The Maltby Murder-Suicide

Breaker boys at Maltby Colliery, Luzerne County

 

Decades before the Luzerne County borough of Swoyersville was given its present name, a tiny mining village stood on the spot. Named for the nearby Maltby Mines, the village of Maltby boasted around four hundred residents in the 1880s. Invariably described in records of the time as a quiet, peaceful place, the village was spared from the terrible mining and railroad tragedies which plagued other local mining patches. But that would change in the spring of 1889, thanks to a 55-year-old miner named James Doran.

A little stone house once stood on the east bank of the gulch at the foot of North Mountain, about three hundred yards from the main street of the village. It was an idyllic spot, shaded by a grove of trees and perched on the banks of a tiny stream. The cellar of this home served as the kitchen and dining room, while the bedrooms and parlor stood on the main floor. This was the home of James Doran and his family, which included his wife, Margaret, three daughters and two sons. On the surface, the Dorans were a happy, healthy and industrious family-- but just below the surface lurked a creeping darkness.

Born in Lancashire, England, on Christmas Day of 1839, James Doran married a pretty Welsh girl named Margaret Edwards and the young couple immediately set sail for America in search of a brighter future. The Dorans settled in Maltby in 1880 and James, like so many immigrants, went to work in the coal mines. In the summer of 1888 he was seriously injured in a cave-in, which resulted in severe damage to the left side of his body. Unable to work, the responsibility of providing for the family fell on the shoulders of James' two sons, 22-year-old James, Junior, and 17-year-old Thomas, and his eldest daughter, 20-year-old Alice. Both of the sons worked at the Maltby Colliery, while Alice eked out a small income sewing dresses. James was eventually able to return to the colliery to perform odd jobs on an occasional basis, but the scant earnings hardly justified the pain. Even with three of his children working as hard as they could, money was tight. As a result, the Dorans decided to rent one of their rooms to a miner named James Foley.

Signs of Trouble

It is a sad thing when a man dies down in the mines, but, in some ways, it is even sadder when a miner is crippled for life. For a miner, this is quite emasculating; unable to find gainful employment, the former breadwinner of the house becomes dependent on his own children for his survival, and his chronic aches and pains haunt him like a ghost. He can no longer do the things he enjoys, and, all too often, his only source of solace is whiskey and strong ale. He looks in the mirror and sees only a shadow of his former self; he feels useless and unwanted. He can no longer satisfy his wife, and while the liquor helps him forget his problems for a little while, he begins to grow insecure and melancholy when the effects wear off. He takes notice of every able-bodied man who smiles or stares at his wife, and this drives him wild with jealousy. It is a story as old as time itself.

One can easily imagine this is how James Doran must've felt after James Foley came to live with the family. Every snippet of polite conversation between the boarder and Margaret must've aroused James' suspicions, and every smile between them awakened James' deepest fears and insecurities. James accused his wife of being too friendly with Foley, and quarrels became frequent. Sometimes, they turned violent. Not even his own children were spared from his rage; in early May, James savagely beat his daughter, Alice, and threatened to kill Margaret. One day in the middle of May, Thomas Doran walked into the family's barn on the hill above the house and saw that his father had constructed a gallows. James had constructed the uprights, crossbeam and platform-- a nearly perfect replica of the county scaffold down to the last detail-- and was quietly adjusting a noose around his neck when his son walked in. The boy told his mother, and together they tore down the ghastly device.

After the scaffold was torn down, James was seen by his children sharpening his knife and razor. His family watched him nervously, unsure if James planned to use the blades on himself-- or on them.  But then, for some reason, James' spirits suddenly brightened and he seemed particularly happy and content. Life at the Doran home returned to normal. On the morning of May 16, James went to work at the Maltby breaker and returned home around four o'clock, but he refused to eat the dinner his wife had prepared. "I'm going down town and will be back soon," he said to Margaret. He returned home at around nine o'clock that evening and asked his wife to make him something to eat.

Margaret went downstairs to the cellar kitchen with the youngest daughter, ten-year-old Maggie, and had just begun to pour James a cup of tea when he picked up an axe, and, while her back was turned, dealt his wife a murderous blow on the right side of her head. Then he struck her a second time. Without a word she fell to the floor, senseless, and she never regained consciousness. For ten minutes she lingered on death's doorstep, never knowing how or why she got there.

James then quietly made his way to the parlor on the second floor of the house, where his daughter Alice was sewing. Alice knew nothing of the dreadful tragedy that had just occurred in the basement. He slipped off his shoes in order to approach his daughter without a sound. He put his hand on her shoulder. Alice looked up in time to see the axe raised over her father's head. She let out a deafening scream just as her father swung the weapon, causing the blade to embed itself in the table. Alice fled from the house in terror. She later recalled that she was so terrified that she had no memory of running away, and couldn't remember the harrowing moments which followed the attempted murder.

James calmly walked into an adjoining room and located his shaving razor, which he used to cut his throat from ear to ear. When he was found, his body was lying on the floor with the neck resting on a wash basin. It was filled to the rim with blood, while more blood splattered the carpet. A doctor from Luzerne Borough was summoned, Dr. Faulds, but there was nothing that could be done. Margaret and James were both long dead by the time he arrived.

 
The Aftermath

According to Alice Doran, her father was a cruel man with a terrible temper. He had once hit her with a heavy chair and often drove her out of the house. She had hated him for years, and the dislike, seemingly, was mutual. "Had he killed only himself and left us mama, I would not shed a tear for him," she said after the tragedy. "I have not seen my father since his death and I never want to look upon his face again." Both bodies were taken to the undertaking parlors of the Townend Brothers to be prepared for burial, but Alice refused to allow James to be buried in the same grave as her mother.

"He abused my mother as far back as I can remember," recalled Alice, who, like her father, had been born in England. "He has been before the Manchester police courts for ill treating my mother and making threats. Two weeks ago he tried to kill me. He rushed towards me and raised a knife above my head, but I ran away. I have not spoken to him for three years."

Alice also stated that, while her father was not a heavy drinker, he had borrowed money to purchase rum on the afternoon of the murder from a saloon-keeper named Buckalew, who had been previously warned never to sell liquor to Doran, since he was prone to fits of rage. Buckalew's failure to heed this warning made him a pariah in the village of Maltby.

True to her word, Alice made sure that her parents were buried miles apart in different cemeteries. According to the May 18, 1889 edition of the Wilkes-Barre Times Leader, James Doran was buried at 10 o'clock on the morning of May 18 in Forty Fort Cemetery, while Margaret was laid to rest later that afternoon in Pittston. However, cemetery records from Forty Fort Cemetery show that a "James Doron" and a "Margaret Doron" were buried there on May 19, 1889. This raises some interesting questions: Did Alice later have a change of heart and have her mother's body shipped back from Pittston the following day? Or was there a last-minute complication which resulted in the wife being buried alongside the man who killed her? It is unlikely the truth will ever be known.

Sources:

Wilkes-Barre Times Leader, May 17, 1889.
Wilkes-Barre Times Leader, May 18, 1889.
Philadelphia Inquirer, May 18, 1889.
Pittston Evening Gazette, May 27, 1889.