On Tuesday, 1 March 1938, Pekin Daily Times readers were met with the shocking and sensational headline:
“DELAVAN BRIDE VICTIM OF GUN SHOT – Mrs. James Crabb, 19, Found Dead in Bed at Banker’s Residence”
The 19-year-old bride, Betty Ersula (Collison) Crabb, wife of a Delavan banking family scion – married only 5 weeks earlier – was dead of a gunshot wound! Her death occurred at the home of her husband’s parents, in the early morning hours.
This tragic tale and its grievous aftermath were told by Norman V. Kelly (1932-2020), a private investigator who after retirement turned his attention to writing mysteries and true crime books. Kelly was author of the 1999 book, “Shadow of a Nightmare: The true story of murder, deceit and greed in Delavan, Illinois – 1938.”
A copy of Kelly’s book is in the Pekin Public Library’s Local History Collection, along with copies of newspaper articles that reported on the event of Betty Crabb’s death and the resulting trials – literal and figurative – that brought down a once prominent family.
Kelly derived the title of his book from a 1 March 1938 conversation of two retired Delavan farmers:
“Did you hear about that young Crabb woman?”
“I surely did. I heard it was a suicide.”
“Could be. I heard they was at a party, drinkin’ you know. Hard tellin’.”
“Well, whatever it was, it’s gonna cast another dark shadow on that family, you can bet on that.”
“Shadow? Sounds more like a nightmare to me.”
From the title of Kelly’s book, the retelling or repeating of the story here at “From the History Room” is titled “A Nightmare’s Echo.”
But what did that farm mean by “another” dark shadow? To answer that question, we shall review the history of the Banking Crabbs of Delavan:
I. Daniel Crabb (1818-1888), a pioneer settler of Tazewell County, came to Sand Prairie Township in 1844, then settled in Dillon Township in 1846, and founded a private bank in Delavan in 1874. Daniel’s bank merged with Tazewell County National Bank in 1887. At his death, he left an estate valued at $300,000, an immense sum for that period. Daniel married Margaret F. Bailey, and their son was:
II. James Warren Crabb I (1854-1926), followed in his footsteps as a Delavan banker. He married Elizabeth S. Schureman and had a son named Warren Willis Crabb. Here is the biographical sketch of J. W. Crabb I from “From “Delavan: 1837-1937” –
“James Warren Crabb, son of Daniel and Margaret Bailey Crabb, was born December 28, 1854, in Dillon Township. Following his father, he entered the banking business in Delavan and soon became active in the community. He was active in the promotion of the Tazewell County Fair Association and served for a time as president of its board of directors. Always taking a close interest in civic affairs, he served as an alderman and in 1893 was elected mayor of the city. He donated the site of Ayer Public Library to the township He was a member of the Presbyterian Church, the Masonic fraternity, Mystic Shrine and Knights Templar. In 1875 he was married to Elizabeth Schureman, and to them were born three children. In a collision of his automobile with an Illinois Central train at the Locust Street crossing, he was killed March 30, 1926. As a mark of respect to one who had long served the people of his city, all business houses of the city were closed during his funeral.”
The sudden, accidental death of J.W. Crabb I in 1926 was the first shadow to fall upon the Banking Crabbs. The next shadow fell about 10 years later.
III. Warren Willis Crabb (1892-1947), also went into banking in Delavan like his father and grandfather, and expected his son to do the same. Married firstly Elizabeth Monroe, but he scandalously (as his contemporaries saw it) divorced her in 1936 and married a younger woman, Catherine Steinmetz of Peoria. W.W. Crabb’s eldest son, expected to follow his father as a banker, was James Warren Crabb II, popularly known as “Jimmie.”
Next week we will tell of how Jimmie and Betty met and married, and how Betty met her death at the end of Jimmie’s Colt .45 pistol.
