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Clan Munro USA
Genealogy Pages
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 1846 - 1902 (56 years)
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| Name |
Mary Elizabeth Sanger [1] |
| Born |
1846 |
, , New Hampshire, USA  [1] |
| Gender |
Female |
| Died |
1902 |
Phoenix, Maricopa Co., Arizona, USA [1] |
| Person ID |
I47278 |
Munro |
| Last Modified |
21 Feb 2003 |
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| Notes |
- Mollie Monroe: memorable, 'crazy' character of early Prescott
By Michael Wurtz
Special to the Courier
Mollie Monroe has the unfortunate distinction of being the first woman in the Arizona Territory to be declared insane. Born in New Hampshire in 1846 and christened Mary Elizabeth Sanger, folks knew her at various times as Cowboy Mollie, Mary Sawyer, and the Amazon of Arizona, Mollie.
Mollie's family was fairly affluent. They gave Mollie a finishing school education to acquire the skills to become the wife of a successful businessman, the life they wished for her.
Unfortunately, her parents' hopes and wishes did not anticipate that Mollie would fall in love at 17 with a young man they deemed totally unacceptable. His parents also disapproved of the match.
Mollie Monroe and her husband discovered Monroe Springs (later becoming the famous resort and spa of Castle Hot Springs). Mollie had the unfortunate distinction of being the first woman in the Arizona Territory to be declared insane.
As was fairly common at the time, the young man became a "Remittance Man." His family sent him west and paid a monthly or yearly remittance to stay away.
Auburn-haired, green-eyed Mollie was strong-minded, however, and two months later, she secretly left her parents' home late one night. Dressed in men's clothes and going under the name of Sam Brewer, she headed west to find her man.
She joined a prospecting party and worked her way to Santa Fe, New Mexico There she learned that her young man had died in a barroom brawl only two weeks earlier.
Swearing revenge, Mollie set out to find her lover's killers. She put on a man's disguise and joined a wagon train heading west. Crisscrossing the West from Montana to Mexico, Mollie looked in vain for the killers.
For several months, Mollie dropped out of sight, but sometime in 1864, at the age of 18, she arrived at Ft. Whipple, Arizona Territory, now the wife of a young Army captain. She was now every inch the perfect Army officer's wife.
The Arizona Miner, Prescott's newspaper, reported her as vivacious and charming, liked by everyone. In late 1865, her husband evidently transferred to another post, but Mollie decided to remain in Prescott.
We don't know the reason, but we do know that soon after she was wearing men's clothes again. She preferred buckskin shirts, and she took to wearing a gun slung low on her hip.
Soon she was the talk of the town, drinking whiskey in the local bars, swearing like a trooper, smoking a pipe and gambling with the best (or worst) of them. She was "one of the boys" and a constant thorn in the side of the town's respectable women.
Mollie made the papers in 1872 when someone saw her in a dress! The Arizona Miner stated it was the first time in seven years someone saw her in anything but pants.
Although Mollie was a hard-riding, gun-toting gambler, she was also a soft touch for any man or woman, who was down and out. She spent many a night nursing sick miners or giving her last dollar to a lady of the evening whose luck was running low. Mollie was the first person they called when someone needed help, and she always answered.
Without a benefit of clergy, Mollie had several husbands during the late 1860s, most of them miners. Sometime in 1869 or 1870, she met George Monroe, a prospector. The 1870 census lists her a Mollie Monroe, occupation cook.
George and Mollie prospected all around the Bradshaw Mountains and in the desert south of Prescott. On one of those prospecting trips, they found a warm spring in the desert country near Wickenburg. they called it Monroe Springs. They later changed the name to Castle Hot Springs, and it became a well-known resort and spa.
By 1877, Mollie's behavior became more and more predictable. She drank heavily and disappeared for days at a time. In May of that year, the sheriff brought her into town disheveled and irrational. They had found her wandering around Peeples Valley. Yavapai County officials conducted a sanity hearing, declared Mollie insane and ordered her confined.
At the time, the Arizona Territory did not have a mental hospital, so they took Mollie in a wagon to the Stockton (California) Insane Asylum. Within a few months, she became so violent that they moved her to San Quentin Prison where they could watch her closely. By 1878, she had calmed down enough they could move her back to Stockton. There she remained until 1887 when Arizona built the Territorial Asylum in Phoenix and they moved her there.
Mollie is on record as patient No. 2. She was now 41 years old. She had been in mental institutions since she was 31.
In 1895, Mollie escaped from the asylum. She roamed the desert around Phoenix for four days before Indians found her near the Gila River. She went back to the asylum where she stayed, almost forgotten, until she died in 1902 at 56.
Questions about Mollie remain unanswered. Was she really insane? Or was she an alcoholic with delirium tremors? Perhaps she had a disease such as syphilis, which can cause brain damage.
In the 1870s and '80s, insane asylums were truly snake pits. If you weren't insane when you went in, you probably would be insane before ling. If we had the medical knowledge then that we do now, what would be Mollie's diagnosis?
We have no answers, but it makes history very interesting!
Compiled and edited by Allen Alger, Genealogist, Clan Munro Association, USA
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| Sources |
- [S8] Clan Munro files - Redden, Virginia, Virginia Redden, Email from Virginia Redden - 2 Jan 2001 (Reliability: 3).
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