The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1911-05-29
WIFE QUITS STITT.
Kidnapped She Returns to Parents and
Will Ask Divorce.

Wlnneld, Kan, May 29.-LaCer QeVel-
| opments in the Stitt-M illigan kidna ping
case present one of the most remark
able sensations conceivable. When the
kidnapers left Winfield Friday night,
they drove to Wellington where Stitt
engaged a room at a boarding house
and remained with his wife all night.
Saturday morning the two friends came
back to Winfield in the automobile and
reported that Mrs. Stitt had gone away
with her husband willingly. and that
they were happy and contented at
Saturday evening Mrs. Stitt came
home. She says she married Stitt
through fear and that she was kidnapped
and carried away against her will. She
is now at her fathers home in this city
and declares that she has a perfect
horror of her husband and is deterrnin-
ed never to live with him. She has
secured the services of a lawyer and
will commence a suit to annul the mar
riage.
Mr. Stitt came back to Winfield this
morning. He positively denies
that he used any threats to compel Miss
Milligan to marry him. That she went
with him to get the license and waited
alone on the probate judges porch
while he went in the house and got it;
that she accompanied him to the par
sonage and went through the marriage
ceremony willingly and on being con-
Dy IHS pdISOll. IOIIie1i hco
that she was too happy to be nervous;
that he used no force in kidnapping and
taking her to wellington; that she ask
ed him to come and get her and went
with him Of her own free will; that
she remained with him over night at
wellington and went out with him Eext
morning in a happy and contented
frame of mind.
Wife Changes Plea.
Later in the day he saw a dispatch
in a Wellington newspaper regarding
the kidnapping and rad it to her and
and contradict it. She agreed to do
so. but when she reached the judges
office she threw herself on her knees
before him and declared the story as
told in the dispatch was substa ntially
true and that she didn't love him and
she wanted to go home. Stitt says he
was completely dumbfounded at this
unexrected statement and that he i'm
mediately asked the judge to take
charge of his wife and send her home,
and he would pay all expenses.
The stories of Mr.. and Mrs. St1tt
agree in almost every particular, the
difference being that Mrs. Stitt claims
that she was in great fear of Stitt and
acted as she did through terror of the
consequences if she refused to do as he
requested, while Stitt maintains that
she repeatedly assured him of her love
and that she freely consented to marry
him and willingly allowed nerSeH 10 ne
kidnapped.
The story Of the kidnapping of his
bride of less than a week by Harry
Stitt, aided by his two most intimate
friends, was told in Saturdays edition
of the Journal. Up to Stitt came the
alternative either to kidnap the girl
whom he had made his wife few days
before or be separated from her for
ever, and he chose the former So
Friday evening an automobile drew up
to and paused before a house on the
perch of which sat the young lady
guarded by her brother and surround
ed by several female relatives. The
three men alighted from the car and,
headed by Stitt. invaded the yard. APP
preaching his bride Stitt implored her
to go with him, and on her refusal to
do so he picked her up and ran with
her to the automobile, his getaway
being covered by his two faithful
friends. The protests and threats of
the young lady's brother, the arrival of
the father with a rifle, nor the screams
of the young lady herself as she was
being borne away, availed to prevent
the abduction, for in less than two
minutes Stitt was in the car with his
bride and his friends and the automo-
in the darkness.