William Grant “Habeas Corpus” Anderson Attorney William Anderson developed a reputation for being a technical legal expert and frequently defended African American clients. ETHELENE WHITMIRE
hicago, 1900. The courtroom was packed with lawyers waiting to hear a decision. In 1895, Joseph Wyman was sentenced to life in Joliet prison for the murder of Wilhemina Dinger. Wyman appealed the decision and hired a Black attorney, William Grant Anderson, who filed a petition of habeas corpus, arguing that the mittimus (a type of warrant) did not state what crime the defendant was charged with and he should not be convicted without knowing the charge was against him. The prosecutors argued that this was a technicality. After listening to hours of arguments, the judge freed Wyman from prison even though he thought he was guilty of the crime.1 Anderson’s use of the writ of habeas corpus would become so widespread and successful that he earned the nickname, “Habeas Corpus” Anderson. The Chicago Daily Tribune published his portrait in July 1902 under the headline “Negro Lawyer Who Opens Prison Doors.” The caption under the portrait summarized his successful release of banker and embezzler Charles Warren Spalding and a long list of people he freed from prison, including murderers, robbers, and burglars. Later, a caption for a photograph in the Chicago Defender called Anderson “the man who has taken over 1,000 prisoners out of the Penitentiary on the Habeas Corpus writ.”2 Anderson was not always successful in his defense of his clients. Sometimes the loss of a case had dire consequences. On Monday, September 19, 1910, three homes in one neighborhood became crime scenes. At around 12:05 A.M., an intruder entered the bedroom window at Clarence Halsted’s home on Church Street. Awakened by a noise, Halsted grabbed at the clothing of the intruder as he made his escape through the window and ripped away a pocket. A short time later, an intruder entered the nearby McNabb home and molested Mrs. McNabb by
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Portrait of William Anderson, c. 1915.
putting “his hand under her clothes against her bare body.” Both Mrs. McNabb and her daughter, Jessie, who shared a bed with her mother, were later able to describe the intruder.
