quietly removed the little girl from his New York home to Greenwich, Conn., and Mrs Forest could not find out where the hiding place was. But one day Mr. Nichols went to Greenwich to bring the little girl to New York for medical treatment, and his former wife followed him.

Hand in hand, the father and daughter came to the railroad station at Greenwich, when Mrs. Forest, who had been lying In wait, sprang forward and tore the child from her father’s arms. She carried the girl out of the station, pursued by the father, and rushed up to a boy who sat In a buggy, Mrs. Forest ordered him out of his own carriage, climbed in with the shrieking girl and dashed away. A mile away she entered a livery stable and hired a team to take her over the state line. As she started off she turned to see herself pursued by an automobile in which sat Sheriff Retch. But the motorcar broke down, and Mrs. Forest got over the line into New York state without being apprehended. The telephone, however, was faster than her horse, and in Port Chester she was arrested and taken before a Justice, charged with kidnapping. The judge, however, released her, and she left town on a trolley car, with the girl still in her possession, just as Mr. Nichols and his friends arrived in a motor car. New York was reached, and Mrs. Forest went to a hotel, where she was found, despite her efforts to preserve an incognito, by her husband. Fearing this, she disappeared, and for a while all truce was lost. Then she was found at a summer resort, and matters were afterward patched up legally.

Maternal Love Dared All.

The strength of parental love was never more clearly shown than in the case of Mr. and Mrs. Forest Clark and their son Carlton, which has been in the papers so many times in the past two or three years, In 1905 Forest Clark was divorced in New York, and the custody of the little boy, then three years old, was awarded to him. The father had the boy adopted by a Dr. and Mrs. Creamer, and thought this would end it. But his former wife almost immediately began to seek possession of the baby. She came to New York from Boston and stole the boy while he was playing in the park. She was caught and brought back. At this time the lawyers declared that Mrs. Creamer, the boy’s foster-mother, was in league with Mrs. Clark to kidnap Carlton, but the case was dropped and the boy sent back to his foster-parents. Then, one time after another, by the shrewdest of methods, Mrs. Clark obtained possession of the little fellow. Playing in the street, sitting on the doorstep, it made no difference where he was, or how carefully he was watched, somehow she would get him, and then would ensue a chase to bring him back to New York. Private detectives were employed by the Creamers on at least one occasion to get the boy back, and the matter of his final possession has never been satisfactorily settled yet.

The Phipps Kidnaping.

The famous kidnaping of the children of Mr. and Mrs. Lawrence Phipps by their father from the Holland house, in New York, interested the public a short time ago. Lawrence Phipps, as is well known, is the son of Carnegie’s first partner, and a multimillionaire. Marital difficulties had separated the husband and wife, and Mrs. Phipps had the custody of the children, two little boys. Knowing that the father wanted them, she tried to keep her whereabouts secret. She was living at the Holland house, and strict injunctions had been placed on the employes not to let her identity get out. But Mr. Phipps learned his wife was there and one morning, before daylight, an automobile drew up in front of the hotel and a man alighted. He gave a whistle, and it was heard by one of the nurses employed by Mrs. Phipps, who must have been in league with the father. The nurse awakened the boys, told them they were to go away, and carefully took them downstairs without arousing the sleeping mother, who was in an adjoining room. The boys were put into the automobile and whisked away. Mrs. Phipps awoke soon afterward to find them gone, and, divining what had happened, rushed to the telephone and informed her lawyers of their disappearance. Joining them, she hurried to Jersey City and there encountered her husband with the little boys, on a train for Pittsburg, but though she called on the police to return the children to her, It was Mr. Phipps’ game at that point, and be went away with his sons in his possession.

Other Famous Cases.

The children of John E Madden, the famous horseman, were the objects of parental kidnaping on more than one occasion before the courts finally stepped in and made a decision that arranged definitely for their custody. James Cook was kidnaped by his mother at Jamaica, L. I., and the police hunted her down. Mrs. Ida May Wood was arrested after a sensational abduction of her own daughter in Brooklyn; Mrs. Ethel Terrell of Chicago kidnaped her two little girls from the hiding place their father had selected for them in Kenosha, Wis.; Mrs. Charles Koster of New Brunswick, N. J., stole her three-year-old son from his father’s house; E. C. Holden of Hackensack figured in the papers when he took his daughter from her mother—the list is almost endless.

It all goes to show that there is a love which rises superior to law and the decrees of courts. A woman may, without a pang, leave the man she has sworn to honor through life. A man may see her whom he promised to cherish go from his side, and never shed a tear. But when there are children concerned it is different. Nothing can ever replace them. Nothing can ever kill the love of father or mother for the little ones. So, while there are children, and while men, and women break their marital ties, we shall probably always read of such cases as these, where the only crime is in stealing what belongs to you, anyway!

NOTES:

Kidnapping was often spelled with one “p” in the past.

This syndicated article (probably from a New York newspaper originally) would have appeared in a number of different newspapers.

This article is similar to one published in 1907: “Love Proves Superior to Courts Decrees,” Anonymous, syndicated, Marble Rock Press (Io.), Dec. 12, 1907 (see Index of Linked Historical Articles)

The Marshfield Times (Wisconsin), June 1, 1910, included an additional illustration.

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