Lizzie Borden and the Massachusetts Axe Murders

Ronald Bartle

Description

A refreshing account of a very famous case. Contains legal and other analysis. A fly-on-the-wall view of the nineteenth century USA justice system. A true story that reads like a thriller.

Sujets

• Droit et juridique
• USA
• Legal history
• États-Unis

Informations

• Publié par: Waterside Press
• Date de parution: 09 mai 2017
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781910979334
• Langue: English

Extrait

Lizzie Borden and the Massachusetts Axe Murders
Ronald Bartle
Copyright and publication details
Lizzie Borden and the Massachusetts Axe Murders
Ronald Bartle
ISBN 978-1-909976-43-6 (Paperback)
ISBN 978-1-910979-33-4 (Epub E-book)
ISBN 978-1-910979-34-1 (Adobe E-book)
Copyright © 2017 This work is the copyright of Ronald Bartle. All intellectual property and associated rights are hereby asserted and reserved by the author in full compliance with UK, European and international law. No part of this book may be copied, reproduced, stored in any retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, including in hard copy or via the internet, without the prior written permission of the publishers to whom all such rights have been assigned worldwide.
Cover design © 2017 Waterside Press by www.gibgob.com Front cover image from an original in the possession of Waterside Press.
Printed by Lightning Source.
Main UK distributor Gardners Books, 1 Whittle Drive, Eastbourne, East Sussex, BN23 6QH. Tel: [phone]; [e-mail] ; www.gardners.com
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Cataloguing-In-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book can be obtained from the British Library.
e-book Lizzie Borden and the Massachusetts Axe Murders is available as an ebook and also to subscribers of Ebrary, Ebsco, Myilibrary and Dawsonera.
Published 2017 by
Waterside Press Ltd
Sherfield Gables
Sherfield on Loddon, Hook
Hampshire RG27 0JG.
Telephone [phone]
Online catalogue WatersidePress.co.uk
Email [e-mail]
Table of Contents
Copyright and publication details ii
About the author v
Acknowledgements vi
Dedication vii
Lizzie Borden in Popular Culture ix
Floorplans x The Case Against Lizzie Borden 13 The Background 19 Before the Holocaust 35 Lizzie’s Visit to Alice 43 The Inquest 49 The Scene is Set 81 The Murder of Abby Borden 89 The Murder of Andrew Borden 111 The Evidence of Hannah Reagan 119 The Blood Mystery 127 The Murder Weapon 135 The Burning of a Dress 147 The Alibi 171 The Exclusion of the Inquest Evidence 193 The Exclusion of the Prussic Acid Evidence 201 Lizzie’s Failure to Give Evidence 211 Closing Speeches and Charge to the Jury 217 The Conclusion 231
Select Bibliography 245
Index 246
About the author

The author in the Garrick Club Library
Ronald Bartle was Deputy Chief Stipendiary Magistrate (now District Judge) for Inner London and earlier practised as a barrister. His books include The Telephone Murder: The Mysterious Death of Julia Wallace (2012); The Police Witness: A Guide to Presenting Evidence in Court (1984 onwards); Three Cases that Shook the Law (2016); and Bow Street Beak (re-issued 2016).
Acknowledgements
I wish to express my sincere thanks to Mr John Bernard for kindly creating and supplying the author’s photograph for this work.
Sources which have helped me in my research are noted in the Select Bibliography at the end of the book.
Dedication
To my wife Molly,
With grateful thanks for all her
enthusiastic support and encouragement
Lizzie Borden in Popular Culture
Lizzie Borden took an axe
And gave her mother forty whacks.
When she saw what she had done,
She gave her father forty-one.
Skipping/Nursery Rhyme — Traditional.
… you can’t chop your Papa up in Massachusetts
Not even if it’s planned as a surprise …
No, you can’t chop your Papa up in Massachusetts
You know how neighbors love to criticise.
… you can’t chop your Mama up in Massachusetts
Not even if you’re tired of Her cuisine …
No you can’t chop your Mama up in Massachusetts
You know it’s almost sure to cause a scene.
Extracts from Lizzie Borden — Chad Mitchell Trio (1962).
Floorplans

Ground floor, Borden House
Second floor, Borden House
Chapter One
The Case Against Lizzie Borden
“Here is a candle to light you to bed and here comes a chopper to chop off your head.”
Old English rhyme.
It has been said that for sheer altitude in the illustrative peaks of crime, the bloodstained palm goes to Miss Lizzie Borden of Fall River Massachusetts, and her inseparable symbol, the hatchet. The case is no ordinary murder mystery. Amid the welter of violent crime which fills the newspapers today, a few terrible murder trials have survived year upon year to retain their hold on the imagination of successive generations of readers and students of legendary homicide.
The study of the dreadful crime of murder is always a gruesome exercise, but some instances contain elements which place them in a category of their own. This may be because of the uniquely, almost unnaturally, shocking nature of the facts, the element of mystery contained in the circumstances or the degree of dispute concerning the conclusion of the jury at the trial. An example of the former is the UK’s Moors Murders in April 1966, perpetrated by Ian and Myra Hindley upon several children. An instance of the latter is the Wallace Case heard before the Liverpool Assizes in April 1931 ( see Chapter Twelve ).
The Lizzie Borden trial which came before the Superior Court of Massachusetts in 1893 combines both of these elements. Patricide and Matricide are acts of infinite wickedness. But to commit both within an hour and a half of each other is of such incredible evil that it defies words adequately to describe such an unsurpassable deed. Yet this was the charge levelled against Miss Lizzie Andrew Borden of Fall River on the 2 nd day of December 1892. The grand jury of the county of Bristol returned an indictment against her charging her with the murder of her step-mother Abby Durfee Borden, and her father Andrew Jackson Borden.
Few cases of murder have been subject to the same degree of analysis as this one. This is particularly true with reference to the United States of America and the State of Massachusetts, since Fall River in Massachusetts is the where the terrible events occurred. Dating from the time of the trial itself manifold books and legal articles have been written on the subject, lectures delivered, debates and seminars held and endless opinions, some by learned men of the law, expressed. Every aspect of this landmark case has been dissected and the house which was once occupied by the Borden family has been visited over the years by countless tourists.
Yet the arguments continue over the question of Lizzie’s guilt or innocence. Numerous authors and legal experts still differ on this crucial question. If she was innocent, a woman of a spotless character was rescued from the gallows. If, however, she was guilty, the verdict constitutes a disgraceful denial of justice where justice was desperately required.
A Controversial Case
Much of the controversy has centred upon the reported events of the 4 th August 1892. The lay-out of the Borden’s house, the members of the family who were present at the time and their various movements together with the element of time and moments of opportunity to carry out the murders have been endlessly discussed. The only person who has been arrested as being the murderer and indeed charged as such is Lizzie herself. Neither of the other possible candidates for the deed, namely John Vinnicum Morse, Lizzie’s uncle or Bridget Sullivan the family maid has been seriously posed as the guilty party. Indeed there has rarely been a celebrated case of murder where suspicion fell within such a narrow compass; both were effectively eliminated as suspects. If Lizzie herself was not the killer it had to be an intruder from outside, yet there is no evidence at all that this happened. Indeed the intense security the Borden family exercised made such a suggestion unlikely in the extreme.
Lizzie herself seemed anxious to present a credible theory that her father had enemies. She impressed this view upon her friend Alice Russell a few days before the killings and expressed to others that this was her opinion. But the whole pattern of the homicide spoke volumes against this theory. Why should someone bent on dispatching Andrew Borden kill Abby Borden first? There was a time lapse of at least an hour between the killings. The medical evidence is of vital importance for two reasons. Firstly, because of the fact that Abby Borden was murdered an hour to an hour and a half before her husband; secondly because the first blow received by Mrs Borden was delivered when she was facing her assailant. In the light of these two facts the theory of the defence that the murderer chased Abby up the stairs to her room in order to eliminate a witness to the killing of Andrew is patently unsound.
Since Andrew Borden was killed within a short period of arriving at home it may be presumed, from the medical evidence, that Abby was murdered well before he was on the premises. An interloper who had a grudge against Andrew would have no reason to make his task doubly difficult by killing Abby — against whom in any event he had no cause for ill-feeling. He would have been unfamiliar with the layout of the house and would have created greater peril for himself by the necessity of spending an hour hiding on the premises before carrying out the second homicide. His whole plan would have been the assassination of his victim and a rapid escape. Why should he complicate the exercise in this way?
Besides, it is universally the case that it is a witness to the killing which has to be eliminated. To slay a potential witness an hour before the bloody deed has occurred is surely unheard of. Since there was an appreciable period of time between the murders the further consideration arises as to why the alleged intruder should unleash such a furious assault upon a harmless woman who by common consent was most probably killed by the first blow which felled her. Yet the views of the medical experts, which the defence did not seek to contradict, was that Abby’s assailant stood astride