These tragic actress associations were apt: After Pat’s husband, Sam Daniels, an appellate lawyer, left her for his secretary, she had psychotic depressive episodes that included, on one occasion, feeding the possessions of their three children, whom she called “schnickelfritzes,” into a living-room fire.
Sam was obviously not the picture of mental health either. Yes, he took the schnickelfritzes for fast-food feasts and magical sounding boat trips under the Big Dipper. But he also enjoyed popping up in the window with a nylon stocking over his head when Pat was washing the dishes, and whispering “you’re not fit to live” as she slept.
Pat found solace as a born-again Baptist, and after the breakup relocated with Patsy and two sons to the small town of Montreat, N.C., because her favored televangelist, Billy Graham, lived there. His wife, Ruth, helped route her to a psychiatric hospital, where she got electroconvulsive therapy, and the Daniels brood into foster care with a missionary couple, which was its own kind of shock treatment: intercom spying system, Maltese puppy tied to a pole and left alone in a basement, etc.
The strict mealtime rules there probably contributed to Patsy’s eventual eating disorder and own institutionalization, under the questionable care of a sinister “Dr. Bill” who had also treated her mother. The sense of control that came with working at the morgue, vile odors and crunch of hardened arteries being sectioned notwithstanding, was probably the cure.
The “Cornwell” came from Patricia’s late ex-husband, Charles, who had been one of her English professors at Davidson College, where she was admitted as a tennis player so good she played on men’s teams, despite a subpar academic record.
