The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1914-12-28
~Flyfne Rollers" Teach Mem
beers Business ssStunts."
COURTS WILL INVESTIGATE
All Michigan Interested in
Troubles of Israelite Colony.
Women Allege Violation of Al
most Every Moral Law.


three women, former members of the
colony, who are suing their husbands
for divorce.
Woodbridge H. Ferris, governor Of
Michigan, has promised that the state
will go to the bottom of the charges
if -worn complaint, embodying the
facts, is -ade to him. Attorney Har-
men whose affidavits started the trou-
BILE, says the complaint will be forth
coming. and there it rests.
II all the charges made against the
colony are true. the Mann act. the
famous IT -cency statutes of the
state of Michigan, and even the liquor
regulations have been violated in the
conduct of the colony by Benjamin
Purnell. its leader. But there are
counter charges of blackmail and ex-
tortion. which lend a different tone to
the ha1 ges when it is considered that
the colony has half million in cold
cash and owns over 5000 acres OF
choice Michigan farm land. an amuse-
ment park. two steamboats, and the
buildings to actually house the colony
outside Benton Harbor.
In Divorce Court.
1t all started about the middle of
November when Mrs. Lena McFarlane
and Mrs. Augusta Holiday. sisters.
who had married men who were
members of the colony It the realm
of King Benjamin" and sued stimuli
taneously for divorce in the circuit
court of Berrien county
Their bills of particulars cited the
most fragrant breaches of the moral
code and declared that Benjamin
made it a rule of the colony for all
the girls who entered it's boundaries
to be his wives.
For" the affidavits allege Ben
jamin taught. II am the little
brother of Jesus and the women of
my flock are all as wives to me-"
Benjamin ruled supreme at the
colony. the bills state, and his long
haired missionaries who roamed the
country in pairs from coast to coast,
sent to him money, reports and girl
converts to the most holy faith of
Israeli
The affidavits set forth how. when
anti-marriage teachings of Benjamin.
he picked by lot twenty girls and mar
ried them to twenty men Of his col
ony at a mass ceremony. Then he
sent the young husbands to the tim
Der islands, owned by the cult. 800
miles away from the new wives. and
took the wives to live in Shiloh" his
own residential sanctum.
At once the members of the colony
and particularly the leaders. raised a
storm of protest until Coy Purnell. son
of the founder of the sect, prepared
a written statement for the Benton
Harbor papers
Calls Them Perjurors.
In his statement young Purnell
called the women "perjurers" and
gave the Israelite version of their
leaving the colony.
At once the women countered with
two damage suits against young Pur-
nell, each suit for $4,000. They OBJ
tanned a body attachment and though
the suits were but civil proceedings,
had him put in the custody Of a
sheriff He refused to give bail and
is still with the sheriff. while the SUI
board.
The House of David. through At
torney James O'Hare, said it was all
blackmail and politics, and the women
and their lawyers then turned their
guns upon O'Hare and his son, 81
year-o1d Chester O'Hare, who had just
been elected county prosecutor.
Petitions were drawn calling upon
the governor of the state to make an
investigation on the ground that the
prosecutor, Chester. could not give a
fair hearing because he belonged to
the law firm of his father, which rep
resented the Israelites.
To prove his fairness young O'Hare
appealed in person to the governor
for an investigation. The governor
answer is that without formal
signed comp1aint-and with all the
talk and buster there has been no
single signed declaration against the
colony-he could not act.
The attorney general Of the state.
Grant Fellows. then became the cen
ter of appeal and his stand is still
Hnannounced.
Newspaper Exposure.
The strictly business character OF
the colony was exposed when a copy
of the Secret Rules came into the
hands of newspaper men. Directions
as to how to sell peanuts and ice
cream cones: how to avoid the wiles
of the city short change artists how
to love. both for effect in public and
for love in private: and how to ex-
believers can get, is explained in the
booklet.
1t was the publication of this "booh
of rules which brought the first re.
tort from the flying rollers" king
Benjamin." who had been reported a.
back of the bears cage, came out long
enough to dictate a statement, the
substance of which was:
What business is it of the public
anyway"
All central Michigan is now await.
ing the February term Of court. fol
then the divorce actions will come te
trial and every detail of their sordic
stories will become public records
Even the federal investigators who
t looked into the Mann act charges viii
be on hand. prepared to use anything
that comes out at the trials in possible
government prosecution that may
come when United States District At.
torney Myron Walker at Crane
Rapids, and Hinton G. Clabaugh, hea6
of the Chicago bureau of the depart
ment of justice. have finished theil
inquiries
Four Die by Fire.