The Ruin of Laura Fair: A Gilded Age Love Triangle and Murder Trial

The Deceitful Life of Alexander Parker Kittinden

• 👨 AP Kittinden, a man from a prominent Kentucky family, lived a life of deception, maintaining a long-term affair with Laura Fair while married to Clara Churchill Jones, with whom he had 14 children.
• 🤥 He repeatedly lied to both women, promising Laura he would divorce Clara and that she was his only true wife, while assuring Clara of his devotion despite long absences.
• ✈️ AP's life was marked by wanderlust and financial struggles, leading him to move his family multiple times, including to Texas and California during the Gold Rush, often leaving Clara to manage the household and children alone.

Laura Fair's Tumultuous Relationships

• 💔 Laura Fair, born in Mississippi, endured two difficult marriages before meeting AP, both to older, abusive, and alcoholic men.
• 💰 After her second husband's death, Laura struggled financially, eventually opening a boarding house in San Francisco where she met AP, who falsely presented himself as a widower.
• 🎭 The affair between AP and Laura was tumultuous, marked by AP's continued deception and Laura's increasing desperation for respectability and a stable life, which she believed AP could provide.

The Fatal Confrontation

• 🚢 On September 3rd, 1870, Laura followed AP onto a ferry to Oakland, where she witnessed him reuniting with his family.
• 💥 Convinced AP had ruined her life and future, Laura confronted him on the ferry, shot him in the chest, and declared, "You ruined me."
• 🕊️ AP Kittinden died two days later, and his funeral was a major event in San Francisco, with courts adjourning in his honor.

The Trial of Laura Fair

• ⚖️ Laura Fair's murder trial became a national sensation, drawing attention to issues of morality, madness, and women's roles in 19th-century society.
• 🧠 Her defense team argued she suffered from temporary insanity due to dysmenorrhea (severe menstrual pain), a novel defense at the time.
• 👩‍⚖️ Despite the defense, an all-male jury initially found her guilty of murder and sentenced her to death.

Acquittal and Aftermath

• 🔄 The California Supreme Court granted Laura a new trial, and she was ultimately acquitted, a verdict that shocked many and sparked debate about justice and gender.
• 🗣️ Laura Fair went on to give public lectures about her experience and managed her finances through mining investments, dying in 1919 at the age of 82.
• 💔 Clara, AP's wife, died in 1881, with no record of whether the two women ever met again after their shared entanglement with AP.
• 📜 The extensive letters exchanged between AP, Clara, and Laura, revealing the depth of their relationships and AP's lies, are now archived at the University of Michigan.