It seems strange and unfair that the body of "the little actress," Corrine B. Gray, who loved bright lights, fine champagne, and the latest Paris fashions, should lie in an unmarked grave in a nearly forgotten cemetery near the Athabascan village of Rampart, Alaska. But Corrine was a casualty of the Klondike Stampede as surely as if she'd been crushed excavating an untimbered tunnel, and most prospectors lost in that gold rush lie far afield. What makes Corrine's case intriguing is the gay abandon of her quest for riches and love, and the fact that she came very close to getting everything she wanted before her dreams slipped away.

She was listed in the 1880 census as Lizzie Bissler, the six-year-old daughter of Anna and Barnhart L. Bissler of Nimishillen Township, in an Ohio farming district, but she was either a child by a previous marriage or born out of wedlock, for Anna and Barnhart had not wed until 1877. Anna Bissler was originally from England; her husband also came from England though he was German-born, a harness-maker who could afford an apprentice.¹ Corrine's uncle, Frank Bissler, was the local barkeeper, and she and her cousin Kathleen Bissler grew up as close as sisters. Beyond that nothing is known about Corrine's early life or her subsequent marriage to a man named Gray.

A dark-haired, black-eyed beauty with an impishly sexy smile, Corrine arrived early in Juneau, moved on to Skagway and, in 1897, continued to Dawson where she easily found employment in the dance halls. She called herself an actress, but her name appears on no surviving playbills, and the press unfailingly described her as a "fairy," the only permissible one-word euphemism for "prostitute" in that post-Victorian era.

Surprisingly, Corrine did business under her real name, even including her middle initial. This was unusual for a girl from a respectable family, but she must have enjoyed her press, for she worked for it.

"Her career in Dawson has been a triumphant one, fraught with a success in social and theatrical circles that would satisfy even the average woman. She has been a star attraction in the Klondike theatrical firmament for the past two years, dimming the luster of the aurora borealis, and shading her rivalry by her luminous brilliancy," a writer for the Bennett Sun reported enthusiastically in November of 1899. "Her versatility has won popularity for every house wherein she has been engaged, and her magnetic charms have attracted thousands of dollars to the coffers of her manager and herself."²

Corrine danced at Walter Washburn's elegant Opera House, where a sign on the balcony reminded customers that "gentlemen in private boxes are expected to order refreshments" including champagne at sixty dollars per quart. She appeared at the Pavilion, built at a cost of $100,000 with ornately carved pillars, elaborate cornices, and rococo lines.³ She also played the Palace Grand and, before it burned, the Green Tree Hotel, a favorite place for "rapid rendezvous," owned by her true friend "Arkansas" Jim Hall, one of the most flamboyant of the Eldorado gold kings.

Corrine's professional ratings were high. "Her fascinating ways have enthralled many a lovesick miner, and when she flitted about in light, gossamery accouterment at the Grand Opera or Nigger Jim's [the nickname for the Pavilion, owned by Jim Daugherty, an outstanding minstrel show performer], it brought them visions of fairyland," the Bennett Sun reported, tongue-in-cheek. "Even though the nights are long in Dawson, they were not long enough, for time passed quickly when in her company. There was nothing slow about times with Corrine."⁴

Unfortunately, Corrine's press coverage usually meant trouble, for which she had as strong a penchant as she did for alcohol. And teamed with A. C. Stearns, a diminutive, sixty-five-year-old former physician known as the "Gambler Ghost," she sometimes outdid herself. "Doc" Stearns had broken the bank at Monte Carlo, so he was usually treated with deference, but together they made both the Klondike Nugget Semi-Weekly and the Dawson police blotter on September 27, 1899.

According to that account, "'Doc' Stearns, a blasé habitué of the gambling houses and variety halls, and Corrine B. Gray, one of the airy fairies of Dawson's half-world, were ejected from the stage at the Opera House on Monday night. 'Doc' and Corrine, who was very much inebriated, were quarreling with each other behind the scenes. Their loud argument threatened to distract the attention of the audience in front, to whom the management was indebted for something more than the production of a lovers' quarrel in real life. George Hillyer, the stage manager, cautioned the noisy couple to be quiet but they refused to desist. Finally they were ejected, but not without some trouble. Corrine considered that her right of person had been violated and on Tuesday morning, she appeared at the police court somewhat the worse after a night's debauch, but, nevertheless, she was there—and swore out a complaint against Hillyer, accusing him of assault."

Stearns accompanied her, planning to offer himself as a witness for the prosecution and thus relieve the "wearisome monotony of the police court." There was no follow-up, however, perhaps because George Hillyer, who'd engaged an attorney, calmed the irate actress. But the following month, Corrine was in court again, and this time the charges were serious.

"Corrine B. Gray, the frolicsome fairy who defrauded Uncle Hoffman of $90 and then took passage on the Sybil for the Outside, has been intercepted by the police at Tagish," the Klondike Nugget reported. "She will be returned here and placed on trial in the magistrate's court."⁵

The Northwest Mounted Police, after long ignoring prostitution, were in the midst of an enthusiastic campaign to stop it, and were particularly zealous about following up on complaints of prostitutes robbing innocent miners. Corrine was charged with selling her furniture to two separate parties—one of whom was "Uncle Hoffman," who may have been pawnbroker Lewis Hoffman—then trying to leave town.⁶ Four days later, the police reported that Corrine was so ill that she could not be removed from Tagish—a customs station between Whitehorse and Bennett, the terminus for the White Pass Railroad—and that she would probably be released under bond.⁷

Since she had an otherwise strong constitution, Corrine's illness may have been alcohol or drug withdrawal. She remained in the Tagish jail for a month until her friend "Arkansas" Jim Hall, the owner of #17 Eldorado, came through from a trip to Bennett and agreed to post half of the $20,000 bail the Mounties required. J. Cole, another successful miner from Hunker Creek, agreed to pay the other half, but charges were magically dropped before it was necessary.⁸

Less than a month later, Jim Hall would find himself jailed by friends who were trying to prevent him from marrying yet another dance hall girl. But Corrine did not wait around to aid her benefactor. Three days out of jail she was in Bennett, badgering the local newspaper editor to help her with an affair of the heart gone wrong.

"Am very sorry to feel myself compelled to ask your aid in my trouble which is really now more than I can bear. It being overwhelming," she wrote in a note she slipped under the editor's door when she found his office empty. "Will return in ten minutes. Please be here if your business will permit.

"Will explain to you then.

"Corrine B. Gray."

She reappeared shortly after the lunch hour, demanded a paper and pencil, and hastily wrote a letter that she wanted published. Her favored suitor would pay the bill, she said. But the editor, who knew a good yarn when he saw one, agreed to run the material for nothing if he could have editorial license in writing a story to go with it.

According to Corrine's dramatic account, two rivals for her affections had followed her from Dawson to Bennett, and the one she ultimately rejected swore revenge. It was he who had her arrested at Whitehorse Rapids, hoping that navigation would close for the winter before she could clear herself and that she would be forced to live with him in Dawson.

Corrine had turned to the rejected suitor for bail, she said, but he grew jealous and withdrew it when he discovered she had talked to his rival.

"His anger and jealousy know no bounds," she claimed. "Since he has been away from Dawson where he thinks no one knows about our affairs, he has repudiated me in full. Never-the-less he owes me $800 cash I loaned him to live on waiting to sell his claim. Now because he cannot use me as he desires he withdraws his bonds as I am an invalid."

Unbeknownst to Corrine, the "rejected one" was snugly "cached" behind the counter of the newspaper office during her interview, and the amused editor noted that he did not seem to enjoy the drama. In fact, on Corrine's departure, he declared he was as anxious to keep the account out of the newspaper as she was to have it in.

Omitting the names of the men involved, the editor ran the story under bold headlines:

Corrine Has More Trouble
Two of Her Favorites Clash at Bennett
ONE REJECTED SUITOR
Expresses a Desire to 'Send His Successful Rival to a Hot Climate'
Corrine's Fairy Story as to the Cause of her Arrest
She Finally Succeeds in Leaving the Country

"In her tour of the Northland Miss Gray made many friends," the Sun writer editorialized. "To her knowledge she never made a single or married enemy. This, she declares, is her undoing—she has too many friends. They are all friends of Corrine, but not friends of one another, and in their endeavors to harm each other they hurled boomerangs of barbed anathema, which, though they came back to the thrower to his injury, usually struck Mlle. Gray on the home stretch. When she decided to come out for the winter to spend a well-earned vacation, two of these friends braved themselves enough to come also. Miss Gray soon became aware they were not content to be on an equal footing in her affections, and that she must choose either one or the other and end the affair then and there. This she did in favor of a well-known Yukoner who has been in the country for over twelve years and owns valuable interests on Eldorado Creek. The result was that while the three were stopping in Bennett the rejected suitor expressed a desire to dispatch his successful rival to a region enjoying a milder climate than he had been accustomed to. The threat was made and was only prevented from being executed by the intervention of the bartender.

"At the direful thought of having to return to Tagish, if the 'persecuting lover' took up the $500 cash bond, the emotional Corrine sought the Sun to protect her spotless reputation and to throw its calcium light of publicity—not for theatrical advertising purposes—on the whole affair and thus expose to view the designs of the 'enamored' one."⁹

Corrine sailed for San Francisco, satisfied that her name had been cleared, but unwisely returned to Dawson in 1900, again provoking the police. Although newspaper accounts do not implicate her, the cause of her arrest was probably the death of Corporal M. W. Watson, age thirty-three, who "accidentally" shot himself in the stomach on March 27.

Throughout his army service, until about four weeks earlier, Corporal Watson had been a "true and noble servant of the queen," his obituary noted. "From a jovial, light-hearted companion he became a sullen and morose recluse, but never for a moment did he forget the imbued instincts of the gentleman, being at all times courteous and polite when addressed by anyone." Most were surprised to learn that Corporal Watson, an orderly room clerk, was actually the Honorable M. W. St. John Watson Beresford of Creaduff House, Athlone, Ireland, the scion of a proud and noble Irish family.

According to the police, Watson's "accident" was the result of a prolonged drinking spree. "He left his place at the barracks and devoted himself most assiduously to keeping up his drunk. The fact that his money became exhausted in no way caused him to deviate from the mad course he was pursuing, for he issued checks here and there for small amounts, usually $10, and the period of intoxication was thus elongated until, in a semi-lucid moment, the young man realized that he had not reported for twenty-one days, thereby entitling the writing of the word 'Deserter' after his name on the army roll."¹⁰

The jury assigned to the case came in with the verdict of accidental death, and severely chastised the Dawson papers for having reported it as suicide.¹¹ But some believed that the careless heart of Corrine Gray had driven Watson to his "prolonged spree," and that she was responsible for ruining a good man. That belief was why the Mounties had trumped up yet another charge against her, Corrine maintained. Again she proclaimed herself the victim of unjust persecution.

Whatever the reason, Corrine Gray found herself wanted by the Mounties in mid-September of 1901. Her longtime benefactor, Jim Hall, had outwitted his well-meaning friends to remarry, and was too busy honeymooning to help Corrine. Other Klondike Kings who had previously been interested in the pretty actress failed come to her aid. She was, in fact, facing another awful term in a Canadian jail.

Corrine's only alternative was to get out of Canada, but the Mounties closely monitored Yukon River traffic. She had all but given up when an unlikely savior appeared. An Alaskan visiting Dawson, William B. Ballou was a tall, fairly good-looking 170-pounder with a dapper mustache. The thirty-year-old bachelor—bored and horny from long isolation in Alaska's gold fields, knowing nothing about Corrine's past—decided after a brief meeting that it was his duty as a gentleman and a fellow American to rescue her.

In another life, William Ballou had worked for the Boston and Maine Railroad as a telegraph man. Happy to leave watchful neighbors who were zealous members of the Temperance League in Somerville, Massachusetts, he had departed for the gold rush in March of 1898, stopping briefly in Seattle where he toured the dance halls and red light district. Forgoing Dawson because it had little land left for staking, he hit Rampart, Alaska, at the beginning of its stampede, acquiring several moderately successful claims and purchasing a town lot at the bargain price of fifty dollars. A good liar, he had gotten most of his mining equipment through Canadian customs by posing as a lawyer and claiming his weighty boxes were law books and clothing.¹²

William's first winter in the North heightened his respect for both the country and those who managed to survive in it. Seven of his acquaintances froze to death in separate accidents. One committed suicide. His nearest neighbor crushed a foot to jelly when a jack slipped on the steamer he was trying to pry out of the ice, and two amputations later his leg was gone below the knee. Another friend froze both legs, dying during the operation to amputate. William himself suffered so badly from scurvy that his legs turned black to the knees before he could diagnose the problem and cure himself.¹³ So he had a sympathetic ear for suffering.

Corrine told him that since a loved-crazed corporal had committed suicide over her, the Mounties had tried to grind her down, ruining her financially. "Anyone in Dawson who can't pay up goes behind bars," William explained in a letter to his brother Walt, an apple-grower and cider-maker back in Vermont, "therefore when I heard the case through and saw a tear glisten in that big black eye, it was all off with me and I told the little girl to trust in me and we would see her through the lines. One hour before the boat sailed in the shadow of night, the little girl was smuggled aboard and stowed in my bunk with me—with a big bottle of booze sticking from under the pillow and the little girl snuggled close in my expansive bosom and the covers well over her head we cleared the dock inspection without a jar but at Fortymile, the boundary line, two red-coated officers with a telegram searched every inch of the boat without success, even tapping me on the shoulder to ask me questions but the bottle had been too much for me and I could only answer them with a grunt.

"After getting over the line with the stars and stripes over us we came out of our hiding and had a lovely time all the way down—in fact I was perfectly willing to sail on like that for ages."

En route to Rampart, then a town of about 1,500 with several booming saloons, Corrine talked the usually thrifty William into backing her in business. "She got off here at Rampart and will start a sporting house where I am to go for a home when I wish," he reported a bit sheepishly to his brother. "The whole thing was a merry thing to do and a 'little yellow' has appeared in my pants every time I have thought about it since, but then no risk, no gain, and I console myself with the thought of 'the happy home that I have won.' It needs a little adventure like that to put the spice into life."¹⁴

On the same day, William wrote to his mother, "Arrived last night after a long six-day trip down the river from Dawson. The boat had freight for all stations, tying up for darkness and took on an extra supply of wood all of which seemed to delay us. Am glad to get back to the old log cabin once more after all my summer's wandering—'tis the house that I'm best fitted for after all."¹⁵

After traveling with Corrine to the States for a brief holiday, William set her up as promised in Rampart, and headed back to mine Claim #8 on the Little Manook. Since Corrine was new to the area, he asked Luther Durfee, a fellow miner who worked at the Northern Commercial store, to watch over her—a serious tactical mistake.

Luther Durfee, age thirty-three, looked strikingly similar to William Ballou, but was even better built. The son of a Wisconsin lumber baron, he was one of Rampart's most eligible bachelors and had much more charm than William, who was totally focused on getting rich.

When William returned to Rampart just two weeks later, he was even more angry than the town's "respectable" women to find Luther betrothed to Corrine. Momentarily he considered challenging his friend to a little pistol play, but the couple knew where the Vermonter's heart really lay and patched up their friendship.

"Although I have lost my home there for this winter I came up promptly with my congratulations and wishes for their best happiness," William wrote his brother, "perhaps all the more so as he came down with the price of her fare from Dawson, expenses on her trunks, and two weeks board since which amounted to about a hundred which I had settled for her."¹⁶

EARLY RAMPART
Correine Gray was relieved to be rescued from the Canadian Northwest Mounted Police by American William Ballou, who smuggled her out of Dawson and over the international boundary to Alaska via riverboat. Later he treated her to a brief trip to Seattle. This photograph of the couple was taken en route.
UW #18026.

Luther also purchased William's cutaway tuxedo, which William grudgingly admitted fitted the bridegroom better than himself. William also served as best man at the wedding, which was remarkable for its elegance in the rugged camp.

"The little girl came out in one of her stage dresses (a Worth from the most expensive house in Paris) and looked very sweet—so much so that I almost wished that I had capped her out myself," William reported. "Well we spliced them together and you ought to hear the talk it has made. . . .

"The newly married couple gave me a nice little supper with lots of wine and we had the big talk and I agreed not to feel abused and am to be their best friend for life—so we smoked the pipe of peace in many cigarettes."¹⁷

It was love. Luther, who'd been heavily into alcohol and gambling, gave both up for Corrine. And she proved remarkably content in the uncharacteristic role of sober, supportive young wife.

"My friends Mr. and Mrs. Durfee are well and very happy—they have a lovely little cabin which she has fixed all up to a queen's taste—they make me lunch with them every time I go in," William reported with mixed emotions. "She makes it a point to look very sweet in some loose kind of pink dress and I always come away with a sad feeling in my heart and kick myself thinking what might have been. The 'four hundred' in camp hasn't recovered from the sensation of their marriage and do not receive them at the pink teas."

Rampart's respectable matrons and old maids insisted that Luther was "throwing himself away," and blamed William for the match, but the jilted Vermonter came to see it as a fortunate marriage for his friend.¹⁸ It would take the newly married couple a little longer, however, to convince Luther's family back home.

Luther Durfee was the last surviving son of William Ray Durfee, who had been born to a wealthy and politically powerful Rhode Island family and had made his way west as a fur buyer and Indian agent. In 1872 William Durfee had founded a successful mercantile business in Ashland, Wisconsin, soon to become the second-largest port on Lake Superior, and he also established a highly successful sawmill and lumber business. But his financial gains were countered by staggering personal losses, including the deaths of his first wife, Cecille, their three daughters, and Luther's older brother, Nathaniel. Three children from his second marriage, to Eugenie Prince, also died.¹⁹

One of William Durfee's only two surviving offspring, Luther may have been over-indulged. He apparently took to gambling and alcohol early on, and it must have been with mixed feelings that his father saw him off to the gold rush. Luther astonished the family by becoming self-sufficient and being promoted to assistant manager of the Northern Commercial store, but William Durfee was not pleased when his heir announced that he'd married an actress. However, the lumber baron was sixty-nine. His second wife, Eugenie, and her sister-in-law, Dorothy (in whom Luther confided), were liberal for that era. Just as Luther and Corrine had convinced their friend William Ballou, eventually they won over the Durfee clan.

"They are to have an increase in the family sometime all their own this time, too, and papa feels pretty smart over it," noted William Ballou, who'd replaced Corrine with the unhappy wife of a professional gambler. "His old man, the Lumber King of Wisconsin, has written them a nice long letter—forgives and forgets with his blessings and wants them to come home, so this puts an end to all my worries over them."²⁰

Corrine must have felt the same relief, plus real happiness, for Luther not only adored her, but was wildly excited about becoming a father. And other Rampart wives were gradually accepting her; the Durfees began to receive invitations from respectable couples. Although "high society" in an isolated boomtown might seem a joke to the outside world, many stampeders were well-bred, well-educated, and well-heeled. Corrine's ability to move into their circle bode well for her future. Perhaps she soon would find herself living in luxury and high society with Luther's wealthy family in Ashland, Wisconsin.

But it was not to be. In September, Luther Durfee again donned William Ballou's cutaway and Corrine her Worth gown, this time for the funeral of their newborn child. Shattered, both began drinking. Luther went so far off the deep end that he almost lost his job, but he managed to pull himself together when Corrine discovered she was pregnant again.²¹

Then, suddenly, their luck ran out. In November Luther, healthy and just three months past his thirty-fourth birthday, caught a cold that seemed harmless until it turned into pneumonia, then into consumption. Corrine, exhausted and terrified, called William Ballou to help her nurse him. After five dreadful nights during which they could do nothing to ease Luther's suffering, he slipped away.

They dressed him in William's cutaway and placed his body in a home-built coffin in an unheated cabin in the backyard; the ground was too frozen to bury him until spring. Corrine, nearly mad with grief, might have joined him had it not been for the child growing inside her, but without Luther she was lost—especially financially.²²

Her husband had left no insurance; his illness and funeral had taken most of their savings. Struggling with their own grief, Luther's parents offered her no assistance, although she hoped they would once the baby arrived. William Ballou had been selling Luther the house on installments of twenty-five dollars a month, which Corrine could not afford to pay. In fact, she could barely afford groceries. The Rampart "four hundred" offered no support. Once again, William Ballou appeared to be Corrine's only hope, but she hesitated to approach the tight-fisted Vermonter whom she had jilted so abruptly. Instead she bided her time, and he finally came to her.

"After Durfee died I firmly and honestly resolved that there should be nothing but friendship between the widow and myself," William wrote his brother Walt in February of 1903, following a bit of soul-searching, "but one night when I was first laid up the first of Jan. I hobbled down there to her cozy house (my cabin) all fixed up with Outside furniture, carpets, lace curtains and such truck that go to make up the furnishings of a cabin when there is a woman and—and the little actress was dressed in one of those thin fleecy wrappers and was so concerned in fixing me up comfortable on the lounge by the fire and insisted on bathing my hip with liniment with her soft little hands.

"I tell you, Old Man, it isn't in the Ballou nature with a pair of big balls between his legs, to stand it and something had to happen—and, after she had shed a few stage tears and given me the old story that she had loved me all the time since I saved her from the horrid red-coated police in Dawson, we pulled the curtains closed so that poor Durfee could not look in from his coffin in the little cabin in the backyard where he lays stiff and frozen hard as a rock, and we crawls in between the white sheets (sheets are a great luxury in this country) and I truly think there is nothing better for the rheumatism in the hip than a nice plump smooth leg applied for a few hours nightly, it is this treatment which now in less than two months has put me on my feet and almost cured me for the Dr. said I should be no better till warm weather next spring same as last year.

"The little girl is with kid from Durfee and I am having the pleasure of watching the little cuss grow and the milk route swell up—we are very careful of him as he will be the only heir to all Old Man Durfee's money. I am trying to break her off from the dope but she takes it on the sly and I have put her on an allowance of booze which she consumes like a fish. She is very passionate but I keep up with her by eating lots of eggs, game and such, and sleep all day—I weigh 186# so you see I have a good chance of winning out in the contest, but it keeps me pretty busy for I have to keep in with society which generally keeps me playing cards the first part of the night until twelve or one from which I adjourn down there until six or seven then come home and to bed until breakfast at twelve."²³

Corrine finally heard from the Durfee family in late February, when Luther's father arranged for his body to be transported to nearby Fort Gibbon for embalming, so it could be shipped home in a metallic casket the following summer.²⁴ Dot Prince, Luther's aunt, apparently wrote to Corrine offering her sympathy, but the rest of the family provided no assistance.

William Durfee did send money to C. R. Peck, one of Luther's close friends, to cover Luther's bills. But William Ballou convinced the lumber baron's embassy to give most of the bank draft to him as payment for Corrine's rent, leaving nothing for the widow. Corrine declared him "penurious" and kicked him out of her bed. William Ballou, who quickly moved on to a couple of grass widows in town, gave the matter only passing thought.

"There came a remittance from Old Man Durfee to my friend Peck to pay any bills and I put in my bills for rent, wood, etc., it was a mean trick on my part," William confessed to his brother, "but we are up in this country for the mighty dollar, even if we have to stint animal nature. I find that the older I get—or is it this country?—the meaner I grow."²⁵

For Corrine, William Ballou's casual act of greed was a monumental turning point. She reacted by going on a drunk with Mrs. White, a Rampart prostitute, wrecking Mayo's saloon and hitting bartender Frank Williams over the head with a chair when he attempted to throw them out. Then she tried (unsuccessfully) to sue Frank Williams for assault and battery.

"One of the most farcical cases ever heard in Rampart was decided by a jury in Judge Green's court Thursday afternoon," the Rampart Forum reported. "The jury was out about two minutes and returned a verdict of not guilty. The evidence showed that Mrs. Durfee and Mrs. Ward or White were both intoxicated and went to Williams' saloon, raised a disturbance, used foul language and were ejected. Mrs. Durfee, while on the stand, was questioned by C. J. Knapp, counsel for Williams, and asked by him if she was intoxicated at the time of the alleged assault said, 'I had only four drinks of whisky in the twenty-four hours.' Knapp said, 'I did not ask how many drinks you had, but were you intoxicated?' Mrs. Durfee answered, 'No, I was not—not at that time anyway. It would take more than four drinks to get me intoxicated, I can tell you.'

"Mrs. Durfee's counsel, C. B. Allen, in his address to the jury, persisted in bringing in outside matter, for instance, stating he had been informed that Mrs. Durfee had served nine months in the Dawson jail for selling furniture she did not own, but on investigation by him he found it to be false. After repeated warning by the judge to confine his remarks to the evidence in the case, Allen was fined $10 for contempt. He borrowed the money from a bystander, paid his fine and proceeded more regularly."²⁶

Three days later, Corrine Gray Durfee filed her last will and testament with the Rampart court. Her bills and final expenses were to be paid as soon as possible after her death, and her body was to be buried beside her late husband, wherever that might be. She bequeathed half of any property that might come to her from her late husband's will or estate to go to Dot Prince of Ashland, in case of Prince's death that estate would go on to her heirs or assignees to keep it in the Durfee family.

Corrine bequeathed one-fourth of what remained to her beloved cousin, Kathleen B. Hanlay of Salem, Ohio, and another quarter to her mother, Mrs. B. L. Bissler of Canton, Ohio, to revert later to James Hopkins of East Palestine, whose relationship to the family she failed to note. She left her jewelry and personal possessions to Kathleen Hanlay and James Hopkins "to share and share alike." Her faithful lawyer, Charles B. Allen, as executor of her estate was to be rewarded with a $300 bond.²⁷

Then she sent for William Ballou and asked him to buy her a supply of drugs.

"When I refused she gave me quite a stage act, as I thought at the time, and flourished the gun (which afterwards done the deed) around in a rather startling manner and threatened to take me along with her if I didn't do as she wished," the Vermonter reported to his brother Walt. "I have thought since that it is a wonder that she didn't do something of the kind, if nothing more than to make her end more dramatic—she dearly loved to do the grandstand act in real life and always spoke with pride of the Mounted Police officer in Dawson who committed suicide over her."²⁸

Two days later, between noon and two o'clock on Sunday, Corrine Gray Durfee shot herself through the head with a revolver. She was found dead by two Native women at six that evening, and the coroner's inquest, held privately the next morning, established suicide as the cause.²⁹

To William Ballou's immense relief, he was not called to testify. And, although he did hold himself partly responsible, he rationalized away all guilt.

"She had been mad at me for over a month since the money came in from Old Man Durfee to pay the debts and I put in my bill in full for rent for the cabin, wood and provisions," he wrote Walt. "This was my mean trick and wholly against the laws and rules of 'the underworld' but I find that this country makes one grow cold-blooded and stony hearted and, although the deed in itself is horrible and disgusting, I cannot help but feel that it was the wisest act that the little girl ever done for she was no good to herself nor anyone else—people in general think it was for love of Durfee that she done the deed but the fact of the matter was that she was out of dope and would not live without it."³⁰

C. R. Peck received a telegraph from Luther's parents requesting their son be buried in Rampart, contrary to their original plan, perhaps because of the additional expense of shipping Corrine to be buried with him in Wisconsin, as stipulated in her will. So husband and wife were interred side by side with their child³¹ in a beautiful clearing in the forest where the blueberries grew profusely, across from the Indian village. Mrs. Sally Hudson, who played there as a girl in the late 1930s, recalled there were no headboards (customary wooden grave markings), perhaps because a forest fire had swept the area. Today the little cemetery has been reclaimed by forest.³²

Settlement of Corrine's estate in 1904 revealed $53 in cash and $204 from the sale of her personal property. Executor Allen paid an outstanding bill of $6 for glasses, $1.50 for watch repair, and an undisclosed sum to Louis Vallier for digging the Durfee graves. The watch went to William R. Durfee. Corrine's cousin, Kathleen, and James Hopkins each got $1.65. Her mother, who must have died in the interim, was not mentioned, and lawyer Allen settled for far less than the $300 Corrine had hoped to pay him.³³

William Durfee died in 1915 with no male heir. His second wife outlived him, childless.

William Ballou took Luther Durfee's job at Northern Commercial and then vacationed Outside, returning in 1904 with a comely blond bride, to be re-embraced by Rampart's "four hundred." He was appointed United States Commissioner of Rampart, a political plum complete with the courtesy title of "Judge" Ballou, but that honor dimmed as the town's population dwindled from 1,500 to 150 when the gold gave out. "I have little to show for years of hard work," he wrote his brother, quite disillusioned.³⁴ He left Alaska for good in 1917, still searching for his fortune, but he never did get rich as he had intended.