The Lewis/Van Guilder Case, Part 1

[The victim of this 1883 malpractice case was variously called Charity Lewis - her true name - and Charity Van Guilder, an alias under which she visited Dr. Doty. Once again I have had to edit my coverage of a case that is so compelling to me that I have sought out an enormous amount of information which is not, perhaps, directly relevant to a summary of the case.

My sources will be listed in a bibliography after the final installment.]

Dr. Stephen Doty handed the tall blonde young lady a prescription written on a scrap of paper. It read "2 ounces cotton root." He also gave her some Dover's powders, a fever medication containing opium. The doctor and his visitors were in his office at 130 Ryerson Avenue, Brooklyn. It was July 30th, 1883. The young lady, who called herself Miss Charity Van Guilder, was 27 years old, and a native of Hoboken, New Jersey. She had recently found herself "in trouble," and so came to Dr. Doty for help.

Stephen Briggs Doty was 58 years old and was called a reputable homeopathic physician in the newspapers. But the press had been able to do a little research on Doty and discovered that he had been fined and imprisoned in 1860 for similar "malpractice" (this term was used as a euphemism for abortion). The 1860 Doty case is quite sordid. He seems to have been the father of the child in question, and he physically threatened the girl in order to procure her silence. The strangest part of this case is that the girl became his wife and in 1883 was still married to Doty and the mother of a sizeable family. (Still more strange, the eldest son, Doty's namesake, had been born about 1860).

Charity had been staying with her friend, Miss Matilda Hawthorne, since July 15th, at Matilda's sister and brother-in-law's house. The brother-in-law, Elias P. Clayton, was a police officer. Miss Van Guilder usually lived with her sister's family in Hoboken but sister Mary had gone "to the country" for the summer. It is probable that Charity left home not because of her sister's vacation plans, but in order to conceal her pregnancy. In addition, she probably wished to seek help in a place where she was not well known.

Charity and Matilda had met at the American Bank Note Company, in lower Manhattan, where they both worked. It was the leading firm for printing and engraving U.S. paper money, bond certificates, and postage stamps. The currency of several other countries was engraved and printed there, too.

And through Matilda's older brother, Charity had also met a young man named Walter Bennett. He was three years her junior, a 24 year old bookkeeper who also happened to be the son of the former Brooklyn City Works Commissioner, George C. Bennett.

The Eagle describes Walter and Charity as if they were the hero and heroine of a romantic novel. Bennett was "tall and slim, with hazel eyes and chestnut hair" and a "pleasant conversationalist." Charity was a tall blonde beauty, "a perfect lady in every sense of the word, and had a host of friends;" her family was "of high social standing in Hoboken, New Jersey." (This last was something of an exaggeration; her brother in law, Charles Gove, was a railroad ticket agent.) But romantic novels did not have such terrible tragedies as that which claimed Charity's life in less than a month.

Dr. Doty's cotton root medicine did not have the desired effect upon Charity - nor did the Dover's powders. The two ladies returned to Dr. Doty for further advice. He recommended that they see a relative of his, a dressmaker/nurse named Charlotte Furlong who lived and practiced at 624 DeKalb Avenue (at Nostrand), Brooklyn.

Later, at the trial, there were two differing stories concerning when Charity had gone to Mrs. Furlong, when she had been operated on, and who precisely had sent Charity to Mrs. Furlong. Matilda said Dr. Doty sent them. And Doty said that when they came to him, Charity had already had the operation. In any case, both Furlong and Doty were consulted in the month of July by the woman calling herself Miss Van Guilder.

Mrs. Furlong advised Miss Van Guilder to have an "operation." She had performed it "hundreds of times" for some of Brooklyn's wealthiest and most distinguished women. Miss Van Guilder agreed. It took about a quarter of an hour, and cost $15 (an enormous sum in 1883).

Walter Bennett, in any case, was the cause of Charity's trouble: this is what Matilda told the police afterwards. Matilda's sister, Mrs. Clayton, confirmed this and said that Tillie and Hattie (Charity) were good girls, that they did not meet men at Broadway Park, that Wally Bennett was the only man Miss Van Guilder had been with.

In July and the first half of August 1883, Matilda, Charity, Rebecca Clayton and Wally Bennett discussed Charity's problem. They all had different ideas about what to do, and afterwards it was difficult to sort out who had said what, exactly. Who had sent Charity to Dr. Doty, and who precisely had recommended that she seek out Mrs. Charlotte Furlong.

Whoever was responsible, the result was the same. Charity became very ill; she was feverish, her abdomen was swollen, and she was in tremendous pain. Another doctor, Dr. Samuel Childs, was summoned to the Clayton house on August 15. He saw Charity every day until her death on the 25th.

And finally, Rebecca Clayton decided that her husband Elias, a police officer, had better be informed about what had been going on.

Image from NYPL Digital Gallery, of DeKalb Avenue at Nostrand, very close to Mrs. Furlong's.



Part Two: An autopsy, two death certificates, and several arrests.