(died about Oct. 1905) presumed murder victim. (Belle Gilchrist) Parents: Mr and Mrs William Gilchrist. She is described in a newspaper story of 1908 as having brothers Duncan and William living at St. Elmo, in GC. (Cornwall Freeholder 18 Sept. 1908) Isabella and her parents are described in the press as being of Maxville. The farm she owned was just across the border in Stormont, being on lot A in the 6th Concession of Roxborough Township, but at one mile from Maxville it was, in any case, near enough to the town to deserve the Maxville name. On her way to Alaska in 1904, Isabella Gilchrist met an American called Lee H. Johnston, described as a “promoter.” She and Johnston were married in June 1905, though he may already have had a wife. Isabella’s body was later found, cut into pieces and partly burned, and buried near a cabin she had been sharing with Johnston at Nome, Alaska.
Johnston was arrested in Seattle in August 1908, on the charge of Isabella’s murder. His explanation was that she had committed suicide and that in agreement with her request in her suicide note he had sought to dispose of the body secretly. Meanwhile, between the disappearance of Isabella and the discovery of her body, Johnston had gone to Maxville and with the aid of forged papers effected the sale of the farm property to its tenant, Charles Morrow. Later, Isabella’s sister, Mrs C. C. Hedge, at a sitting of the High Court of Justice in Cornwall, in Nov. 1913, recovered the farm from Morrow on the grounds that Johnston had no legal right to sell it to him. In 1914, the case was before the courts again. The result was that Morrow had to pay a second time for his farm. This is the impressive farm property, now known under the name of Morrowdale, which catches the eye of travellers between Maxville and Highway 138, and which is still operated by the Morrow family. While being taken by steamer from Seattle to Nome for trial in the summer of 1908 Johnston disappeared overboard, and is thought to have perished.
Johnston’s own account of Isabella’s death in his signed statement read as follows, “It was just about dusk, on a cold evening in October, I was going down to an old well, near our cabin, for some water. My wife was standing in the doorway and smiled at me, telling me to hurry back, as supper was about ready. I told her I would, and arrived on my return trip, in about five minutes. What met my gaze when I returned was my wife’s prostrate form, stretched across the doorway, her bosom heaving and a look of great pain on her face. By her side, was a half glass of Cyanide of potassium. She died about five minutes after my arrival. Near her side, was a note. I lost the note.”
Johnston reconstructed the suicide note from memory: “Darling Lee–I realize that I am no companion for you, and never can be, nothing but death will relieve my suffering, I want you to have all my personal and real property, and no one else. Dispose of my body secretly and let no one know I sought self-destruction. Forgive me and God bless you.”
[Thomas W. Munro,] “Do You Remember,” Glengarry News 23 June 1939 (fairly detailed narrative; includes the two passages by Johnson quoted in the present entry) * undated clipping, presumably from Montreal Gazette of Nov. 1913, on the trial in Cornwall, with retelling of the Belle Gilchrist story, in papers of J.G. Harkness in Archives of Ontario * arrest and death of Johnston, Cornwall Freeholder 18 Sept., 2 Oct. 1908 * Cornwall court case, CF 21 Nov. 1913, Cornwall Standard & CF both 10 Dec. 1914 * Gilchrist (Morrow) farm, Maxville (1991) 759-761 * Registry Ofiice, Stormont County, for lot named