State vs Ellen Fluharty Part 1

The Fairmont West Virginian., May 5, 1905

State vs. Fluharty.

     The notorious case of the State vs. Ellen Fluharty for keeping a house of ill-fame at Mannington, finally came to trial at eleven o'clock. J.G. Jones was the first to witness called for the State. Jones testified that the Fluhartys had lived in the house next to his for two years; that all kinds of drinking and carousing had been going on there at all times of night and day; that a Welsh woman and a woman named Rose Sturgeon had been living at the house; that the reputation of these two, as well as of Ellen Fluharty and her daughter Daisy Blodgett, was that they were prostitutes; that through a window he had seen Daisy Blodgett and a man in a nude state and compromising condition.
     On cross-examination the witness got one on the lawyer for the defense that made even that gentleman himself smile. When asked in what "capacity" Rose Sturgeon lived in the Fluharty house, he said he did not understand what was meant by "capacity" as used.

     "I am not a lawyer," he said.

     "What are you?"

     "I am a man."

     Jones is an honest looking, straightforward man, however, and the effect of his testimony on the jury will be hard to overcome.

The Fairmont West Virginian., May 6, 1905

THE FLUHARTY CASE ONE OF

THE RACIEST EVER TRIED

IN THE COUNTY.

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     In the case of the State vs. Ellen Fluharty, before Judge Kendall yesterday afternoon, the witness L.G. Jones continued his testimony by saying that he had seen several Mannington citizens at the Fluharty house, whom up to that time he had considered respectable.  He swore the Ed. Cunningham, 64 years of age, had made an indecent exposure of his person at the door in broad day light.

     Mrs. E.B. Hayes, a daughter of Jones, gave most startling testimony.  She said that she was at the rear of her father's house one afternoon last summer, when, looking across at the Fluharty house, she saw Daisy Blodgett and a man whom she did not recognize, in a compromising position outside the Fluharty kitchen door.  Mrs. Hayes also testified to being called to the Fluharty house on the occasion of the serious illness of Daisy Blodgett's child, and to seeing on one occasion Daisy Blodgett lying across the bed with one Clarence Fluharty, a third cousin, and on another occasion Daisy's  skirts lifted to a most indecent height while men were in the room.

     Several citizens of the neighborhood testified to the reputation which the inmates of the house bore of being common prostitutes.

     The defense put Mrs. Fluharty on the stand first.  She testified that she her husband and her three daughters slept in the same room.  She said her husband was a very free-hearted man, and never refused admittance to any men or women that came to the house.  She had had trouble with Jones about six months before because of a story Jones had told, so she said, about her younger daughter going to the woods with a man.  She declared that Jones was sore, and not "neighboring" with them any more, and was responsible for all the trouble.  She stated that Rose Sturgeon was turned away from home and came to her for a refuge until she could find work, and that Emma Welch came and stayed under similar circumstances.  She said that men drank at her house.  It was not denied to her friends to drink.  "Most everybody drinks now-a-days."  She admitted that Rose Sturgeon and Emma Welch didn't bear good reputations, but that she had never seem anything wrong with them.

     On cross-examination she admitted that the girls had "beaux," and that she considered it all right for her married daughter to have men to see her.  She became considerably worked up in talking about Jones.  She declared that Jones had had the State's witnesses summoned and that she had something to tell on Jones.  The prosecuting attorney urged her to tell what it was, but she sid she was going to tell the June grand jury.

     At the continuation of the trial this morning the prosecutor had Mrs. Fluharty on the stand again and asked her if the notorious story was true that she herself helped to hold her 14-year-old daughter, Ida Fluharty, while a certain Mannington citizen took advantage of her.  Mrs. Fluharty denied the story.

     Michael Fluharty, the husband of the accused, took the stand next.  He corroborated his wife's testimony about the two girls coming to his home, and said that they slept in the same room with him and his wife and daughters.  He said they usually hung a skirt up at the window when they went to bed.  He said that he had engaged in some of the fighting in the house himself.  He related how Mart Looman had been in the house and gotten into some kind of altercation with "old man Burdine."  He said that Burdine had long chin whiskers, and that Looman was pretty drunk and seized the whiskers.  Fluharty grabbed a stove-poker and Looman let go his hold on Burdine and made for him, whereupon he hit Looman over the head with the poker.  Then he and his son threw Looman out.

     On cross-examination Fluharty said he went to bed usually about nine, but that his wife stayed up with the younger crowd often until a late hour.

     Ida Davis testified to having been at the Furhartys' frequently, and to having been in the kitchen when the son, Alf, was in bed, and in one of the other rooms when the rest of the family was in bed.  She said that a fight which Jones had mentioned in his testimony had occurred after a dance at her house, and that the Fluhartys were not mixed up in it.

     On cross-examination she she said there was no necessity for Rose Sturgeon and Emma Welch to be there so far as helping with the work was concerned. She said that she and Jones were not on speaking terms, that she would speak to him if he would to her, but that she wasn't going to speak first.

     Daisy Blodgett took the stand.  Her testimony was largely a denial of the stories told by Jones and Mrs. Hayes.

     On cross-examination she said she thought fighting would occur "any place," and that she thought there was no harm in her receiving men callers nor in their drinking "a little beer."

     Mr. J.L. Roup testified to going with Mr. J.W. McElroy to try to buy the Fluharty house and admitted to Mr. Lowe that he did it in an attempt to get the Fluhartys to leave the neighborhood.  He said that Rose Sturgeon, Emma Welch and Daisy Fluharty were regarded in the community as common prostitutes.

     Mr. Parks, counsel for the defense, put Fluharty on the stand again at this point and showed that he went to Mannington last night in an attempt to serve a summons on Clarence Fluharty.  Michael said he had searched for Clarence but that he was unable to locate him.

     Mr. Parks then called Nimrod Wells to the stand.  Wells testified to having heard Jones tell his son Alva on the train going to Mannington last night to "go ahead and get that fellow out of the way."

     Mr. Parks spoke strongly against this performance and urged that the prosecuting attorney haul Jones up before the grand jury on the charge of interfering with the course of the law.

     Counsel agreed to take a half hour each to argue the case and began at one o'clock to do so.