MA - Lizzie Borden: Axe murders, Fall River, 4 Aug 1892

[KarlK]

I didn't realize all the different aspects of the case (lesbianism, the half brother, other axe murders, etc...)

Well, back then cases that involved "morality" issues were the ones that captivated national attention but since the press in Victorian times avoided mentioning those issues directly it made for quite convoluted, sometimes surreal narratives that can be misleading to modern readers. There's a lot in the Borden Case that must be read between the lines.

 

[Danaya]

I think it was Lizzie.

 

[reportertype]

I remember reading that Lizzie did either buy or attempt to buy some type of poison. Some family members also reported being sick a day or two before the murders, but that is more likely from eating old food, as Andrew Borden was cheap and wouldn't have wanted it to waste. If I remember, it was the visiting relative and the maid who both fell ill.

One interesting facet of the timing is that Andrew had recently signed over some of his properties to some of Abby's relatives, which reportedly upset Lizzie, as she thought ALL of his properties and holdings belonged to herself and her sister. There were also myriad reporters of Lizzie being a kleptomaniac; in fact, some of the rooms in the house were kept locked by the parents because of this.

Merchants would let Andrew know when Lizzie had taken something and he would quietly pay it.

 

[Stella]

I believe Mr. Borden died intestate-without a will. There is also an old TV movie that suggests Lizzie committed the murders in the nude, then washed herself off in the basement after both murders. If so, that would explain why there was no blood on her clothes. I've read every book written about this case and I still can't give an opinion as to who did it. You could really make a case against everyone; Lizzie, the maid, the uncle, or the illegitimate son.

 

[Boyz_Mum]

I believe Mr. Borden died intestate-without a will. There is also an old TV movie that suggests Lizzie committed the murders in the nude, then washed herself off in the basement after both murders. If so, that would explain why there was no blood on her clothes. I've read every book written about this case and I still can't give an opinion as to who did it. You could really make a case against everyone; Lizzie, the maid, the uncle, or the illegitimate son.

Do you have any suggestions as far as the best reading material on this murder? Thanks in advance!

 

[dalcanton]

The Lizzie Borden case is definitely a cold case - almost 117 years old! Still, I've always been fascinated by this case mostly because it's one of those infamous whodunits that will never be solved (unless some mysterious diary shows up one day). I visited the original house in Fall River, MA, & stayed overnight (it's a B&B). I slept alone in the John Morse Guest Room, where Abby Borden was murdered. I'd like to hear others' opinions on this unsolved double murder in 1892. I've studied it a lot & although I wouldn't exactly exonerate Lizzie, neither could I convict her if I had been one of the jury members at that time. A lot of the "evidence" used against her was circumstantial at best, in my opinion.

 

[gaia227]

HI Dalcanton!

There is already another thread about Lizzy that was started within the last couple weeks.

http://www.websleuths.com/forums/showthread.php?t=82529

 

[gaia227]

This is a pretty good website. It has photo's, Lizzie's testimony at her trial, newspaper clippings, etc.

http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/LizzieBorden/bordenhome.html

I just can't get over the fact that the step-mother was murdered about 90 minutes before the father. So an intruder came into the house in broad daylight while other people were home, murdered the step-mother, then hung around or left and came back to murder the father and no one was any wiser? The time frame just doesn't make sense. Even if it was Lizzie why did she wait an hour and a half to murder her father? Was she not scared someone would find the body of her mother in bedroom - why not? Because the maid already knew?

 

[reportertype]

This is a pretty good website. It has photo's, Lizzie's testimony at her trial, newspaper clippings, etc.

http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/LizzieBorden/bordenhome.html

I just can't get over the fact that the step-mother was murdered about 90 minutes before the father. So an intruder came into the house in broad daylight while other people were home, murdered the step-mother, then hung around or left and came back to murder the father and no one was any wiser? The time frame just doesn't make sense. Even if it was Lizzie why did she wait an hour and a half to murder her father? Was she not scared someone would find the body of her mother in bedroom - why not? Because the maid already knew?

The time frame is why I think it had to be family member or someone who lived in the house. It's also why I don't think it's possible some random person came in, grabbed a handy axe and did the deed.

But it does make me think that if Lizzie did it, the maid had to know. Or vice versa, though there is nothing I've read that would indicate the maid had any reason to off her employers.

 

[gaia227]

Regarding my post above.......if Lizzie did it she waited 90 minutes to kill her father because he wasn't home when his wife was killed (duh!)

I think it had to be someone in the house too. After reading through Lizzie's testimony and initial version of events she just wavers to much. Her story is constantly changing. Not to mention I don't think it is very quiet business killing two people with an axe. There were no signs of a struggle so I wonder if Lizzie had poisoned them too to render them unconscious or incapicitated enough so they couldn't fight back.

There is some suspicion that maybe Lizzie and the maid were having an affair. I think it is possible Lizzie payed off the maid. From what I have read the maid went back to Ireland pretty soon after the murders and it was most likely an all expense paid trip thanks to Lizzie.

I would like to read more about Lizzie's brother (or half-brother).

 

[reportertype]

I know one account I read has the maid dying in Montana in the 1940s, I think. She may very well have been in Ireland before that, I don't know. Either way, every account I've read has her leaving town. So you're theory about a payoff is quite plausible, I think.

In one of John Douglas' books, when he recounts the case, he mentions that the maid was living out west, Wyoming or Montana, and fell ill. She called for someone as she had something important to tell them but before they could arrive, she recovered and so never told what she was going to.

 

[CastlesBurning]

I've long been fascinated by this case, perhaps moreso by the fact that I live in CT, not far from Fall River. I'm actually planning to visit the B&B and gravesite within the next few months, so I'm particularly glad to find this thread...

IMO the evidence is pretty strong against Lizzie. But...there's also a number of things that don't really fit. *shrugs*

 

[carrie]

Unfortunately for her, as a spinster without legitimate cause Borden would have been considered suspicious on that ground alone.

*respectfully snipped*

Hi KarlK,

I'm curious what you meant by a "spinster without legitimate cause."
Not following you there. My ignorance undoubtedly, but, could you explain what that means?

 

[carrie]

I would like to read more about Lizzie's brother (or half-brother).

*respectfully snipped*

Hi all,
I've always been very interested in this case and have read several books about it. Although it's been a long time ago.

gaia227,

I wanted to tell you I read a book about 10 years ago, not sure of the publishing date, in which the author focused on the half-brother, William.

Seems like, IIRC, the first chapter or so gave the history and details of the crime. After that, the rest of the book was all about William and why the author thought he was the murderer.

In a way, the book was similar to that one Patricia Cornwell wrote, entitled Jack the Ripper: Case Closed, in that the book focused on trying to prove William was the real culprit. Not sure hemade quite the claim Cornwell did in claiming the case was closed - lol. It was an interesting read, as, at the time, I'd never even heard of the illegitimate half - brother. I wish I could remember the title but I can't.

Anyway, just wanted to let you know there is at least one book out there that focuses entirely on William.

 

[carrie]

Hi all,

I was wondering, since we have Lizzie's testimony and statements taken at the time, if the use of statement analysis could be useful in deciding if she was guilty.

I found this link (below) in the Caylee forum. It's an interesting website. The author gives the basics of the technique and offers online classes on it. The most interesting part to me is a page where he analyzes the statements made by the accused in some famous cases, some unsolved. The way it's set up, it seems that he made the analyses in some cases prior to them being found guilty and was correct, as he has updates on some of them. He analyzes statements from Casey Anthony, Michael Jackson, O.J. Scott Peterson as well as players in the disappearance of Natalie Holloway, Chandra Levy, and others.

Anyway, I thought it might be interesting to try to apply his methods to Lizzie's testimony. See what you guys think. I'll be looking at it further as well and post if I come up with anything.

For the record, like most of you, I'm not sure that Lizzie commited the murders and I'm not sure she didn't.

Thanks for starting this thread.

Oh yeah, almost forgot. Here's the link: http://www.statementanalysis.com

 

[pittsburghgirl]

This is a response to the request for reading recommendations on this case. While Wikipedia is not an authoritative source of information, it is a good place to look for books and articles. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lizzie_Borden

One of the most interesting theories argues that Lizzie Borden was an incest/sexual abuse victim. Marcia Carlisle's essay "What Made Lizzie Borden Kill?" argues the Lizzie did it but that she was also a victim. Carlisle also provides a nice reading list at the end of the article. The link is to the full article.

The link between sexual abuse and parricide came forcefully into the public consciousness in 1982, when the sixteen-year-old Richard Jahnke killed his father after enduring years of physical abuse and witnessing the physical and sexual abuse of his mother and sister. According to Paul Mones, a lawyer who specializes in defending abused children who kill their parents and the author of a book on the subject, the Jahnke case was “the first parricide to attract intense national attention since Lizzie Borden.” In 1986 a Long Island teen-ager named Cheryl Pierson paid a classmate to murder her father. When she was caught, Pierson told authorities that she had been abused by her father since she was eleven and that she feared he was about to turn on her younger sister. These two cases drew attention to abuse in respectable middle-class families, families in which the abusers, as Mones writes in his When a Child Kills, are “successful wage-earners, regarded by their peers as honest, hardworking people,” people, in other words, “generally indistinguishable from the rest of us.”
In the nineteenth century the connection between sexual abuse and homicide was simply not part of the public consciousness. A rare example came to light in Boston in 1867, when the seventeen-year-old Alice Christiana Abbott poisoned her stepfather. According to the correspondent for The New York Times, she claimed he had had “improper connection” with her from the time she was thirteen. She had told others about it, but most believed “something was the matter with her head.” When her stepfather threatened to put her in a reform school if she revealed the abuse, she killed him. Her case came before the Suffolk County Grand Jury in August 1867. That body committed her to the Taunton Lunatic Asylum without further investigation. Buried in the records of the Magdalen Asylum, a home for “fallen women” in Philadelphia at the turn of the century, are other reports of women seeking refuge from their fathers. The administrators of the home told these women to work hard and to pray hard; little other recourse was available.

http://www.americanheritage.com/articles/magazine/ah/1992/4/1992_4_66.shtml

Here is a link to a second article referencing Carlisle's essay and her theory:

http://mensnewsdaily.com/2007/11/22/the-lizzie-borden-conspiracy-with-hyman-lubinsky/

It is also possible that he felt the slayings were justified. David Lee Dickerson believes Lizzie was probably an incest victim. Here he agrees with the theory articulated by Marcia R. Carlisle in her essay, “What Made Lizzie Borden Kill?” Dickerson points to the extreme brutality of the murders as suggesting a fury triggered by sexual violation and Carlise finds “an impressive body of circumstantial evidence to suggest, in that bloody morning’s work, the awakening rage of the incest survivor.”
Carlisle notes, “In Heroes of Their Own Lives, published in 1988, that Linda Gordon analyzed the case records of one of the many child-protection organizations at the turn of the century. She identified one hundred cases of incest. . . . About one-quarter of the episodes took place in households in which the mother was absent. In another 36 percent of cases the mother was ‘weakened’ by illness or fear of violence from the male in the household.”

 

[VespaElf]

Yes it is in Mass. But it wouldn't be the first time something like this happened. For instance, Jeffrey Dahmer, as a child lived in WA state. When he was 12, a little girl went missing from her home in WA state, less than two blocks from where the 12 yr old Dahmer lived. Although the crime has never been proven to be him, many people now believe that it was Dahmer's first kill. When his parents moved when he was 14, he went with them. And no more killings, (that we know of anyway), happened until he was much older. Years and years went by, with his muderous streak staying dormant. The child in WA was found murdered not long after she went missing. Again, this happened on the other side of the country.

*With Respect* You mean TED BUNDY........It was Bundy not Dahmer you are referring to..................The little girl ,btw,was also NOT found......the theory/myth is she was buried underground as the street was being repaved.
Dahmer's victims were all male(Bundy's all females)and Dahmer killed his first (male)victim when he(Dahmer)was in high school(remains were found in woods behind his house,iirc) Slightly O/T but Im a stickler for facts!

 

[MaryLiz]

Originally Posted by Laura_Bean
Yes it is in Mass. But it wouldn't be the first time something like this happened. For instance, Jeffrey Dahmer, as a child lived in WA state. When he was 12, a little girl went missing from her home in WA state, less than two blocks from where the 12 yr old Dahmer lived. Although the crime has never been proven to be him, many people now believe that it was Dahmer's first kill. When his parents moved when he was 14, he went with them. And no more killings, (that we know of anyway), happened until he was much older. Years and years went by, with his muderous streak staying dormant. The child in WA was found murdered not long after she went missing. Again, this happened on the other side of the country.

*With Respect* You mean TED BUNDY........It was Bundy not Dahmer you are referring to..................The little girl ,btw,was also NOT found......the theory/myth is she was buried underground as the street was being repaved.
Dahmer's victims were all male(Bundy's all females)and Dahmer killed his first (male)victim when he(Dahmer)was in high school(remains were found in woods behind his house,iirc) Slightly O/T but Im a stickler for facts!

Right, that was Ann Marie Burr. Here's her Charley Project page where she is still listed as missing.

http://www.charleyproject.org/cases/b/burr_ann.html

 

[Stella]

Checking with Amazon, I found there are a few recent books on the case that I haven't read. The ones I did read are out of print now. On Wikipedia, there is a rich source of references on Lizzie reading that I did read. Check your library and half price books to see if they have any of the older books.

 

[justthinkin]

Wow. I started off reading about Lizzie, and then wound up looking into the Austin serial killings in 1885.

William S. Porter AKA O. Henry actually looks good to be a suspect. He was living in a boarding house within blocks of most the murders. Other reasons make me think so as well.

Okay, back to Lizzie. I got sidetracked.