In May 1917, Kerrigan was nearing the end of a four-month-long personal appearance publicity tour that had taken him across the United States and into Canada. At one of the final stops, a reporter for The Denver Times asked Kerrigan if he would be joining the war. Kerrigan replied:
I am not going to war. I will go, of course, if my country needs me, but I think that first they should take the great mass of men who aren't good for anything else, or are only good for the lower grades of work. Actors, musicians, great writers, artists of every kind—isn't it a pity when people are sacrificed who are capable of such things—of adding to the beauty of the world.
Picked up and reprinted in newspapers across the country, this statement stunned his fans and his popularity plummeted, never to fully recover.[citation needed]
Family members later claimed in Behind the Screen (2001) by William J. Mann that his slump in popularity was more due to his living with his mother and partner James Vincent in the same house, and not having a business manager to overcome the negative publicity.[citation needed]
Revival
In the spring of 1924, after John Barrymore bowed out, Kerrigan was assigned the starring role in Captain Blood. While the film was a moderate success, critics were unmoved and Kerrigan found himself working less and less and in smaller roles. In December 1924, Kerrigan was injured in an automobile accident in Illinois. According to the Des Moines Tribune (page 1, Monday, December 8, 1924) his face was badly scarred and it was stated that "he may never star in films again".[1]
Personal life and death
Kerrigan lived with his domestic partner James Carroll Vincent from about 1914 until Kerrigan's death in 1947.[citation needed]
James Carroll Vincent
James Carroll Vincent (November 9, 1897 – May 15, 1948) was a silent movie actor. He was born in Baltimore, Maryland, and moved to California to be an actor where he met Kerrigan. Vincent moved into Kerrigan's home at 2307 Cahuenga Boulevard in Los Angeles, where they began a long-term relationship. He was listed at various times as Kerrigan's secretary or gardener.[2] Not to be confused with actor James Vincent, born in 1882 and only three years younger than Kerrigan, while his partner is described as being much younger than Kerrigan;[3] or stage manager James Vincent (who worked with Katharine Cornell and was long-time friend of George Cukor), born in 1900 who committed suicide in 1953 in New York City.[4]
In 1919 Vincent, who was a "juvenile" actor with Bessie Barriscale, appeared in the cast of Out of Court,[5] in 1920 he was in the cast of The Coast of Opportunity[6] and in 1924 in the cast of $30,000, all three of them movies with or by Kerrigan.[7] In 1924, Kerrigan and Vincent, along with several of their friends, were in an automobile accident in Dixon, Illinois, on the route from Sterling to Chicago. In news reports Vincent was again named as Kerrigan's secretary.[8]
After Kerrigan's death, Vincent married Mitty Lee Turner (1894–1968) on October 24, 1947. On March 15, 1948, Vincent committed suicide by gas in his bedroom at 14716 Magnolia Boulevard in Van Nuys, California, nine months after the death of Kerrigan.[10] He is buried at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, California.[11]
Filmography
A Man's Man (1917)Lobby card with Kerrigan (left) in The Drifters (1919)
^Wilson, Scott. Resting Places: The Burial Sites of More Than 14,000 Famous Persons, 3d ed.: 2 (Kindle Location 25361). McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers. Kindle Edition.
^"Ends Life by Gas". The van Nuys News: 4. March 18, 1948. Retrieved October 3, 2017.
^"17 March 1948". The Los Angeles Times: 31. March 17, 1948. Retrieved October 3, 2017.
^Workman, Christopher; Howarth, Troy (2016). "Tome of Terror: Horror Films of the Silent Era". Midnight Marquee Press. p. 222.ISBN978-1936168-68-2.
