Murder of Grace Brown

Grace Mae Brown was born March 20, 1886, and grew up in South Otselic, Chenango County, New York, the middle child of a dairy farmer. In 1904, at age 18, she moved to Cortland, New York, to live with her married sister and work at the Gillette Skirt Factory. There she met Chester Gillette, the nephew of the factory's owner, who had moved to Cortland in 1905. The two began a romantic and sexual relationship.

In spring 1906, Brown became pregnant and returned to her parents' home in South Otselic. Gillette agreed to take her to the Adirondacks, apparently promising marriage. During their journey, the couple registered at hotels under false names and, according to accounts, left at least one hotel in Utica without paying. They traveled by train to Tupper Lake and, after rain disrupted their plans, went on to Big Moose Lake, which straddles Herkimer and Hamilton counties. Gillette registered there using the pseudonym "Carl Grahm."

On July 11, 1906, the couple was seen rowing out onto Big Moose Lake. Gillette is believed to have struck Brown, possibly with a tennis racket or an oar, after which she fell from the boat and drowned. Gillette returned to shore alone and gave varying accounts of what had happened. Brown's body was recovered the next day, and Gillette was arrested in the nearby town of Inlet, New York.

At trial, the defense argued that Brown had become confused and jumped from the boat herself, despite being fully clothed. Gillette testified that she "got up and jumped in the water, just jumped in." Prosecutors introduced love letters Brown had written to Gillette, seized from his rented room, in which she pleaded with him to take responsibility for her pregnancy. District Attorney George Ward read these letters aloud during the trial, drawing national newspaper attention. In her final letter, dated July 5, Brown wrote of her impending trip and her inability to tell her mother about her pregnancy.

The trial lasted three weeks and ended in a guilty verdict against Gillette for the premeditated murder of Brown; he was sentenced to death. The New York Court of Appeals affirmed the conviction, and Governor Charles Evans Hughes declined to grant clemency. Gillette was executed by electrocution at Auburn Correctional Facility on March 30, 1908.

The case drew significant national attention at the time and later inspired several works of fiction and nonfiction, including Theodore Dreiser's 1925 novel An American Tragedy and its film adaptations, as well as two 1986 nonfiction books examining the case. Letters exchanged between Brown and Gillette, along with Gillette's diary, have since been donated to Hamilton College.