1. "Lets Dissect Victoria Lincoln!"
Posted by Susan on Dec-27th-02 at 9:19 PM

It seems that Victoria is leading us into muddy waters again! I think it might be time, once and for all, to put her book to the test and go over the troublesome points together and we will all have the info on the forum at everyone's fingertips.  Are you with me?

A PRIVATE DISGRACE: LIZZIE BORDEN BY DAYLIGHT
BY Victoria Lincoln
1967 G.P. Putnam's Sons, New York

To start off with, I'd like to tell you all that I don't have a personal agenda against Victoria Lincoln, I love this book, its one of my favorite Lizzie books!  But, the misinformation contained has gotten me and others into trouble.

In her book she has statements that are irksome; in the ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS on pg. 8 she writes, "And I should like to thank my husband, not only for his long patience with a working wife but also for the frequency with which he said,'How can you document that?  How do you know?'"  I'm curious about that too.

On pg. 20 she writes, "While many books have been written about Lizzie, they were necessarily written without the benefit of certain key facts, and, which is far more important, they were not written out of first-hand knowledge of the world that made her.  Little by little I have come to realize that only such first-hand knowledge can save any writing on the Borden case, however careful and honest, from being only another deceptively well-documented fiction."  Like her book is only based on well documented facts.

And further on in the book she writes, "The memories were consistent and detailed, so detailed that I must assure you in advance that I am not inventing as I write.  If I quote, if I describe a look, act, gesture, or even tell what someone was thinking about, I am always quoting a witness's memories or making a running digest of actual evidence given in court."  Yet, she makes no notation with some of these "facts" as to where they have come from.

So, with all that said, the first topic for discussion is on pg. 23, "Lizzie's own parents, strictly speaking, had no friends, except for Abby's half sister and Andrew's brother-in-law by his first marriage, but my grandfather sat with Andrew on many of the same mill boards and they were both presidents of local banks, a circumstance that has enabled me to uncover the precipitating motive of the crime."

Do we know for a fact that Andrew and Abby were friendless in Fall River?  What of the Miller family across the street?
And what of Victoria Lincoln's grandfather?  Any way to prove that he and Andrew worked together ever?

I feel like Linda Richmond (Mike Meyers) from Saturday Night Live, I'm feeling ferklempt, I'll give you a topic, discuss. 

Good topic. 

Andrew's friends appear to be more business acquaintances than pal around buddies. The pallbearers at his funeral were mainly businessmen. These were the people whom he had daily contact with. That's not uncommon for a man of his personality type. The social life simply didn't interest him. From Rebello, page 25, citing the Fall River Herald:

"He [Southard Miller, an intimate friend of Andrew Borden] had known Mr. Borden for a half century, and his dealings were such that nobody could take offense with him. ..."

There were neighbors who attended the funeral. Again, Rebello, page 103:

"Neighbors who attended the funeral were Dr. Bowen and his wife, Mr. Southard H. Miller and his son, Mr. Franklin Miller, Mrs. Addie Churchill, Mrs. Thomas Cheetham, Mrs. Rescomb Case, and Mrs. James D. Burt."

Were the last 3 women mentioned friends of Abby?  We simply don't know.

Also, wasn't it Diana, who discovered that Abby was secretary (or treasurer) of some organization?  A certain amount of popularity must have been required for that.

I've looked through Rebello's reference work and didn't find much mention of the particulars of Leontine Lincoln. 
He is not listed in Dr. Hoffman'a reference work.
He is not in Knowlton Paper's Glossary A or B.

I checked the 2 volumes of Victorian Vistas that Stef has acquired, and here are most cites, culled from newspaper articles.
("V.V." vol. II encompasses the years 1886-1900, and vol.III, 1901-1911.)
March 20, 1886     Leontine Lincoln mentioned at the City Hall
                                 fire-  helped save books.

March 20, 1890      Lincoln Chairman of the School Committee,
                                  consulted by the Principal after a snowball
                                  fight amongst some boys got out of hand
                                  and projectiles hit a few St. Patrick's Day
                                  Paraders who were CAtholic.  Matter dropped.

March 4, 1891         Lincoln still School Chairman, casts deciding     
                                   vote as to afternoon sessions at school start
                                   times, to begin at 2, to exclude recess.

Dec. 2, 1891            Lincoln School Chairman...corporal punish-
                                   ment allow in school?  Yes or No?  [photo]

June 21, 1893         Only "Lizzie-related" item.  Lincoln is
                                   mentioned  as
                                   President of Second National Bank, with
                                   Charles Holmes as Cashier there.

3 more cites follow in vol. II, and 6 more in vol. III.  Leontine Lincoln (Victoria's grandfather) was on the Executive Committee for the visitation of the Mexican and South American delegates to Fall River  (June 12, 1897 news date).  In Jan. 13, 1898 item, Lincoln is on stage with the Mayor and others, dedicating the Boys Club.  (Donated by big-wig M.C.D. Borden).  By Feb. 21st, 1901, L. Lincoln is in the news as President of Committee on Education , and our very own A.S. Phillips as Treasurer.  March 20, 1901, Education is again the topic, including the names of A. J. Jennings, and A.S. Phillips, along with L. Lincoln.  March 27th, 1902 Lincoln is called "President Lincoln of the Board of Trustee's", Bradford Durfee Textile School.  Item of June 24th, 1911, President Lincoln of the Bradford Durfee Textile School escorted U.S. President Taft through the Textile School building.
 
                                 

(Message last edited Dec-28th-02  4:58 AM.)

I think that we should let Victoria, like Lizzie and Emma, rest in peace. Her "biography" of LAB is preserved in my county library system. She did state that it was derived from "in-group hearsay".
VL was a successful novelist, and knew her market. Just remember that her story is "too good to be true" (eg. epileptic fit that explains things except why it never reoccurred). Read it for entertainment, but not as Trial Testimony reviewed after 75 years.

lincoln's explanation of lizzie's mental illness is something i discount altogether because there is apparently nothing to back it up other than a reference to a conversation where lizzie is supposed to have talked about how distracted and odd she had felt on some occasion.

but lincoln's most valuable contribution is the emphasis she places on lizzie's inquest testimony.  her point being that lizzie lacks the imagination to make up a more believable story; her strategy is to stick as closely as possible to what she actually did that morning, changing times, sequences, etc and making necessary deletions.  at least it's intriguing. 

consider this:  in the immediate aftermath of the murders, lizzie clearly tells people of a sound she heard; she has three words for it:  a groan, a distressing sound, a scraping sound.  if it was indeed heard, some have attributed it to the screen door being throw open.  however, if bridget is to be believed, this cannot be the case, for she testifies that she heard absolutely nothing until lizzie called her, and that she could hear that door opening and closing from her bedroom.  but could it be (speculation, of course) that she is describing sounds she heard as she murdered andrew?  an involuntary groan from the man with that first blow?  did the axe making a scraping sound going in or out of the skull?  could it be that she felt it necessary to mention for fear that someone nearby might have heard it?  i think her initial statements are particularly important.

lincoln's explanation of how lizzie hid the dress, got it downstairs in the middle of the night to the kitchen, and later managed to burn it -- this seems doubtful to me.

lincoln does provide an explanation of how that coat is under the pillow.  and it does go far in explaining how lizzie could kill father and get rid of the evidence well within 15 minutes.

how's this for speculation?  what if lincoln is right that the murder weapon is the ash-covered axe with the broken handle?  about that i've wondered how she broke it off?  perhaps it broke while she was doing the deed.  this would also explain the fewer number of blows to andrew as compared to abby.

of course, i haven't dissected lincoln--but those are some of my thoughts about her theory.

Rays, Victoria Lincoln's book is still available for sale here and there. So, I think it would be in every Bordenite's best interest to go over these points that are not based on fact and we can all thereby use this information as a measuring tool to stand the other author's books that are out there up against.  I didn't see where she said that her book was based on "in-group hearsay", she states that it is based on fact and her knowledge from having been raised in that yankee circle of life.

Thanks, Harry. Yes, I do recall Diana's wonderful find about Abby:

Here's a newspaper report that indicates Abby was out and about on May 19th, 1891.  She appears to have been a member of the Women's Auxiliary of the Y.M.C.A. and gave a membership report at their first annual meeting.  (She also may have had a nice piece of cake later.)



May 20, 1891
Source: Fall River Daily Globe
Transcription provided by Bruce Laurie, Department of History, University of Massachusetts at Amherst.
"Report from the First Annual of the Women's Auxiliary
The Women's Auxiliary of the Y.M.C.A. held its first annual meeting yesterday afternoon which was largely attended. This branch of the association has contributed largely to its success and has been untiring in its efforts to promote the work which has been undertaken.
Mrs. Norman E. BOrden, the president, tendered her resignation but her executive ability and efficiency were too highly appreciated by her associates and they refused to entertain the idea of her withdrawal. Consequently she consented to serve another term and all were reelected. Interesting reports of various topics then followed the election. They are as follows:
Membership by Mrs. Andrew J. Borden
Social by Mrs. George Stowell
Rooms by Mrs. B.J. Handy       
Devotional by Mrs. R.K. Remington
Visitations of the Sick by Mrs. E.T. Marvel
The exercises were interspersed with vocal music by Ida F. Ferry, Mrs. R.K. Remington, and Mrs. D.A. Chapin.
The general secretary in a few brief word expressed the appreciation of the association of the help rendered by the Auxiliary after which the meeting adjourned for a social hour during which chocolate and cake were served by the social committee.
Later on it is possible that the receptions which have been so successful will be repeated."

I think one of the problems with people who write about this case currently forget about the social ideals and mores of Victorian America.  Women's sphere, if married, was the family home and her family, not to be out and about galavanting with her girlfriends.  The ideal for women at the time period was "useful leisure".  There were many books at the time for women to read that expressed how a woman should budget her time.

'In 1856 Catharine Beecher advised her readers to "have some regular plan for employment of your time, and in this plan have a chief reference to making home pleasant to your husband and children." At that time the expectations of female domesticity had changed considerably from those of the eighteenth century. Leisure had become an integral part of nineteenth-century culture as advances of the industrial age influenced American lifestyle. Families began to move to urban centers, where men found work outside the home and women maintained household affairs with greater convenience. The average urban housewife often supervised one or more domestic servants and could purchase many of the necessities that earlier generations labored to produce within the home. She often used the hours remaining after completion of domestic duties for ornamental needlework, reading, social calls, and charity work.'  From the site:  http;//www.librarycompany.org/HookBook/Section1-case2.htm                                                              It sounds as though Abby may have joined her social calling and charity work into one by joining the Ladie's Auxillary of the Young Men's Christian Academy.  And whos to say that Addie Churchill didn't ask Abby over for a cup of coffee or tea.  I think we have just barely scraped the surface of Abby and Andrew as people, we may find out more about them as time goes by.  But, to say that they were friendless, no, I personally don't think that they were.  Perhaps they just weren't big socializers due to Andrew's choice not to?

Kat, thanks for all your work.  So, the one instance we can find so far is that Lincoln's grandfather was on the same bank board was 1893 after Andrew was already dead, interesting. 

So, shall we count this as 2 strikes already or continue with these topics, or shall we move on to a new topic of discussion from the book? 

I've wondered along with you, if that handle broke off whilst doing the deed.  But some say the break is too clean...?

I do believe Lizzie heard some sound of some kind.  If she was in another room, in the death room, or outside...wherever she was she heard a sound, I think.  Mentioning it for fear someone else might have heard it, doesn't do the later version of her story justice--that she was in the barn loft (too far away to hear anything).  So I don't think she mentioned the sound for that reason.  It may be because it was true, and seemed natural for her to do at the beginning. 
But admitting to hearing a sound places her too close to the body or the screen door to be fitting, for someone who claims not to have seen anything.
(Unless a murderer escaped out the front door, and one of the very last blows was a death moan.)

The Lincoln book is supposed to be *rewarding* in it's depiction of the times and the atmosphere around town in that infamous year 1892-93.

William do you know any more about Leontine Lincoln?  Anything biographical?
{Edit here:  I hadn't seen Susan's post-Above- before composing this one...]

(Message last edited Dec-29th-02  12:37 AM.)

"Mr. Borden was a board member of several banking institutions".  (R. 23)

"Andrew J. Borden, Pres. Union Savings Bank, [lived at] 92 Second Street"  (R. 24)

I don't know that Andrew Borden & Leontine Lincoln shared any boardroom seats.  We still need more info on where their Spheres might have intersected.

They were head of 2 different banks.  The person they did have in common, though, seems to be Charles Holmes, which I find interesting.

Fall River Daily Globe, Thursday, August 4, 1892  Page 7:

"[Andrew] was president and director of the National Union Bank, a director in the B.M.C. Durfee Safe Deposit Trust Co., the Globe Yarn mills, the Troy Cotton and Woolen Manufactory, the Merchants Mfg. Co., and was interested in other manufacturing corporations."  [news items all thanks to Harry]

--Mr. L. Lincoln is not mentioned in the Evening Standard News accounts, nor the Rochester papers, nor various newspapers Harry has access to, from the times, intermittant from the dates Aug. 4th 1892 until mid-June, 1893.
Maybe there is a biography or autobiography of the man someone may know about?



(Message last edited Dec-29th-02  1:24 AM.)

Given the fact that there were several Andrew J. Bordens in and around Fall River, can we be sure Abby is the one mentioned here?
Another point -- assuming Abby was the one involved in this group, I notice one of its ongoing activities was to visit the sick.  Maybe that could explain the note that Abby supposedly received on August 4.  Perhaps the group, on learning of someone's illness, would dispatch a  member who lived nearby to visit and render aid.  Of course that still doesn't explain why nobody came forward to admit to having sent the note.  Nor does it explain why the note's deliverer didn't emerge from the shadows.  (Is this YMCA a different group from today's YMCA?  I note this is referred to as the "Young Men's Christian Academy," while today's organization is the "Young Men's Christian Association.")

Kat,

In your search for Leontine Lincoln, you mention the citations in Vols.1/2 of Victorian Vistas. There are no citations in volume #1.
Took a quick look at Google; there are several entries for the subject.  I didn't check them out, but you might want to have a look-see. Other than this, I have nothing to offer.

My memory (failing?) was that was her quote in the Introduction.

Hi, Edisto, I missed you!  You are correct, my freudian slip is showing, YMCA is Young Men's Christian Association, my bad, sorry.  Here is the link to the "Counting Andrews" thread, it seems that in the 1890s there were 3 Andrew J. Bordens, ours, a city hall janitor and one that was our Andrew's pallbearer who was a treasurer of Merchant Manufacturing Co.  So, there is a possibility it was the treasurers wife, I don't think the janitor's wife would have had such an opportunity, but, I could be mistaken.http://www.arborwood.com/awforums/show-topic-1.php?fid=27&taid=1&topid=917
YMCA
Beginnings in London
The Young Men's Christian Association was founded in London, England, on June 6, 1844, in response to unhealthy social conditions arising in the big cities at the end of the Industrial Revolution (roughly 1750 to 1850). Growth of the railroads and centralization of commerce and industry brought many rural young men who needed jobs into cities like London. They worked 10 to 12 hours a day, six days a week.

Far from home and family, these young men often lived at the workplace. They slept crowded into rooms over the company's shop, a location thought to be safer than London's tenements and streets. Outside the shop things were bad--open sewers, pickpockets, thugs, beggars, drunks, lovers for hire and abandoned children running wild by the thousands.



George Williams

George Williams, born on a farm in 1821, came to London 20 years later as a sales assistant in a draper's shop, a forerunner of today's department store. He and a group of fellow drapers organized the first YMCA to substitute Bible study and prayer for life on the streets. By 1851 there were 24 Ys in Great Britain, with a combined membership of 2,700. That same year the Y arrived in North America: It was established in Montreal on November 25, and in Boston on December 29.

The idea proved popular everywhere. In 1853, the first YMCA for African Americans was founded in Washington, D.C., by Anthony Bowen, a freed slave. The next year the first international convention was held in Paris. At the time there were 397 separate Ys in seven nations, with 30,369 members total.

The YMCA idea, which began among evangelicals, was unusual because it crossed the rigid lines that separated all the different churches and social classes in England in those days. This openness was a trait that would lead eventually to including in YMCAs all men, women and children, regardless of race, religion or nationality. Also, its target of meeting social need in the community was dear from the start.

George Williams was knighted by Queen Victoria in 1894 for his YMCA work and buried in 1905 under the floor of St. Paul's Cathedral among that nation's heroes and statesmen. A large stained glass window in Westminster Abbey, complete with a red triangle, is dedicated to YMCAs, to Sir George and to Y work during the first World War.


Civil War times
In the United States during the Civil War, Y membership shrunk to one-third its size as members marched off to battle. Fifteen of the remaining Northern Ys formed the U.S. Christian Commission to assist the troops and prisoners of war. It was endorsed by President Abraham Lincoln, and its 4,859 volunteers included the American poet Walt Whitman. Among other accomplishments, it gave more than 1 million Bibles to fighting men. It was the beginning of a commitment to working with soldiers and sailors that continues to this day through the Armed Services YMCAs.


Only 59 Ys were left by war's end, but a rapid rebuilding followed, and four years later there were 600 more. The focus was on saving souls, with saloon and street corner preaching, lists of Christian boarding houses, lectures, libraries and meeting halls, most of them in rented quarters.

But seeds of future change were there. In 1866, the influential New York YMCA adopted a fourfold purpose: "The improvement of the spiritual, mental, social and physical condition of young men."

In those early days, YMCAs were run almost entirely by volunteers. There were a handful of paid staff members before the Civil War who kept the place clean, ran the library and served as corresponding secretaries. But it wasn't until the 1880s, when YMCAs began putting up buildings in large numbers, that most associations thought they needed someone there full time.

Gyms and swimming pools came in at that time, too, along with big auditoriums and bowling alleys. Hotel-like rooms with bathrooms down the hall, called dormitories or residences, were designed into every new YMCA building, and would continue to be until the late 1950s. Income from rented rooms was a great source of funds for YMCA activities of all kinds. Residences would make a major financial contribution to the movement for the next century.

Ys took up boys work and organized summer camps. They set up exercise drills in classes--forerunners of today's aerobics--using wooden dumbbells, heavy medicine balls and so-called Indian clubs, which resembled graceful, long-necked bowling pins. Ys organized college students for social action, literally invented the games of basketball and volleyball and served the special needs of railroad men who had no place to stay when the train reached the end of the line. By the 1890s, the fourfold purpose was transformed into the triangle of spirit, mind and body.

Moody and Mott

John Mott, a leader of the YMCA movement in America, received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1946. Mott's award was in recognition for the YMCA's role in increasing global understanding and for its humanitarian efforts. Mott himself was a student of the YMCA movement, and he was a major influence on the Y's missionary movement.
Through the influence of nationally known lay evangelists Dwight L. Moody (1837-1899) and John Mott (1865-1955), who dominated the movement in the last half of the 19th and first half of the 20th centuries respectively, the American YMCAs sent workers by the thousands overseas, both as missionary-like YMCA secretaries and as war workers.

The first foreign work secretaries, as they were called, reflected the huge missionary outreach by Christian churches near the turn of the century. But instead of churches, they organized YMCAs that eventually were placed under local control. Both Moody and Mott served for lengthy periods as paid professional staff members of the YMCA movement. Both maintained lifelong connections with it.

The U.S. entered World War I in April 1917. Mott, on his own, involved the YMCA movement in running the military canteens, called post exchanges today, in the United States and in France. Ys led fundraising campaigns that raised $235 million for those YMCA operations and other wartime causes, and hired 25,926 Y workers--5,145 of them women--to run the canteens.

It also took on war relief for both refugees and prisoners of war on both sides, and worked to ease the path of African American soldiers returning to the segregated South. Y secretaries from China supervised the Chinese laborers brought to Europe to unload ships, dig trenches and clear the battlefields after the war. Y.C. James Yen, a Yale graduate working with YMCAs in France, developed a simple Chinese alphabet of 100 characters that became a major weapon in wiping out illiteracy in China. Funds left over from war work helped in the 1920s to spur a Y building boom, outreach to small towns and counties, work with returning black troops and blossoming of YMCA trade schools and colleges.

From the site:http://www.ymca.net/index.jsp

(Message last edited Dec-29th-02  2:16 PM.)

For what it's worth -- the UMass Fall River project lists Leontine Lincoln as a director of the Barnard Mills, the King Philip Mills, and the Tecumseh Mills. Andrew doesn't show up on those boards but Charles Holmes is president of the King Philip Mills.

Here's the link.
http://ccbit.cs.umass.edu/lizzie/images/documents/L0031F01.html

There is an elementary school in Fall River named for Leontine Lincoln and a short bio at the URL below. I assume it's the same man.  He was born in 1846 which would make him 24 years younger than Andrew.

http://www.fallriver.mec.edu/Lincoln/default.html

Click the brief history of the school URL.

The photo of the school loads VERY slow.

Wow You Guys!
That was some flurry of Research!  Good for you!

Diana, that page from the incorporation history of some of the mills was really interesting.  That was exactly what i felt we needed to see to get a more rounded view of the man.  I wonder if one makes money sitting on Boards of Directors?

It's also interesting that most those mills listed were owned by subscription and were built for specialty concerns.  E-Gad can you picture something like that Now-a-days?  "We need to build a concern that will allow us to specialize in fine lawn materials (etc) so lets get up a grunch of money and build this HUGE GIGANTIC MILL!
And then let's Do It Again Next Year!"  "And next year!"
Jeesh, I wonder how many of those buildings were converted into modern uses, and how many are abandoned, nowadays...

Well, Susan, I never really KNEW anything about the YMCA so that was really cool.  (Yup, I read the whole thing, and some parts twice).  Even if our Abby wasn't the same Mrs. A.J. Borden, this sounds like the sort of genteel charitable activity that her peers would be involved with, including Lizzie.

[I wonder what "the Boys Club" was, in relationship to a YMCA?  I know they're different, but Lincoln was involved with that...]

And in reading the bit of biographical info provided by the Lincoln School site (I had heard of the Lincoln School!   Should have figured since Mr. Leontine Lincoln was in Education for so many years that that school was named for him, but it didn't click in my mind!)-anyway, there was that birth year of the man and I double-checked his photo on page 308 in V.V. II, and he LOOKS about 45, and the picture was probably contemporary to 1891.
So that was some good investigating, you guys!

Also, in all the Education Committee stories naming Mr. L. Lincoln, in V.V., there was almost always also mentioned MISS SUSAN H. WIXON...she who wanted the vote to reflect that "Corporal Punishment Be Abolished" in the school systems (pg. 307-8).  I am happy to see Miss Wixon had a school named after her.  Apparently she believed in recess and no physical abuse in schools! 
Now I wonder what V. L. claimed about the man.

Well, it seems that Mr. Lincoln's civic duties were important to him and because of this he became inportant.  This was enlightening finding out about the man, Lincoln.

Here's a little "itch" of a question for us now:
Would this man speak about this crime and those Borden's to his young grand-daughter?  In 1923?  I thought families did not dicuss this type of past infamy with their offspring?
This is not an idle surmise but a real question that I now have about the familial relationships back then?

Come to find out 1923 was the year of Leontine Lincoln's death.
He would have been 77. 
After that, no one could ask him if he filled Ms. Lincoln in on those old Fall River stories, that very year.
I wonder if he really did?

Leontine, being a gentleman of the old school, telling his young grand-daughter about a murder that happened in their home town....hmmmm.  It doesn't really sound like something that he would have done unless he was asked, but, he did work in the school system where the thirst for knowledge was quenched.  I was trying to figure out how old Victoria would have been just before her grandfather died, she says in her book that her parents were of Lizzie's generation and that she reached her dancing days on the far side of World War One--the watershed, but, not how old she was.  If she was a grown woman asking him these questions while writing this book, then perhaps I can see it.  But, wasn't that a big point in Fall River that these yankees just didn't discuss the Bordens after it was all over with? 

Victoria Lincoln was born in 1905 and therefore was 18 at Leontine Lincoln's death in 1923.

The book "A Private Disgrace" was published in 1967, some 44 years later.

That's a long, long time.  Was she taking notes or relying solely on memory?  Sounds suspicious, like much of Lincoln, to me.

(Message last edited Dec-30th-02  10:21 PM.)

did lizzie borden murder them or not?  that's still the question. 

Thanks, Harry.  Yes, very suspicious as per usual.

Haulover, according to Lincoln's book, Lizzie did it. 

Yes.  It seems to me firstly, that a gentleman such as he would not discuss such things, but there is that *quenching of the thirst for knowledge* Susan referred to.
BUT.  As an 18 year -old, was Victoria really interested in such things, as the Borden crimes?  What about boys, and travel, and gowns, and parties?
Sounds a bit like another author when the informant dies right after spilling the "truth"?  Or didn't that happen ever before?

The answer is NO.
See the real trial in 1893, the mock trial in 2000 Calif.
Note that LAB was tried for her Dad's murder; she had an alibi (seen outside around the time). No such alibi for Abby.

I wonder what the jury would have said if she was tried for 'obstruction of justice'? (Not telling all.)

I think the people of Fall River talked about the murders amongst themselves but like people do, they considered it an intrusion for someone from outside to talk about it or for them to talk about it with someone from outside.

Lizzie said she heard, your quote..."a groan, a distressing sound, a scraping sound" she did not say where that sound was coming from. Show me where it says in the testimony that she said it was coming from the house?

The fact that Victoria Lincoln married, relocated and wrote a number of successful books is evidence that she had many outside interests beyond the Borden murders.  Her book is proof of her passion, however.  It is an outstanding account of what happened in Fall River and she makes a comment about her own interest in the Borden murders.  When she visited the Borden home, then a private residence and not readily available to those curious about the case, she gained admittance because the owner spotted "the look," the passion she had for what had taken place in the house so many years earlier.  Victoria Lincoln knew she had "the look."  And it was especially evident when she stood at the top of staircase (where Lizzie had stood
and claimed she did not see Abbey's body on the floor in the front guest room).  Ms. Lincoln fulfilled a lifelong goal of anybody interested in the case--to stand in that spot and determine for oneself whether Lizzie was lying or not.

Hello Jim!
You must be really interested in Lincoln to jump into the middle of this.
Susan has just been dissecting the author for mistakes handed down as legend.
It is factual errors that we're interested in...now that we have sources that may not have been available to Ms. Lincoln.  As someone said here, it's not that anyone thinks these errors were compiled on purpose, or to intentionally mislead.
I too, have respect for authors.  Admire your intensity.

I believe Kieran and Morse, in seperate re-enanctments, tried to find a spot where Lizzie could have stood in the upper hall, and not caught sight of Abby's body.  Kieran testified that she could not have seen from her bedroom doorway.
But that is moot to Lizzie, as she claims the guest room door was closed on her journey on the stairs.

[Edit here:  I just made a ham sandwich and thought about what we both wrote.  I didn't really think about Why the defence (and prosecution) was so interested in where the body of Abby could be sighted, if Lizzie said the door was shut!  Wonder why they would persue the question?  Just places more suspicion and emphasis on it...]

I have heard that Ms. Lincoln might be considered as a turn-coat to her Fall River roots to let the *light of day* onto this  *private* scandel.
..............

If Lizzie heard a groan, from where could it have come?  Any theories?

(Message last edited Jan-2nd-03  3:39 AM.)

Well, so far our topic discussion seems to stand at:

1) We don't know for sure whether Andrew and Abby were friendless outside of Abby's half sister and John Morse.  Though it does make them sound rather one dimensional, perhaps we will uncover more in the future.

2) We have no concrete proof that Victoria Lincoln's grandfather, Leotine Lincoln, ever sat on a bank or mill board with Andrew Borden, they are of different generations, it doesn't seem likely at the moment.

I was thinking it might be a good time to bring up a new topic for dissection.  I don't know if you want to get into Lizzie's 'peculiar spells' which runs into the description of Lizzie having epilepsy of the temporal lobe.  Lizzie certainly acted peculiar at times, but, would that be enough to consider her having 'spells'?

pgs.24 to 25
   "We wasted little time wondering how anyone, even Lizzie, could nurse for five years a smoldering, mounting, murderous hate for anyone as dismally uninteresting as Abby Borden, and plot for two weeks her death by prussic acid.
  We did, however, attach grave importance to Lizzie's "peculiar spells."
  They had to be mentioned in whispers, since such "spells" were said to "run in families."  Lizzie, as we saw it, had taken out one of her spells on the hated Abby and had been swept on by its sheer momentum to kill her father, too.

Here, for the first time, I will attempt to clarify the nature of those "peculiar spells," to demonstrate that in fact they were seizures of epilepsy, epilepsy of the temporal lobe, a strange disease whose symptoms (as I have recently learned and as I will try, in time, to show you) explain more than one mysterious crime in the Borden house on Second Street."

Hi Kat

Yes, I have been interested in Lizzie for years and I admire the writing skills of Victoria Lincoln.  I found this site by accident and feel fortunte to be able to join in.  I am a member of a similar site devoted to the 1964-1965 New York World's Fair (nywf64.com)and I have fun posting messages with experts on that event.  I teach history on the high school and junior college level and love exchanging ideas with passionate and knowledgeable people and I hope I can contribute.  I was not sure where to jump in, but I selected the discussion on Ms. Lincoln.  I have visited Fall River and have stood outside Lizzie's Second Street house and on the sidewalk outside of Maplecroft.  I am not certain where Ms. Lincoln may have made errors, but there are are a number of areas where she admits she is making educated guesses (what happened in the kitchen the morning the dress was burned, where Lizzie may have hidden the dress etc.) so I will be eager to hear what new information has been revealed in recent years.  I do recall that the Fall River Historical Society told me that they believed Ms. Lincoln's book to be the best account of Lizzie ever written and that the author had done outstanding research.  Can you suggest more recent titles?  Much like Ms. Lincoln, I would love to have the opportunity to visit that house and stand in those rooms where the crime took place if only for just a few moments.

I've known people with epilepsy before & I never
heard of them (or anyone) being violent because of it. Does
it actually cause "peculiar spells" where they space
out & basically sleepwalk? I've heard of people being
violent & doing strange things while sleepwalking,
even killing people---I saw once that a man stabbed & killed
some of his in-laws while asleep & they found him not guilty.
I think I saw that on the Discovery Channel or The Learning
Channel one. 

In the Lincoln book she says Lizzie had a meeting
with a detective a few weeks before the murders, I
don't remember seeing that anywhere else.

It's So Cool To Meet Ya, Jim!
Thanks for introducing yourself.
Yes, I could feel the intensity of your interest in this subject...in fact I wanted next to ask you if you had been to The House.
I haven't --but I DO have a Poloroid of me where Stef is calling me by phone from the 92 Second Street sitting room.

Personally I love any PEARSON on the subject.
He's my favorite.  He was writing during the time Lizbeth was still alive; he's just close enough to some rumors to make them sound true;  and he has an OPINION.

Other than that, I suggest all source documents, and I also like Lunday: 
"Lunday, Todd. The Mystery Unveiled: The Truth about the Borden Tragedy:Fresh Light That Must Be Convincing to All Readers. Providence: J. A. & R. A. Reid, 1893. Rpt. Portland, ME: King Philip Pub. Co., 1990.
A 56-page pamphlet, published immediately after the trial, in which the writer concludes that, with Lizzie Borden acquitted and no other suspect substituted, nobody committed the murders. 'Todd Lunday' is the nom de plume for a writer whose actual identity is still unknown."--[SK]

And Rick Geary's Illustrated story:
"Geary, Rick. The Borden Tragedy: A Memoir of the Infamous Double Murder at Fall River, Massachusetts, 1892. NY: NBN Pub., 1997.
Geary presents the Borden murders story for the first time in a comic book format of approximately 300 drawings with captions that tell an accurate version of the story. A bibliography is included."--[SK]
--Both cites from:
http://www.lizzieandrewborden.com/BibliographyCase.htm

(I also love his Jack The Ripper).

Thanks for asking!

I have heard that V. Lincoln gave good background, if ya know what I mean! 

Hi Jim!  Welcome to the forum!  As Kat said, we are not trying to bash Victoria Lincoln per se, just the myths that are in the book that people believe to be true.  I know, I'm one of them, its taken me some time to disassociate myself with them, but, occasionally one will still pop up and give me grief.  The findings will benefit all of us with all of the books that are out there, I think.  Again, welcome to the forum, post away and have a whacking good time! 

Kimberly, I think you're referring to the Ken Parks case.  This was a trial that made Canadian legal history.  Parks drove a fair distance and stabbed both his wife's parents.  His mother-in-law died of her injuries.  He was acquittted using a defense of sleepwalking.  The prosecution appealed twice but both appeals were denied.  The verdict sounds bizarre -- but June Callwood gives an excellent account of the events and the trial in her book "The Sleepwalker" (Lester & Orpen Dennys Ltd. Toronto, 1990) that helps show how such an outcome could be reached.

The link below shows the second appeal ruling from the Supreme Court of Canada.
http://www.lexum.umontreal.ca/csc-scc/en/pub/1992/vol2/html/1992scr2_0871.html

Hi Jim and the rest of y'all.  I guess one of the faults I found with Victoria Lincoln is her claim that the Borden house was so small inside.  On the contrary, my wife and I were surprized to find it quite adaquate and even large.  Lincoln also appears to be a snob.

Now, as to her research, I have no doubt that she did an incredible amount, and it is accurate.  I disagree with her theory of epilepsy being the trigger for Lizzie; I've done a little (very little) research on epilepsy and I question that it is exacerbated by menstruation.

Nuff said.
j

That bit about Detective Shaw and the dressmaker has always been confusing.  Lincoln uses Volume II of the trial as her source for this information. (Lincoln, p.58,59)  She claims that the questioning by Detective Shaw happened when Mrs. Raymond was staying at the Borden house to do some dressmaking -- quite a while prior to the murders.  Lincoln tries to link the visit from Shaw to one of Lizzie's "spells".

Yet, in the trial transcript, Mrs. Raymond is testifying about the color of the dress she made for Lizzie and how she described it to Detective Shaw. And it's obvious from the following testimony that they are talking about a visit made on behalf of the prosecution to obtain information about Lizzie's wardrobe after the murders. 


Q.  Didn't you tell Mr. Shaw that this faded so as to look something like drab?
A.  I said when I read Dr. Bowen's evidence that I thought he might possibly have taken that for that; I couldn't tell.

RE-DIRECT.

Q.  (By Mr. Jennings.)  You say it didn't look so to you?
A.  It didn't look so to me; no, sir.

Q.  Who is this Mr. Shaw?
A.  Well, I don't know. It is some one that came where I was sewing. I understood him to say it was detective Shaw.

Q.  Is he a dressmaker?
A.  Not that I know of. I don't know what his occupation is any more than that.

Q.  Was he there to have a dress made?
A.  No, sir.

Q.  Did you find out what he was there for?
A.  Well, he seemed to come to ask questions.

Page 1583 / i604

Q.  That is about all you know of that?
A.  That is all I know about it anyway; yes, sir.

Q.  Did you tell him or Mr. Knowlton about this old wrapper being burned?

Just HOW was Lizzie "peculiar?" I'm not sure anyone has ever really said.  The police dragnet for people who might think Lizzie deranged or queer didn't produce too much specifics. 

I don't know what menstruation has to do with epilepsy either. But fainting does have to do with it.  Some women have such pain with it that they faint! If Lizzie had pain with her monthly periods then it is possible that she did faint, or act "peculiar" which were then called "spells" and if she was out she might have fainted in public. People may not have made the connection because no one knew when a woman was having her period.

These days Doctors can prescribe pain pills which alleviates this pain considerably, but in Lizzie's time I doubt they had such pills. My thought is perhaps Lincoln, who may not ever have experienced pain with her periods selected epilepsy to explain what came down the grapevine as Lizzie being peculiar.  But how a person could kill someone in an epileptic seizure or while fainting from menstruation pain is beyond me. Having an epileptic seizure or being in pain from having a period while killing both Borden's sort of casts premeditation to the winds in my opinion as well.

pgs.24 to 25
  "We wasted little time wondering how anyone, even Lizzie, could nurse for five years a smoldering, mounting, murderous hate for anyone as dismally uninteresting as Abby Borden, and plot for two weeks her death by prussic acid."

This is very interesting.  It tells me that Lincoln never experienced nor has any understanding of having to live in the same house with someone that was detested over a period of time especially growing up in a house as a child with a detested adult always there. Anyone who has experienced this could not write such a sentence.  Whether Abby was dismally uninteresting to my mind has nothing to do with anything either, whatever the motive for the crime, Abby wasn't, killed for being uninteresting. 

As I recall (haven't gone back to her book today), Lincoln described Lizzie's ailment as "temporal epilepsy," which I believe is different from the epilepsy with which most of us are familiar.  When my daughter was about eight, she suddenly developed what was diagnosed as epilepsy.  In seeking treatment for her, I learned a great deal about the malady.  There are a number of different kinds.  As it turned out, my daughter was suffering from a type of transient epilepsy, which was caused by a very minor brain injury.  I was told that she might overcome it when she reached puberty, and that's exactly what happened.  I hadn't realized until then that it can be a temporary condition.  For several years, my daughter took medication to control seizures.  She was most likely to suffer a seizure when she was watching TV, and I've since learned that flickering lights can trigger such an episode.  It's a very mysterious problem, and I don't think science yet knows all there is to know about it.  Possibly that's one reason why Lincoln seized on it as an explanation for the Borden murders.

Thanks, Edisto.  I hope that your daughter is alright now.  One of my good friends works with disabled young adults and a couple of them have seizures, very frightening to me, but, he seems to handle it well.

(Message last edited Jan-3rd-03  8:57 PM.)

There were instances like when Lizzie was questioned by the police directly after the murders, she acted very calm and cool which was thought to be peculiar, odd.  I personally wouldn't call it a "spell" myself.  There are other instances that occurred like the dress burning that is peculiar.  There was the instance after the trial where Lizzie made a packet of press-clippings and relevant photos, including photos of the bodies, and sent them, with a polite note to Mr. Moody "as a memento of an interesting occasion." 

Yes that was the case, it was a great story, very
frightening to think that someone might actually
do that.

I think most of the book was confusing,
and so bitchy!

Hi Joe

I am impressed that you have been in Lizzie's house.  Can you share some of what you saw?  Perhaps you have done this but I would love to hear your impressions as you walked through that place.  How much of the furnishings are origninal?  I believe the barn is long gone.  Is that correct?  Did you have the chance to tour the entire house?

Also, Ms. Lincoln indicates that during the inquest and I suppose during the trial as well, Lizzie claimed that she had no knowledge of a pharmacy (where she, evidently, attempted to purchase prussic acid) although it was just a block from the house where she had lived for so many years.  Is this an accurate statement and if so, doesn't it indicate Lizzie had a tough time with the truth?

Rebello, Interview with Mrs. Cluny, a second cousin and who  "spent a week with the Bordens and did some housecleaning for them":

Page 177
"The reporter asked Mrs. Cluny if she had any reason to believe Lizzie to be insane.
Mrs. Cluny said, 'No, I always thought she was pretty level headed. She was peculiar, though. She was odd, very odd. I have heard a number of persons speak of it.' "

Lizzie's uncle Harrington describes her as having a *repellent* disposition (R.230).

"Queer?  Yes, Lizzie is queer."  Quote of first sentence of *Emma's Interview" with the Boston Sunday Post, April 13, 1913.

A junior member of her own defense team, Arthur Phillips, years later, stated," If Miss Borden's mind showed any lack of balance in later years, it should not be weighed as evidence of her former condition, because she ever afterwards lived alone, she had no close friends, she was always ogled in public and very annoyed by public activities and encroachments upon her private life."...
("In Defence Of Lizzie Borden.")

(R. 499)  Abby Potter described Lizzie as "an outsider, a big mannish woman that people were afraid of."

Lizzie's meeting Wednesday night with Alice was peculiar, and the story she told Alice was so odd, that it is still discussed to this day.

Lizzie's period was over by Wednesday, which was stipulated in court.  Therefore THursday's killing spree cannot be associated with a menstrual cycle, unless she had some terriblly debillitating disease like endometriosis (sp.).  We have no proof of that, or any other health complaints other than her saying that she had been feeling queerly the week before the murders, which would have been her PMS cycle IF she suffered from that at all.

These are opinions of Lizzie's sister, her cousin, her uncle, her defence personnel, and her stepmother's 1/2 sister's daughter.  (Her step-niece?).

Anyway, all these testimonials come from relatives and not from neighbors as in that "Sanity Survey."

Thanks, Kat!  I was planning to delve further and list all references to Lizzie being called odd, peculiar or queer, you beat me to the punch.  So, even her family members saw her as an odd duck.  But, this sounds like it is always so and not done in "spells". 

Rebello
Pg. 177--More of the *Interview*

... "The reporter asked her to tell about Lizzie's oddities. Mrs. Cluny said, 'There were times whereby Lizzie would not speak to members of the family who were visiting the Bordens. She would act as though she did not see them, and go right through rooms where they were without speaking a word to them. Then, again, she would be extremely pleasant and would act as though there was nothing too much for her to do for anyone ... A great many members of the family had the same experience.'

As the interview continued, Mrs. Cluny stated Lizzie had a 'great habit of staying in bed in the morning. I have seldom seen her at breakfast. She would almost invariably remain in bed until 10 o'clock or so.'

Mrs. Cluny provided the reporter with a vivid and revealing account of Lizzie's personality. He asked if Lizzie was 'irritable or would she fly into a passion.' She said, 'Lizzie never impressed her as being very passionate. She seemed cold blooded ... she seemed to mope and sulk. I never heard any words, and couldn't tell what the trouble was, but I knew it was generally considered as one of Lizzie's odd streaks.'

The issue of insanity surfaced when the reporter asked, 'Would you be surprised if it turned out now that she was insane?' Mrs. Cluny replied, 'Well, yes, I should. Her odd streaks never lead me to think anything like that. She never acted in any way like an insane person -- that is, like what I call a maniac. She didn't do things wrong, and wouldn't get excited and hysterical. She just seemed to have spells of moping and sulking, and I call it her condition. Then there never was any insanity in the family that I know of.' "...

--I imagine sleeping late, in those days, was also considered peculiar.
Also, I've heard of this moping and sulking, and ignoring relatives as it suited her.  I believe this last mentioned behavior was referred to by Mrs. Whitehead, as well.

Witness Statements
Pg. 13+
"We then went to Mrs. Geo. Whitehead, on Fourth street. She said 'this property was owned in part by me and my mother. My mother wished to dispose of her interest. I could not purchase it, and did not want to sell; so in order that I might keep my place, Mrs. Borden, my step sister, bought the other interest. This the girls did not like; and they showed their feeling on the street by not recognizing me. Lizzie did not like Mrs. Borden.' "





(Message last edited Jan-4th-03  3:50 PM.)

Good stuff!  Thanks, Kat.  So, by Lizzie's peers she was judged odd by the standards of the day and some of it holds even to this day, acting like someone was invisible and walking by like they weren't there.  Yeesh!  The rest sounds like she was depressed or just a very moody woman. 

Remember what uncle Hiram said about her?
That no way could he picture Lizzie being solicitous of Andrew's comfort so as to settle him gently on the couch for a rest.

Lizzie Borden:  A Case Book of Family and Crime in the 1890's, edited by Williams, Smithburn, and Peterson, 1980, pg. 42-44:  *Interview with Hiram Harrington*

"Fall River Daily Herald, Aug. 6, 1892:

.."Then she [Lizzie] asked him tenderly several times if he was perfectly comfortable, if there was anything she could do for him, and upon receiving assurance to the negative she withdrew.  All these things showed a solicitude and a thoughtfulness that I never had heard was a part of her nature or custom before.  She described these little acts of courtesy minutely."


"... Lizzie, on the contrary, was haughty and domineering with the stubborn will of her father and bound to contest for her rights.  There were many animated interviews between father and daughter on this point.  Lizzie is of a repellant disposition, and after an unsuccessful passage with her father would become sulky and refuse to speak to him for days at a time. "...

http://www.arborwood.com/awforums/show-topic-1.php?start=1&fid=27&taid=8&topid=424&ut=1019688668

Sorry, Jim...didn't mean to get so far ahead of your post.  When I'm on the track of something I may charge through, but I know to return to something interesting!
I was hoping Joe would reply, but here's the link to his visit to The House.  Post #10, I believe, starts his tale.
He has taken a couple of fascinating pictures that should be previewed at the Museum/Library soon.
http://www.arborwood.com/awforums/show-topic-1.php?start=1&fid=27&taid=2&topid=875

------------
INQUEST
Lizzie
pg.89
Q. Your attention has already been called to the circumstance of going into the drug store of Smith's, on the corner of Columbia and Main streets, by some officer, has it not, on the day before the tragedy?
A. I don't know whether some officer has asked me, somebody has spoken of it to me; I don't know who it was.
Q. Did that take place?
A. I [sic] did not.
Q. Do you know where the drug store is?
A. I don't.
Q. Did you go into any drug store and inquire for prussic acid?
A. I did not.

--We only have her statements about anything to do with the case in the Witness Statements, and this Inquest.  ( Tho The W.S. are second hand accounts).

Well, let's see where Columbia & Main are located...



Well, you sure know your locations!  I never really placed the drug store before.
For those of you needing orientation:
The very exact middle of this map is the intersection of Main & Columbia.  Columbia is the street w/ no name (i left it out).  Spring, which dead-ends at Second, is to the left of Columbia.  The next (big wide) street to the right is coming in at an angle and that is South Main. That 4 way corner where that white bldg, stands facing us is the intersection, whereabouts was the drug store where Bence worked.  Very much in Lizzie's neighborhood!
Interesting!

This ASSUMES that the newspaper was correct!!! Neither reliable then or now. This was covered in books, and earlier msgs.

If H Harrington was inside for only a few minutes, how did this lengthy conversation take place? Was he on good terms with Lizzie or Emma? If not, consider the sources.

You are right, Ray, about newsarticles...but believe it or not Rebello's fine book of reference material is based on newspapers! Not all of it, but at least 1/2.  And yes, a person should read at their own risk...but if a person has a question as to the veracity of another, it wouldn't hurt to look for corroboration on one's own.  The reason being that I may have 3 sources and only post to one of them, as I'm not writing a book, here.

Witness Statements
Pg. 11
"Hiram Harrington. 'When the perpetrator of this foul deed is found, it will be one of the household. I had a long talk with Lizzie yesterday, Thursday, the day of the murder, and I am not at all satisfied with statement or demeanor. She was too solicitous about his comfort, and showed a side of character I never knew or even suspected her to possess. She helped him off with one coat and on with another, and assisted him in an easy incline on the sofa, and desired to place a afghan over him, and also to adjust the shutters so the light would not disturb his slumber. This is something she could not do, even if she felt; and no one who knows her, could be made believe it. She is very strong willed, and will fight for what she considers her rights. She went to the barn, where she stayed twenty minutes, or half an hour, looking for some lead from which to make sinkers for fishing lines, as she was going to Marion next week.' He spoke about the Ferry street estate being given to the girls, and afterwards being returned. He spoke at some length about her telling about the same story as was published in the News and Globe of Friday evening."

(Doherty & Harrington)

--BTW:  Wasn't it a Reporter who said Harrington was only inside a few minutes?
You can have it both ways?



(Message last edited Jan-5th-03  9:08 PM.)

sends press clippings including photos of victims to moody as a "momento of an interesting occasion."  is this documented?  because this backs up one theory i've had about lizzie as the killer.  that she was one of those lacking in basic human compassion and would be able to regard all this as just that -- an interesing occasion.

If someone wants to look this up, I believe there might be a reference in Rebello that cites the Pearson/Knowlton Correspondence.

I checked on my copy of Rebello, page 298.  He cites (ugh) Lincoln as a source.

I think I read something in a LBQ about it but I'm not sure about that. This old brain can't remember much anymore.

Isn't Pearson/Knowlton Correspondence referred to in there?
I remember Knowlton (Frank) telling Pearson that it was just a rumor, that his family knows the person who was stating that as fact, and they were not to be believed..."Lodge"? I believe the name was?  I'm really reaching here.
But it is in Rebello twice I think.

Right you are, Kat.  That same page (298).  Here is some of it:

"Pearson in More Studies in Murder (1936, page 130) made reference to a package of photographs and a note sent by Lizzie to Moody that read, "as souvenirs of an interesting occasion." In a letter to Frank W. Knowlton, son of Hosea M. Knowlton, dated Oct. 29, 1930, Pearson wrote: "Did I tell you that Miss Lisbeth sent a collection of photographs of the scene, bodies, etc., as souvenirs, to Mr. Moody. I have this on the authority of the daughter of Senator Lodge, formerly Mrs. Augustus Gardner, who had it from Mr. Moody."

"Knowlton replied, "I hope you will pardon me if I was a little skeptical about the alleged souvenirs sent to Mr. Moody. We get some pretty fanciful things from the descendants of Mr. Lodge, particularly in the female line, so that I don't take much stock in what I hear. Mr. Moody was a very good friend of my father's and used to visit us almost every summer. ....I am surprised, if it is true, ....I never heard of it. Frankly, it is quite improbable."

Sounds like another rumor that Lincoln reported as fact.  I checked Radin and Brown and neither of them mention it.

See, she did it again, I get these things lodged in my brain!  Thank you for finding that. 

Yes, thank you for finding that!
I was sitting here enjoyably reading the whole of the Pearson/Knowlton Letters, and 1930 is still way in my future!
But I figured it might be easier to find in there, than in Rebello!
Thanks again.
I go make "just add water" brownies now!

Mmmmm, brownies.  Did you make enough for the rest of the class? 

"...So, by Lizzie's peers she was judged odd by the standards of the day and some of it holds even to this day, acting like someone was invisible and walking by like they weren't there.  Yeesh!  The rest sounds like she was depressed or just a very moody woman."

The people who are quoted as thinking Lizzie peculiar or queer weren't exactly her admirers. If those who remained her friends and who she left inheritances to had been interviewed by Knowlton for his sanity brief Lizzie might not have picked up such a name tag.

It isn't peculiar to pretend someone you don't like or don't wish to acknowledge isn't there, happens all the time. This problem is called human nature...it is nicely portrayed in the movie "You've Got Mail."

According to this logic, then Lizzie was a different person around her friends, then around her family.
This is often true.
But it seems as if the family (Emma, Hiram, Mrs. Cluny, Mrs. Whitehead etc.) would know her better and to her core, having lived with her or among her for many years.  So if her family were not her admirers, that says a lot about the 1892Lizzie, more so than any friend.
Also, she seems to have had a new set of friends, largely, after the trial.
At that point, she could then re-invent herself.

one part of lincoln i'm sceptical about is how she describes lizzie's reactions during the trial and specific junctures.  how she reacts to seeing mr. bence.  how she turns purple and breaks down while her lawyer speaks of a daughter's love for her parents.  how she smiles and shares looks with bridget.  etc.  there's a lot of that in lincoln's book.  anybody know how accurate it is?  was she using real press reports?

... "The reporter asked her to tell about Lizzie's oddities. Mrs. Cluny said, 'There were times whereby Lizzie would not speak to members of the family who were visiting the Bordens. She would act as though she did not see them, and go right through rooms where they were without speaking a word to them. Then, again, she would be extremely pleasant and would act as though there was nothing too much for her to do for anyone ... A great many members of the family had the same experience.'
These were Lizzie's family members, that is what I was going by, if they judged her as odd, what are we to think?  One second she acts like they don't exist and the next moment she is as sweet as pie to them?  Thats manipulative at the very least.

And if there is any truth to Emma's interview, Emma herself called Lizzie queer and she was definitely someone who loved and stood by Lizzie through her trials and tribulations.

I've never seen "You've Got Mail", is it any good?  Worth renting?  I have seen "Sleepless in Seattle" and really liked it. 

I just noticed today that Mrs. Cluny was actually AT the funeral service in the Borden home, Saturday morning.

Lizzie may not have been different around her relatives than her friends. Relatives see personality traits as oddities and it always puts a one-upsmanship situation into play if you are OK and someone else isn't.  Your personallity peculiarities rather become queer and not just an aspect of your make-up. 

I am not surprised Emma and Lizzie didn't get on on the character/personality level, their charts over-all point they were quite different, yet they were sisters growing up together. If one is a family member and doesn't get on it is different than being an acquaintance and not getting on.  Being in the family makes more serious adjustments and tolerances a necessity. Sometimes they are never overcome, such as with Abby and the sisters. Being united against Abby might have made the sisters closer in that respect.

I wonder if anyone called Emma queer, peculiar, etc.  I think that came out because Lizzie was the one on trial.  All this businesss about remembering Lizzie as being queer came out after she was arrested. Relatives with an ax to grind with Lizzie wanted to get back at her now that she was accused of having done so with the old folks.

Yes, the fact Lizzie wanted to reinvent herself is evident from the fact she changed her name too. But core personality traits don't really change and if Lizzie was peculiar to her friends before 1892 I think new friends would have picked up on the same basic queerness and none of them did. 

Yes, I highly recommend You've got Mail.  A VERY favorite movie of mine, with Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan. I have a copy of it. There are people who might say Meg Ryan's character is a little queer, but I don't think so. 

How can you say "none of them did"?

I know one Cancerian, and if she is anything like our Lizzie, I wouldn't want Lizzie in my group of friends!  This woman is an emotional rollercoaster, takes everything to excess, has delusions of grandeur, etc.  I would definitely call this woman strange and I try to keep my distance when possible.

I don't know if this indicitive of Cancer women or not, this is the only one I know.    Sorry, no offense meant to any Cancers out there.

Maybe the news item we always hear quoted:
"Mrs. Andrew J. Borden is quite ill at her home with bronchitis", March 2, 1888, is the same Mrs. Borden that was on the committee of the Y, who may not be our Abby.
Our Mrs. Borden was sick for one day as reported in testimony, but after Bridget came there to work.
[edit here:  Make that 2 times Abby was ill, since Bridget came]

(Message last edited Jan-10th-03  6:18 PM.)

"How can you say "none of them did"?"  As far as I have read what her friends of later years said of her "none of them did" say she was queer.

Cancer suns are generally very self protective about their emotions and selves and without some Saturn to modify the trait and perhaps a little too much Jupiter, a Cancer sun could be as you describe. But that's just a nutshell interp.

You will never regret one penny applied to the rental of You've Got Mail!

Lizzie's sister, Emma, thought she was "Queer".
She moved out and away and changed her name because of the *queer* thing that happened in 1892--and when she realized she could no longer live with Lizzie.
Lizzie was then alone, except for her servants.
Rich single women would usually have companions paid to live with them and provide chaperonage and escort.
Lizzie did not.
What this means, is that she was untraditional (which we do know), and also that she did not entertain guests, and that she went out of town to visit the theatre and see friends.
A night or two on the town, taking in a nice dinner and a performance, only to return to her empty house where her few friends were her servants, shows that Lizzie could be amusing and friendly for short bursts of time, but always returning to that empty house.
It is easy to be rich, beholden to no one, able to travel, and meet with a few friends occaisionally and not seem *queer*, and not show those traits which her family disliked.
Also, as she aged, those tendencies might gradually dampen, or have less potency.

Thanks, Carol.  I know a little about astrology, but, not much.  I will have to find out exactly when the birthday is of this Cancer woman I know.  She definitely has an evil streak in her as she likes to pick at people and get others to join in with her until the person she is picking on snaps or breaks, very cruel.  And she constantly needs to be reassured that her friends are still friends with her, very insecure.

I'm wondering if there are any similarities with Lizzie at all?  I've been trying to get in her brain and find out what made her tick, what she was really like as a woman, as a person.  Could a woman of the Cancer temperment be pushed by social constrants of the times, treament by others to her and such to the point that she could possibly snap and take it out on them with a hatchet or not?

"You've Got Mail" is now on my list of 'To See' movies.  Thanks. 

CANCER   [July 19  can be considered cusp]

Important people born on July 19 include: Edgar Degas, Charles Mayo, George McGovern, Samuel Colt, Vicki Carr, A.J. Cronin.
 
STRENGTHS: graceful, self-aware, emotional
WEAKNESSES: impatient, temperamental, difficult
MEDITATION: much of what we need is quite close at hand.
Title of The Day: The Day of Controlled Movement
 
"Recurrent themes in the lives of July 19 people, are movement, grace, and form. Those born on this day are highly attuned to how they present themselves and often involved with mastering their body. Perhaps this preoccupation stems from their desire to channel and shape their emotions. Many born on this day are prone to mood swings, sometimes resulting in passive-aggressive behavior. They are also likely to be temperamental in adolescence, which may be especially trying and awkward for them and others. As they mature, July 19 people work actively to cultivate their innate grace; they are not only conscious of how they carry themselves, but also of how they speak.
 
In fact, the self-awareness that July 19 people demonstrate, on a number of levels, can be an exceptional quality. When they have made a mistake, they are quick to acknowledge it, and though they may not rush to apologize when they are unfair or unkind to someone, they will try to improve their attitude in the future. This capacity for improving on themselves generally does not go unnoticed with friends, family, or mates, who appreciate a July 19 person's efforts.
 
But though July 19 people generally succeed at mastering their deportment and how they relate to others, they still may not be in firm control of their own emotional center. Stillness of mind and non-action are vitally important in this regard. Those born on this day who come to understand the value of non-action will enhance their active side and bolster their self-confidence.
 
However, because July 19 people are self-critical by nature, non-action must not be confused with hesitancy or indecision. Rather, using the power of waiting to advantage, contemplating and acting at the right moment is what is meant here. For those born on this day, denial of immediate gratification is essential in developing strength of character, and at some point in their lives they are likely to take on difficult experiences that teach them much in this regard.
 
July 19 people should beware having undue faith in others, or engaging in adulation and hero-worship, which may ultimately rob them of their own self-worth and individual expression. It is vital that they cultivate and nurture their uniqueness, perhaps by even having the courage to strip themselves to the bone and build themselves up in a realistic fashion brick by brick.
 
July 19 people must also guard against perilous encounters, as their unreality factor can be rather high where their perception of others is concerned; they are particularly prone to project their own emotions on those close to them. This July 19 tendency toward excessive subjectivity must be shaped and refined, not merely suppressed, as efforts at control should aim to produce a joyful, playful and vibrant personality, not a repressed or habituated one."
 
ADVICE: " Though you must bring your emotions under control, never lose your spontaneity and insist on freedom for yourself. Don't worry about appearing naive; be more forthright. Beware of putting others on a pedestal or investing them with your own emotions."

The Secret Language of Birthdays, Personology Profiles For Each Day Of The Year, by Gary Goldschneider and Joost Elffers, 1994.



(Message last edited Jan-10th-03  10:24 PM.)

Thanks, Kat!  As I said before, I need to find out when this woman's birthday is, if its close or not.  I have that book and its oh-so-helpful in figuring some people out! 

I think the traits are there, or at least the potential.
I think Lizzie "hero-worshipped* Emma and thus was way-too-influenced by her.
If Lizzie did it, then Emma made her...meaning Emma helped to form & mold the person "Lizzie".
I also think this shows that she probably was very concerned with Appearances, and being a cusp is usually unsettling.
I also think Lizzie's emotional and psychical development was stalled at about a 16 year-old's level.
She may have caught up to her physical age much later in life.

Yes, I totally agree!  Her behaviour seems so juvenile, the sulking and pouting when she didn't get her way, pretending people that she doesn't like are invisible, etc.  Very childlike.  Could someone with a child's mentality of that time era, I know it happens all the time nowadays, commit murder of her parents?  Lizzie seems very teen angst ridden, probably would have made a great storyline for a John Hughes movie; Pretty in Pink, Sixteen Candles, etc. 

Cancer has a shell, and Cancer suns can hold up in their "shells" which serve as protection, which in Lizzie's case would be, I would think, her house Maplecroft.  Earlier on it might have been a mind set which blocked out other people, such as when she didn't recognize others who came to visit (Uncle John), etc.  On the night he arrived she WAS out visiting Alice Russell to whom she did pour out thoughts (was crabby)and in some emotional distress of various kinds. So, deep in thought about this she could easily disregard Uncle John and want to be in her own world upon coming back to her house. I would suspect Lizzie retreated to this shell when she was interviewed by the police on Thursday which is why she was described as cold.  When Cancers are not brooding they can be very warm and INCLUDE everyone around them in their world.

I don't think being a Cancer has anything to do with whether Lizzie could be capable of murder, all the twelve signs are psychological character traits, the negative sides of which, when taken to extremes or combined with environmental situations, etc. could cause someone, anyone to pitch themselves into the dark realms. And the sun is only one aspect of the person.

If Emma *Made* Lizzie, or at least helped form her early character, from where did she get her yearning for more...for more delightful possessions, for reading and fantasy, for *bettering* herself which might have gone sometimes to the extreme of snobbery?
I wonder whose influence formed this latter trait--
I'm not sure that I see Emma as a snob, unless *shy* people Are by some inate nature?
Maybe more self-absorbed, than really a *snob*.?

I figure the person who had a lot of influence on Lizzie in the 1885+ years is Mrs. Holmes.  I wonder if she realized the partly blank slate that was Lizzie when she finally joined the Central Cong. Church.  If she had, I wonder if she would have taken responsibilty for finishing the formation of our Lizzie's character.

After living amongst all those Bordens at Ferry street, AuntUncleGrandfatherStepGrandmotherCousinStepmotherand Sister--
then moving to Second Street would seem a step up.  But what influences would there be on the growing child Lizzie in that huge extended family on Ferry street?

Would there be no time to give her personal attention, where everyone is an adult, even Emma?  Did she develope bad habits to gain their notice?  Shunning, pouting, not speaking.

Mrs. Holmes said that Lizzie changed a great deal about 5 years before [1892], and came out of her shell (which had not  served her well, nor been attractive) and started to be more outgoing and thus making friends.  Of course this corresponds to Lizzie joining the Church, and finding her social *sea legs*.  Yet she was already 25.
Also at this time there were the beginnings of all the upheaval's:
"Lil'" Abby was born 1884.  It has been declared that our Abby didn't *care about* the Borden girls.  Maybe at this time Abby was concerned with her 1/2 sister, her pregnancy and the birth, and was tending to those matters.  Who doesn't love a new baby? [maybe Lizzie?]

Lizzie joins the Church 1885.
In 1887 the *house divided* situation starts.
Abby's loved younger 1/2 sister AND HER BABY were in need of the mortgage payoff.  Andrew makes the mistake of not declaring it to the girls.  Then, next, Lizzie and Emma receive their first joint property.  Lizzie stops calling Abby *Mother*. (Wonder if jealousy over that Whithead baby had anything to do with that).  That Lil' Abby was at least related to our Abby, unlike the Borden girls.  AND if Abby brought the new little family succor, she would be receiving in return admiration, love and gratitude and respect, that the Borden girls may not have been capable of showing. So her interest goes to the Whiteheads and the girls are motherless once again, feeling Abby's divided loyalties.

The next Watershed is that Lizzie goes to Europe with a group of spinsters like herself, travels, inhales art and culture and personal servants/service in hotels and sumptious meals, and beautiful scenery and lovely gowns and beautiful fashions.
And upon her return, or thereabouts, Lizzie acquires the bigger bedroom, and Bridget comes to work...all within that year.  Also, around the time of her return, the A.J.Borden building is finished and so might at this point be the *finishing* of Lizzie's development:
A trip to Europe
A Bigger Bedroom
A building with her name on it!
And then?....

And then a balloon bursts...things are not different...she is treated the same...the same conflicts and jealousies rear up, the family dysfunction is not miraculously fixed, she is still trapped in her social position, with weird relatives that she'd prefer not to acknowledge.  The fleeting promise of her future dissolves, just ...dissolves...
What frustration..what yearning turned to ashes?
Nothing will change.
The narrow, self-absorbed inmates of that house plodding through the same lives as before--you cannot step out of your assigned role...they won't let you.
You cannot GROW or groom yourself toward sophistication while still being treated as the dull younger daughter who has no prospects of ever any other life.
Morse comes and goes..he comes and goes like the tide so that soon you can't remember when is the tide?
And they are all so much older...they have always been so much older...all of them, even Emma--of a different generation.
Even Alice.  even Mrs. Holmes...where was Lizzie's childhood?
Then the evil, lurking feeling starts..the predator, the *other* who is out to get them..robbery, breaking & entering...almost a poltergeist effect?  A *heaviness*, a depression, an unacknowledged pre-sentiment of disaster and doom...all the HOPE of the previous few years turned to ashes in her mouth  clogging it until she cannot speak, cannot warn, cannot leave...

Wow Kat, that was good. Will have to read it again to fully digest it.

Has the makings of an LBQ article!

Let me add, wow!

My prospective two-character play has to do with Emma's culpability.  Since I'm going to be home for another two and a half months, maybe I should, oh, I don't know, write it?

Once again, Kat dear, wow.

Thank you my kind friends.
I am most satisfied that there were no EDITS!

Would all this be true if Lizzie was innocent of the murders?

Wow, Kat!  That was beautiful, just sheer poetry!  I've said it before and I'll say it again, we have some really creative people on this forum. 

There SHE IS!
HELLOOO Susan!

Sorry, its been a loooooooong weekend, my first without my single crutch!  No more Tiny Tim jokes to listen to, thank god/dess!  The weather has been absolutely beautiful out here and I've been trying to make the best of it before it gets cold again.  Went for an honest to goodness walk on the beach today in Coronado, it was heavenly! 

Well, so far our topic discussion seems to stand at:

1) We don't know for sure whether Andrew and Abby were friendless outside of Abby's half sister and John Morse.  Though it does make them sound rather one dimensional, perhaps we will uncover more in the future.

2) We have no concrete proof that Victoria Lincoln's grandfather, Leotine Lincoln, ever sat on a bank or mill board with Andrew Borden, they are of different generations, it doesn't seem likely at the moment.

3)  That Lizzie was viewed as odd or queer by her contemporaries.  But, we don't know if she had Temporal Lobe Epilepsy, she wasn't under a doctor's care that we know of and there were no other occurences in her life that could be construed as an epilectic episode.

I was going to bring up the topic of Lincoln's description of Lizzie, but, its a no-brainer.

Page 26.  "For the rest, she was TALL, stocky, jowly, dressy, and unremarkable." 

At 5'4" I would hardly call Lizzie tall, I'm 5'9" which I think is tall for a woman, but, yet I see women all the time that are in the 6' range and taller, so, I am not the giantess that I think I am at times.  Perhaps Victoria is going by her memories as a child, all adults are tall to children.

Now heres a good topic for discussion!  Whether Lizzie actually bought off the printers of a book that was produced of the murders at the time.

Page 27.  "On the other hand, like most of Fall River, I had always wanted to read Edwin H. Porter's The Fall River Tragedy.  However, Lizzie bought off the printer, a local, and had the books destroyed before they hit the shops.  There was no cheaper way to handle it, for the work was not actionable; it expressed no opinions and gave no damaging information that had not already appeared in out-of-town newspapers.  I may be wrong, but I think that Lizzie acted on the advice of Mr. Jennings, and that it was about the last advice he ever gave her."

Discuss....

There is an easy reply and then there's one that takes more effort to prove.
But the bottom line is that book was bought through subscription, and I believe that means pre-ordered.
Maybe even a deposit required.
So the publisher would produce as many books as had been signed for, right?
Some shop may order 5, and different individuals order 1, or 2.
I can't see how a person could *buy up all the copies* with a pre-arranged order to at least the individuals.

See Rebello, 359

(Message last edited Jan-19th-03  2:20 AM.)

That angle about the subscriptions makes sense.  If the books were pre-ordered and paid for in advance (wholly or partially), it would have been pretty hard to go around and buy them up.  Can't you just see Lizzie knocking on doors (hatchet in hand?) and saying, "I'm here to offer you $25.00 for that book you just bought for 98 cents."  (Wonder what the subscription price was.  Anybody know?)  The story of Lizzie's buying up most of the copies sounds like another of those legends, especially as more and more of the originals turn up.
Anyway, that book isn't all that hurtful to Lizzie.  There's nothing in it that hadn't previously appeared in the newspapers, and it's gentler on her than some of the news stories.

According to Rebello (page 360) the price was $1.50.

Exact wording is: "His account of the Borden murders defended the Fall River Police and strongly implied Lizzie Borden's guilt. Porter's book was sold by subscription for $1.50."

On page 359 - "It is known, that Lizzie, through her attorney, made an attempt to cease publication of Porter's book if it was published before the trial, contained any false statements and photographs she did not want published"

The later (359) - "According to the Fall River Daily Herald, Mr. Porter met with Att. Jennings on Monday and explained to him that his book would not be published until after Lizzie's trial. The photographs were not used in the book."

I agree the book is far less harsh than other books and many times less harsh than some of the Fall River Globe articles.


(Message last edited Jan-19th-03  11:03 AM.)

Thanks for the speedy responses!  So, this one sounds like a "legend of Lizzie".  Its easy to see how it got started though, Jennings trying to suppress publication of the book before the trial, which probably came down the line as Jennings trying to suppress the publication forever. 

I have this book and it doesn't pull any punches, nothing new or earth-shattering in it.  I guess Jennings didn't want all the information found all in one place for any or everyone to read at the time.

(Message last edited Jan-19th-03  1:52 PM.)

Q. Was Porter's book suppressed at the printer's?
A. That is what many people close to the case said. Note that the prepaid copies may have been sent out (or the money returned?). Who here can prove otherwise?

Q. If it was culled from the newspaper, why suppress it?
A. Because by gathering all the reports in one place, it hinted at the identity of the true murderer, which must be suppressed. Read the book, take notes, and see for yourself. Any proof otherwise?

Since we don't live in a perfect world, it is very likely that some copies were already sent out. That may explain its scarcity. Less than 100 copies out of a thousand?

I was at a yearly visit to the doctor yesterday.

I was waiting patiently in the waiting room (our dad says that's why we are called "patients"), and picked up a brochure for an osteoporosis drug.

As I was reading it, I was becoming convinced that here was just the drug I needed!  (I guess I'm suggestable to that?)

Then, near the end, they included F A Q's which I have come to find out lately is kind of computer-speak for Frequently Asked Questions.  This is where the *Herd* goes because obviously, to the pamphlet-writer everyone has just the same few questions and that's it.

I got to the one that was so Zen, I had to chuckle and put away the brochure.
The question was this:
"How do I know the drug is working?"    The answer was:
"You don't".

Lets see, wanted to come up with a new topic from Lincoln's book to discuss.  Hmmm....on page 35 Andrew is listed as being six feet two, and the autopsy report has him a five feet eleven.

Ah, page 37 Lincoln states that Lizzie graduated high school and gave Andrew her class ring.  As far as I know, Lizzie never finished high school.

"Still, she was rich and a Borden.  In high school she was accepted on the wistful outer edge of the inner circle.  But when she graduated, and high-school rings were being exchanged, it was on her father's little finger that she put her own, asking him to wear it always.  It was on his hand whe he died."

On page 37 Lincoln also states that Lizzie was a red head, but, where is the proof?

"Her hair was naturally curly; however, until it turned the mousy brown I remember in her later years it was red, and in her day red hair was considered ugly, a misfortune to be pitied."

Emma says at Trial, that Andrew wore a ring Lizzie gave him that Lizzie used to wear herself.

She says it was given him "10 to 15 years" before.

10 years before Lizzie would have been 22--it's the "15 years" before which make it then sound *school-related.*--as she would have been 17.

The undertaker doesn't remember if there was a ring or not when Andrew was buried.
Doherty told Mullaly about the effects on Andrew's body but in Harry's selection of testimony, it doesn't mention the ring.[Trial
612].
Is Emma our only source that Andrew always wore that ring?

Apparently the only other person who mentions the ring is Lizzie.  I searched everything and in the Preliminary she tells Mullaly what kind of property he had on him, watch, chain, pocketbook and the ring.

Dr. Dolan is questioned at the Trial as to whether or not he saw the ring on Andrew's finger and he can't remember it.

Philip Harrington states that Lizzie said that Andrew wasn't robbed as he had the above mentioned articles including the ring on him.

And the only other mention I find of it is in George Robinson's closing argument where he states that it was put on "many, many years ago when Lizzie was a little girl..."  I think I would prefer the term young lady if she was indeed 17 when she gave it to Andrew.

And Emma appears to be the only person who knows for sure that Andrew was buried with the ring on his finger.

I'm wondering if Lizzie did buy a class ring with the intention of graduating and then dropped out of school?  I recall in high school that we had to order our class rings quite some time in advance to have them for graduation. Or, was this just a simple piece of jewelery of hers that she decided to give to Andrew? 

That was really good, Susan, Thanks.  It reminded me of the stick.
There's something odd in the way Lizzie thinks of herself as "quite a little girl" only "10 or 15 years ago".  I remembered that same time span as mentioned about the ring, as also being mentioned about when, approx.,she had seen Andrew's  stick or club that scared Alice when she found it under the elder Borden's bed:
Inquest
Lizzie
86
A. My father used to keep something similar to this, that looked very much like it under his bed. He whittled it out himself at the farm one time.
Q. How long since you have seen it?
A. I have not seen it in years.
Q. How many years?
A. I could not tell you. I should think 10 or 15 years; not since I was quite a little girl, if that is the one. I can't swear that it is the one; it was about that size. (Marks it with a cross.)
Q. How many years, 10 or 15?
A. I was a little girl, it must be as much as that.

She considers herself "little" at minimum age 17?--or even 15 or 14????




(Message last edited Feb-5th-03  12:58 AM.)

I know, how strange is that?  I realize during that time period that teenagers weren't focused on as a group like say in the 1940s and on, but, I would think even then you would refer to someone of that age as a young man or young lady, not little girl.  Perhaps it had something to do with Emma's treatment of her, never fully letting Lizzie grow up or become an adult? 

When is calling someone a little girl an insult? When the person
being called "Little Girl" is 30? I got called that today & I have
been pissed off all evening. I always assume it is meant to put me
in my place, that I'm not a woman & don't know what grown-ups
are talking about. I don't think I've ever thought of myself at
16 or 17 as a little girl --- I usually say teenager --- but they
didn't call it being a teenager then did they? So maybe her "little
girl" just meant her girlhood that never became "womanhood" because
she never married? Even Emma in her 40's was called a girl, at 17
they might very well have been "little girls".

I believe Rebello says Lizzie's high school didn't provide rings to its graduates until after Lizzie's day.  High school pins were used instead.  (I just tried to look this up.  Would you believe it isn't in Rebello's index?) 

It's a strange thing to say about oneself.
That I was quite a little girl, at 17.
To me, that means under school age, or at least until age10 or so.
Maybe this "Ten or Fifteen years"  thing is just a figure of speech.
Maybe neither Emma, nor Lizzie, ever stopped to count backward and that it is a euphemism--and that "quite a little girl" is more exactly what she meant?

Still tho, I have this strange tableau in my mind of Andrew whittling that stick and Lizzie giving him a ring at the same time...10 or 15 years ago...

Wasn't there a book about when little girls become little women?
I think of little girls as not being teenagers, 13 is not a
little girl. I don't think I've ever heard of Lizzie or Emma
ever called "women" I think if you are old enough to be called
an old maid --- you are a woman.

This conversation made me think of the book little women. Written in 1867, so I imgine that you were a young lady, or little woman in the teen years at this time!







Little Women
by Louisa May Alcott (1832-1888)
Type of Work:
Sentimental, life drama
Setting
A small New England town; mid 1800s
Principal Characters
Mrs. March ("Marinee"), mother of four daughters
Mr. March, her husband, and army chaplain in the U.S. Civil War
Meg, their 16-year-old daughter
Jo, 15, wants to be an independent writer (and serves as the novel's narrator)
Beth, a frail girl of 13, the "heart" of her family
Amy, 12, the beautiful pampered youngest daughter
Theodore Lawrence (Laurie), the boy who moves in next door

It was written in 1867 and is a fictionalised biography of Alcott and her sisters.

Ooooo, Edisto, that would be a valuble piece of information to have!  That would mean that the ring was just a piece of jewelery that belonged to Lizzie.

Redfern, I love that book!  I used to see the movie all the time with Elizabeth Taylor right around the holidays, they haven't shown it in awhile though. 

Rebello, pg. 8:

"Lizzie had given her father a ring she had worn before she gave it to her father. Mr. Borden had the ring on at the time he was murdered. It was on his finger at the time of his burial. (Trial: 1530)
Victoria Lincoln, in A Private Disgrace (1967: 94) wrote, 'And for fifteen years Andrew had worn Lizzie's high school ring on his little finger.'

Note: The Fall River Historical Society maintains a collection of pins from the Fall River High School where Lizzie attended. High school rings became a tradition at the Bradford Matthew Chaloner Durfee High School after it opened in 1887."

So, even if Lizzie had graduated, no class ring for her, just a pin.  Where did this ring of Lizzie's come from, something from her mother?  A childhood gift?  I know this won't help solve the murders, but, its a small point that is part of the Lizzie legend that we are deconstructing, piece by piece.  And, why did Lizzie give Andrew this ring, an odd gift for a father from a daughter, more like something you would give a spouse or a lover. 

Thanks, Kat.  That's exactly the passage I remembered, and I don't know how I managed to overlook it.  Actually it doesn't say rings weren't used at Lizzie's high school, but it seems to imply that they weren't.  As to why Lizzie gave the ring to Andrew -- we'll probably never know (since she's not here to answer the question).  Part of it might have been the customs of the time, which seemed to attach particular significance to tokens such as locks of hair and bits of apparel that had been worn by a loved one.  Emma actually testified at the trial that Lizzie had given the ring to Andrew about ten to fifteen years before. (She was unsure of the exact time.)  That would be when Lizzie would have been in her late teens or early twenties.  Possibly the ring was one she wore as a child that became too small as she grew older but would still fit on Andrew's little finger.  -Or maybe it was even a ring that had been worn by Lizzie's mother before her death.  Giving it to Andrew might have been a subtle way to undermine Abby.  That's pure supposition, of course...

Remember how Evan Hunter explains the ring? That is was a gift to
Lizzie from a beaux? But, I guess she could have shoplifted it.

Aren't high school rings given to signify 'going steady'? Then or now?
Some intersting questions; 'my heart belongs to Daddy'?

I've come across another "15 years ago" statement...this one by Morse.

He is asked when Andrew said he had destoryed his will.

His answer was 15 years ago. (Inq. 106)

Now we have, approx. 1877:
A will destroyed
A stick appears
A ring given

Nobody can say for sure what they did there in the 1870s when Lizzie left or graduated from school. Is it possible that the daughter of one of the richest men in town could get special treatment, and leave when she wanted to? Or the school encouraged her to leave?
This is another question that can no more be solved than "how many angles will fit on the tip of a pin".

lincoln's explanation of lizzie's mental illness is something i discount altogether because there is apparently nothing to back it up other than a reference to a conversation where lizzie is supposed to have talked about how distracted and odd she had felt on some occasion.
<cut>

  Why is it, I wonder, that you "completely discount" Victoria Lincolns explanation of mental illness? Do you think it's not possible?

  I tend to be a believer. I have a sister that suffers to something simular. She would sometimes go absolutely berzerk before and during her period, even one time going as far as pulling a butcher knife on her husband. It took some time for she and her doctor to figure out what was going on, but they were and she was successfully treated.

  The mind can also be a dangerous thing, especially when holding  resentments like she seemed to have for Mrs. Borden.

i was just noticing a lack of evidence of lizzie having had a history of turning violent -- in such ways as you suggest.

i suppose it's possible that such things happened in the household which emma would never choose to tell about.  bridget might also have chosen to keep her mouth shut about such things if she saw them; she might not have seen them if they did happen.

two reported incidents that could be foreshadowing:  the prussic acid and the robbery.  but they don't resemble insanity.

If Lizzie had seizures she might not have wanted to, or allowed to go, on that 19 week European tour.  Especially if her menses brought on her seizure--that long a time away would encompass almost 5 menstrual cycles.
She also would probably have other, more obvious side-effects of a disorder--sleep problems, circles under her eyes, emotional mood swings--her friends would have noted these... we would have heard more through common talk about her other than she was sometimes *peculiar*, etc.?

Not to mention some evidence of any disorder or disease in the 10 months Lizzie was incarcerated...
with all her visitors and all the attention.

 

  I really think mental illness has to be better understood before it can be totally discounted. Too many people automatically think insanity when they hear mental illnes. Mental illness is not something that necessarily can be *seen*, it can be very well hidden. These types of disorders, including depression, are usually triggered by undue stress, this can explain why Lizzie can go on a 19 week vacation and not have a "spell." Also, of course nothing would be witnessed during her ten months of incarceration, the murders let loose 30 years of pent up frustration and resentment. She was mentally free.

  I'm not a Dr. or a shrink, I'm purely speaking from personal experience.

As I read it, the most common form of "mental illness" is compulsory contrariness. Often seen in the senile? What have you heard?

Very Good Point!!! No problems then, a few years earlier!!!
Ergo, no such "peculiarities" (or "queerness" as it was called then).

I was also going to say that maybe Lizzie wouldn't even have HAD friends, if she had a mental illness, even depression.
People do not gravitate to those who don't seem like others.  They may tend to stay away.
In all the years of knowing Lizzie, Alice never let on there was anything about Lizzie that would or could be found , in her favor, in a court of law, as mitigating circumstances.

I was watching Survivor, as I mentioned...there was a deaf woman and a model, as contestants.
The model thought the deaf woman might be a liability in their team-work they needed to win, because of her handicap.  The extra time it would take to communicate with her.
(Like they're GOING somewhere?)

A mental illness can be like a handicap, and I still think we would know about it in anecedotes from her peers.  The only thing we know for certain, as someone remarked here before, is that Lizzie gave a word-picture to Alice Russell Wednesday evening as to vague feelings of *whatever*--pretty self-serving-sounding, considering the next day part of her family is slaughtered...

--------
I'm sorry for your unfortunate experiences within your family, and it must be hard to try to do the right thing for someone who may not recognize their *handicap*.

I should include here my thoughts on stress.
I think for someone who has a form of disability, going away from home & family for an extended period of time, would be stressful.   There would be the rigours of travel, as well.  All kinds of adjustments.
I also think being incarcerated would be stressful , as well as being a new orphan with an uncertain future.  Just being around a retired Governor would be stressful--etc.


(Message last edited Feb-14th-03  5:20 PM.)

(Message last edited Feb-16th-03  11:39 PM.)

John Chalmers Da Costa, 1910
Female suicide is most common at a menstrual period, as are acts of criminal violence and attacks of insanity.

Source: Da Costa, John Chalmers. Suicide [Speech given to the American Philosophical Society, October 7, 1910]. [Reprinted in Selections from the Papers and Speeches. Philadelphia: W.B. Saunders; 1931, p 429].

According to Hippocrates, menstruation began the same in all women--the blood collected in the womb in order to flow out.  When a girl was no longer a virgin, and her "egress" opened, then she could menstruate safely with a clear pathway from the womb.  If the girl's virginity was still intact, as was common at the time of their first periods, and the egress was not open, then the blood could not flow as freely and instead gathered around the heart and lungs.  When "these [were] filled with blood, the heart [became] sluggish, and then, because of the sluggishness, numb, and then, because of the numbness, insanity [took] hold of the woman" (Hippocrates, Diotima, 349).  Hippocrates asserted that the veins were slanted in the area around the heart and lungs, and so the blood did not quickly flow back down to the womb.  It was a place "suited for madness" (Hippocrates, Diotima, 349), and hysteria.

Hysteria set in first with shivering, cold sweats referred to as fevers.  The girls went crazy from the fevers and  "[became] murderous...and afraid" (Hippocrates, Diotima, 349).  The blood around the heart alone caused them to try to choke themselves and, "their will, distraught and anguished because of the bad condition of the blood, [forced] evil on itself" (Hippocrates, Diotima, 349).  Many would experience visions, causing them to say shocking things and to be suicidal.  Those that did not experience visions had a desire "which [compelled them] to love death as if it were a form of good" (Hippocrates, Diotima, 349).  Sexual intercourse, by opening the egress, relieved the symptoms of this hysteria, and pregnancy cured them for life.  As women were supposedly the less courageous and weaker sex, those that failed to cohabit with a man eventually succumbed to the visions, choking themselves to death (Hippocrates, Diotima, 349).

-----I don't necessarily go along with V. Lincoln's premise, cuz I don't think Lizzie smote her parents.  But what I do see is that there may well have been some fact in Lincolns theory.

Joe

I have heard that older folks who are contrary do live longer!
Why?  i don't know.  And I also think the remark by deecx is uncalled for.

It's true! They do live longer.  My mother is a prime example.  She's 83.  And I agree that the remark by deecx was unnecessary.  Stay with us, Rays.  I enjoy your comments, contrary or not.  And, by the way, I find that A. Brown's work has a lot of merit.  I re-read his book over and over.
Joe

I apologize! I'm a bit cyclic.

That is big of you.  Thanks for that. -Kat

i was going to say something i'm glad i dont' have to say, since you did apologize.  kat did not deserve an insult there, and you might consider and respect the fact that some (kat being primary among them) are more well-studied than you and have accumulated some knowledge you would be wise to consult.

and don't plead insanity.  and if nothing else (old fashioned as i may be) i don't like vulgar statements directed at women.

  Firstly it wasn't directed at Kat it was directed at rays who never seems to have anything helpful to say, so he has to
insult new people.

  Secondly I wasn't aware rays was a woman.

i stand corrected about who it was directed toward. i dont' know rays gender.  i thought the remark itself was a bad idea.  i apologize for what i specifically accused you of.  i was mistaken.  it's wonderful to have you on board here.  sorry, deecx.  (an honest confusion in identifying posts.)

(Message last edited Feb-15th-03  3:18 AM.)

EEK.
Let's not let the shade of Victoria Lincoln divide us.

If we none of us make personal remarks, we should be OK.

I doubt Rays was aiming anything at anyone in particular...

And it's almost a full moon!

As a Moon-child I'm cyclic myself.

Lizzie as Moon-child, and CUSP at that, probably had some issues of sensitivity--do you think she had depressions and no one knew?
Or do you think she had a psychosis, and it's being the Victorian era, it was successfully kept secret?
There might be some merit in brain disorder, as her cousin and sister both died of  "brain disease" and "dropsy on brain".
I just don't know why we wouldn't know?
And I still doubt seizures, though they could be outgrown...she is probably too old at 32 to still have one and then never another.

Looking it up, July 19th 1860 was a full moon.
August 3rd, (closest to the 4th for a recorded moon phase.(1892) was a first quarter moon.
June 2nd, (closest to the first) 1927 was also a first quarter moon.
June9th,1927, (closest to the 11th), was a full moon.

  Thought I would go ahead and look at the moon phases on Lizzie's birth, death, the murders, and Emmas death.
   Red

Is a first-quarter moon the same as a "new moon"?

My vet said once to have surgery on my dog in the "new moon" = New beginnings...successful outcomes...  a good time to START a project...It DID work out fine, and it was pretty major, and my dog was no spring chicken.

Read E Radin's "LB the Untold Story" for witnesses about Lizzie before the murders. Poor little rich girl?

While it is good to read the classics, you should know that the passage of 2200 years has seen some advances in science and medicine since the Dark Ages. Maybe in the last century too?