1. "The Swedish Suspect"
Posted by augusta on Dec-28th-03 at 1:02 PM

This comes from "Victorian Vistas", Volume 2, page 339:

"Suspicion was directed early toward a Swede employe of Mr. Borden who worked on his farm at South Swansea.  It was said that he came here to get some wages that were due him but Mr. Borden said he had no money handy but would pay him when he returned from the bank.

"Mr. Borden went to the First National Bank this morning and returned shortly after 10 o'clock.  Whether or not the Swede called again cannot be told at this writing."

This is the first I've heard of this man.  Does anyone have any more information on him?

Wouldn't that be Alfred Johnson, the Swede who worked on Andrew's farm and came to the Borden house to chop wood and mow the lawn?  The one that Bridget refers to as the Portuguese?  Thats the only Swede I've ever read about in Andrew's employ. 

It sounds as though the reference is to Alfred C. Johnson (who was Swedish).  He worked on Andrew's Swansea farm for about nine years and did "work at the house, cutting wood and cleaning up the yard, when not busy at the farm." (Wit.Stmts. 36,37)  He also told the police where the hatchets and axes were kept in the Borden house.

I guess it's not unlikely that he would have come by Second Street to pick up some wages.  But I hadn't heard that he came by the day of the murders.  And surely that would have come out when he was interviewed on August 11 by George Seaver. Frederick Eddy was questioned at the farm at the same time and he doesn't seem to have made mention of it, either.  I wonder what VV is using as a source?

(Oops, looks like Susan was quicker off the mark -- again!) 

(Message last edited Dec-28th-03  4:56 PM.)

There was a supposed visitor at 9 a.m. at the front door Thursday.
That has not been proved.
It always sounded to me like the circumstances surrounding the Manchester murder where the employee comes for wages and is blown off.

This alleged encounter is in a couple of places I think.  All Newspapers, tho.

Thank you for the great posts!  That must be it.  I remember hearing about the Portugese man who worked at the Swansea farm.  I didn't know, or forgot, his name was "Johnson".  I wonder why Bridget thought he was Portugese?? 
Yes, I agree that if he had come round on Thursday it would have come out in testimony somewhere.
The Victorian Vistas use old newspapers as their sources.  But the editor doesn't use them verbatim.  And in parts where he does, he doesn't put quotation marks around it, which is on the maddening side.  I guess he did it that way to make it more readable, but I'd think he would have known that people would use these as reference books ... 
I guess the sources used are in one of the three volumes or in the back of the book - they certainly aren't on the same page as the (seemingly paraphrased) article.  Grrrrr ...
The illustrations in Victorian Vistas are irritating, too.  The list is in the front of the book - not captioned on the page.  So whenever you want to see what something is, you have to stop and look it up in the index.  Grrrrrrrr again ....
Don't get me wrong - the books are very good.  It must have been cheaper to publish this way.  They are loaded with photos, and photos are not inexpensive to publish.

Sorry Diana, didn't mean to step on your toes, your post is far more substantial than mine.  I thought I was alone at the time when I posted my answer to Augusta. 

Kat, Lincoln allegedly has witnesses to this 9 AM visit to the front door of the Borden house.  Her opinion is that that was the time when the actual note was delivered for Abby as an excuse to get her out of the house so she could go downtown and sign paperwork with Andrew for whatever property shenanigans were supposed to be going on.  Apparently, Lizzie got the note first and slammed the door in the face of the delivery boy.  If you'd like, I could check on the names that she has listed for the neighbors that were witnesses to see if it jells with anything else that might be out there? 

Augusta, I've read that at the time, the Portuguese were considered low men on the totem pole, even lower then the Irish.  It may have been Bridget's way of saying that this guy was a foreigner and was beneath her as an Irish woman.  There seems to have been alot of prejudice going around in the 1890s. 

First, it is possible that Bridget never met the servant on Andy's farm, and assumed it was a Portoguese. Maybe Andy employed one previously? Just like E & L calling the maid "Maggie" (a generic name like the "tin lizzie"?).

Most of all is the testimony of the one person who was present and observed the person who left: "it wasn't Bridget or anyone who worked for Father". Implies Lizzie did see the Swede earlier?

Is this the *Swede* who was sick, or is this the *Swede* who didn't come to Fall River from Swansea with the eggs because Morse had collected them the day before?
Which guy are you guys referring to?

Here are the Portuguese in the case:

Portuguese — W.S., pg. 33, Medley, Fall River, Sept. 13, 1892 notes,


"I have visited New Bedford, going to the hardware store of Hillman & Vincent.  Mr. Mark Vincent is the man who sold the ax of which I have before made mention, the purchase being made about two days before the murder.  I took Mr. Vincent to see the Portuguese working at the slaughter house on the Davis farm, and who is well acquainted with Mr. Morse.  But after a thorough look at the man, concluded he was not the man;  neither had he ever noticed him in the store at any time.  The Portuguese man has a distinctive look about him;  and anyone seeing him once, would know him again.  This Portuguese claims never to have been in New Bedford, except on Sunday, at any time within six months."


Portuguese — W.S., pg. 6, Harrington, and Officer Leonard, Aug. 4, 1892, notes, 


"Officer Leonard and I had a  call to the N.B. Savings Bank.  There we found a Portuguese who was drawing out his full deposit of sixty odd dollars.  He could speak English but poorly, so we brought him to the station.  Officer Leonard went for an interpreter, and the suspect giving a satisfactory account of himself, he was allowed to go." [See Antonio Auriel]


Portuguese, Farm-hand — Rebello, pg. 50n.  Also, Porter, pg. 49: 


"On Sunday (two) 'outside clues' came up for consideration . . . The other clue was to the effect that a Portuguese had been seen burying a bloody hatchet on the Borden farm in Swansea.  Officer Medley visited the farm and searched in vain where the axe was alleged to have been buried.  He found a Portuguese laborer who had been on the farm all day Thursday and who had killed some chickens for market."

from:  LABVM/L  Suspects List, Pt III:
http://www.lizzieandrewborden.com/CrimeLibrary/SuspectsListPart3.htm

I can't recall where I read that Bridget made a statement to that effect, but, reading through the Preliminarys she knows that the man from the farm that comes to the house is named Alfred.  There must have been some confusion or question about a Portuguese that worked for Andrew, found this in the Trial, Doherty is on the stand, pg 595:

Q. Will you be kind enough to state what it was?

A. Yes, sir.  I said, "Miss Borden, where were you when this was done?"  She said, "It must have been done while I was in the barn."  Was there a Portuguese working for your father over the river?"  She said, "No, sir.  Mr. Johnson and Mr. Eddy worked for my father."  "Were they here this morning?"  "No, sir, Mr. Eddy is sick.  They would not hurt my father anyhow." etc, etc, etc.    

I don't know which employee is in question, Kat.  I didn't recall a Swedish guy working for Andrew.  And I had never heard the story about how this Swedish man was looking to get paid, and Andrew supposedly got his wages at the bank Thursday morning.

This comes from Hoffman, page 183:

"Alfred C. Johnson
Alfred C. Johnson was the property manager of a farm Andrew Jackson Borden owned in Swansea, Massachusetts, referred to as the "upper Swansea farm" to distinguish it from the "lower" Swansea farm managed by William Eddy.  When police officer Patrick H. Doherty asked Lizzie after the murders if Johnson or Eddy could have killed the Bordens, Lizzie said neither was capable of harming them and they were immediately dropped as possible suspects. *

"Johnson and Eddy did give statements to the Fall River police about their knowledge of any axes or hatchets at 92 Second Street.  They were both summoned to appear at the trial of Lizzie Borden but were not called upon to testify."

* = Gee, they dropped them as suspects just because of that?

"Eddy" doesn't sound Portugese to me.

To the Witness Statements! 

Other writers said they were investigated by the police, of course.
"Eddy" could just be a shortened name made more pronouncable. Haven't you ever heard of this? Is your backgound British?

Yup, you're right, Rays.  "Eddy" could be a Porgtugese name (or other) made more "Americanized".

My background is pretty much just a mixture - American caucasian.  I had an ancestor whose name was changed when he emigrated to the US because he couldn't speak English.  It's weird not knowing what your real last name is.

The subject of last names is very interesting. "Last names" as we know them were relatively recent, like in the last 500 years. Originally from the trade, like Archer, Miller, Wainwright; or from the location. The basic was the patronym (son of ...). Iceland still uses this ...sen or ...dottir. When most people lived all their lives in small villages, you didn't need last names. How often do you use a last name when talking to friends?

Years ago I talked to an Indian from Asia. He had FOUR names. His first name, his family name, his tribal name, and his original village name. (As I remember it.) Think of "Lizzie Andrewsdottir Borden clan of Fall River Mass". In fact Scandinavian names are so common (like the Chinesw) they were the first to use numerical identifiers.

This is an interesting thread! Can you tell I am trying to catch up on all that has gone before?
To help a little, the Eddy family in Swansea was an English one, not Portuguese or Swedish. However, Johnson IS another ballgame! Did you know Ruby Cameron's mother's maiden name was Maggie Jonnsen from Iceland and she ended up here in this country with her brother when they were shipwrecked on the coast off Gloucester?
We should bounce this discussion over to Gramma and Ruby, I guess.

Gramma

Is the spelling realy "Johnson"? That would be a very strange spelling in Sweden, here the namne "Johnsson" or "Jonsson" should be more natural.

"Eddy" comes probley from "Edvardo".

Hi Jimmy,
Welcome back! Think I heard someone calling for you a while back.
The spelling of Jonsson, Jonson, Jonsen, Johnson, Johnsen, etc. is one of those that goes by the way the person who writes it wants to put it down. I have a line of that name that appears in New Amsterdam(early New York) that shows up all kinds of ways including the additions of Jansen and Janson. It is entirely possible mine was Norwegian in origin as this ties into my Anneke Jans line (not direct, but by marriage). It turns out Anneke was not Dutch but rather was born in Norway.

Gramma

(Message last edited Mar-24th-04  2:16 PM.)

Those from a non-English nation could see a changed name if they were illiterate, or lacked a proper passport. Or how Immigration wrote their names. People still change their names for many reasons, to simplify it, etc.

Gramma's correct about Eddy being an English name. There's an Eddy Homestead in Middleboro.

http://www.eddyfamily.com/EFHA%20Info.htm

Last August, at the Eddy family reunion, I was invited to re-enact the role of Capt. Joshua Eddy who fought in the Revolution. There are Eddy descendants here in Fairhaven, too.

(Thank goodness for this edit function)

(Message last edited Mar-24th-04  7:06 PM.)

i'm glad you brought this general subject up.  this is what i want to know more about, but i dont' have the sources for it.  it did not get into the trial.  what i'd like to know is how many employees were there at the farm or "farms."  how many at the slaughterhouse?  we know axes are going back and forth between the farm and the borden house.  bridget mentions "alfred."  morse says "butcher davis."  there is a cow's hair on a hatchet in the borden basement.  did someone quit the slaughterhouse soon after the murders?   exactly how did they do the slaughter?  what were the relationships between the borden household and these people at the farm?  if you eliminate the lizzie legend and look at the murders more "clinically," where does suspicion point?  how did someone know a Portuguese and/or a Suede - -was it sight, sound, or what?  i would have liked to have gone over these farms with a fine-toothed comb.  might lizzie have been involved with someone there?  i wonder why there is so little about this aspect of it -- when the connection would appear to be so obvious?  i'd like to explore this, but what is there to go on -- that lizzie was involved with a butcher who slaughtered the bordens to keep their mouths shut and that lizzie was unable to do anything about it had she wanted to...................the thing is, the police could have rightly (and knowlton, of course) seen that lizzie was guilty (but that did not mean that her own hands swung the axe).  the investigation appears to have stopped there, when it should have gone further.

BTW, "badgering bridget" is a  comic masterpiece.  3 or 4 passages in  particular made me laugh aloud repeatedly.  its success is partially in that it is based absolutely on truth (in the immediate aftermath, there was more to get out of her).  i would grade it as the most successful piece in the whole first edition.

I was thinking about the Eddy Homestead as I was reading this thread.  I wondered if the Middleborough Eddys' were related to the Swansea Eddys'. 

I grew up in Bridgewater and have known of the Eddy Homestead for years, but can you believe this....I've never been there.  I love history and you would think that I might have ventured thata way but no.

I have some family friends that brought an antique house on route 105, quite near the Homestead.  They plan on developing the land, but that is another story.  On their property is a grave of someone who died of small pox.  From what I read, most folks who died from small pox were not welcome in the local grave yards.

On another note, I find it strange that Lizzie was asked about the farmers and also about Bridget for that matter, if they could have committed the murders and she said "oh no, not them".  She slowly but surely eliminated all the suspects except herself.  I am not sure if she did that knowingly or was tricked into it by the constant questioning.

Thanks for the background on the Eddy lands.

Wasn't he supposedly sick at the time, too?

I could never understand Lizzie saying who didn't do it.  You'd think that would garner her more suspicion, because she could only know who didn't do it, by guessing, or knowing, who did.

I also don't know why she later named Hiram.  The authorities didn't seem to investigate Hiram.  He did move house between the murder and the trial- but I don't know if he especislly moved to a better place, which I think Brown claims.  Living that close to the train depot does not sound that good to me.

My assumption is Lizzie did not want to give WSB up to the police. She was honest enough to clear the innocent suspects. Shouldn't that have been enough clues? After Uncle John returned they clammed up.