Abby Borden's Feet

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InterestedReader
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Abby Borden's Feet

Post by InterestedReader »

Specifically, her footwear.

Surely these are mismatched. Yes Abby is surprisingly shod in oversize boots or shoes, but one looks to be many sizes bigger than the other, and the soles are different shapes.

We might say this is due to foreshortening - that the foot we see on the left is turned on the ankle or buckled against the floor. But the explanation doesn't seem to work. The toes are on a level.

How do people read this part of the crime-scene photo?

I'm using the FRHS image. I don't know if it's been much altered but with the foot on the right (Abby's left) we see almost nothing of the upper, suggesting these are mule-type slippers.

Abby was a corpulent person; she may have had diabetes and oedematose feet and worn house-boots or men's slippers on the swelling. But whatever she has on her feet here just doesn't look like a pair. It makes one wonder almost if they were rammed on her after death. Maliciously?

It's strange how the footwear found on Andrew Borden's corpse also has its attendant problems.
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Re: Abby Borden's Feet

Post by MysteryReader »

The only thing I remember about this (it was awhile ago that I read it) was that she was wearing men's shoes. Why? I don't know. The shoe on her right (and ours) seems to be longer and narrower than the left.
It's kinda hard to "read" the crime scene photo- the left foot is turned, perhaps when she fell, or afterwards when the body relaxes in death. While the temp wasn't too hot (at least not for us but maybe for them), rigor mortis could have set in and then the body relaxed (forgot that term). I'm interested in hearing other theories.
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Re: Abby Borden's Feet

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I've not yet discovered a contemporary statement as to what she has on her feet.
Or any inventory of her clothing. There's only what Chase said he had buried in the yard - just chemise, drawers, dress, skirt (petticoat) and aprons, as to clothing.

'Andrew's boots' seems to be modern speculation - and if 'Andrew's boots' were this much too big for Abby they'd be dangerous.

It's a pity no-one made a note about this in 1892 because then I wouldn't be wondering if they are a mismatch and more importantly, if there was blood on the soles.

Lizzie told a complete fiction about Andrew Borden's slippers. A peculiar, pointless fiction. He was found in boots, not slippers. But if she slipped into his slippers to commit the crimes couldn't she finish by ramming them on her stepmother's feet?

Whatever they are, I think it's masculine footwear.
Relatively little footwear was mass-produced at that time and cobblers still cobbled so it was a lot easier for long-footed women than it is today. I don't think it really holds out, the answer that Abby wore men's shoes indoors because she had big feet..!

On the other hand. In Lizzie's own account of a projected trip for which there was never any corroboration her last exchange with her step-mother was "You're not going out like that?" I know, these aren't the actual words she allowed herself to have said... But there's something inane about her preoccupation with clothes and wouldn't it be awful if she saw red because Abby was shabby and shameful.
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