Did Bridget say it..?

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Did Bridget say it..?

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...Did Bridget say "Both Bordens are dead'" before she should know both are dead? Before Abby is found?

We left this by explaining it as Coggeshall telling Officer Albert Chase some three weeks after the event - as being third party hearsay kind of thing. We left it as originating in the Witness Statements. That discussion was appended to another thread, so this is a new thread in case there is more to consider here.

Chase interviewed Coggeshall August 24th. Witness Statements:

Alexander B. Coggeshall, a stable keeper on Second street, left his stable at 11.10 to go to diner. He stopped to talk with Mrs Buffington, and she told him that there had been trouble in the next house. Just then Bridget Sullivan came out of the house on the run, and went over to Southard H. Miller’s house, and went in. Soon after Mr. Miller came to the door, and called him over, and said “Here Alex, I want you to listen to what this girl says,” Bridget then told them that Mr. Borden and his wife had both been murdered. Mr. Coggeshall then went to dinner at Mrs. Tripp’s No. 80 Second street, and he told her of the murder. It was then 11.20 by the clock in the restaurant.


But there is more.
We also have a direct statement made by Southard Miller himself.

Moulton Batchelder of the District Police interviewed several people 'in reference to the relatives of Lizzie Borden' - I believe the issue was heredity insanity - and sent these interviews to Hosiah Knowlton (HK102).

S. H. Miller of 93 Second St. Fall River opp. the Borden House.

...Bridget the Servant girl came running into my house and said both was dead just then a man was passing. I called him and told Bridget to tell him what she told me. She did and that man was a witness. I did not want anything to do with it and I did not go near the house.

A little earlier he says:

I was not a witness at the trial. I did not intend to be.

This document sent to Knowlton is dated November 24 1892 when the Trial has not yet taken place and Southard Miller must be speaking of the Inquest. He had known Andrew Borden since Borden was a young man, he says he was Borden's first employer, and he wants nothing to do with any trial, just as he wanted nothing to do with the crime-scene that August day. Someone else would have to be a witness to Bridget's running into his house.

As a consequence, was it overlooked? That odd wording of Bridget's he reports hearing? This is before Abby is found. This is at a moment, a stage in the events when according to her testimony - in fact according to the testimony of Bridget, Lizzie, Addie Churchill, Alice Russell, Dr Bowen and more - Bridget should not yet know Abby Borden is dead because the corpse is yet to be found. And according to her own testimony, isn't this after Lizzie told her Mrs Borden is out on a visit? After being told she's out, before she knows she's dead?

If we look at Coggeshall's interview in the Witness Statements, we find that Southard Miller had Bridget say it all again to Coggeshall. 'Bridget then told them that Mr. Borden and his wife had both been murdered.' In Southard Miller's interview with Batchelder, the same thing. 'I called him and told Bridget to tell him what she told me. She did and that man was a witness.' It's wrong to say Coggeshall learned this third-party. Coggeshall was a direct witness, as much of a witness as Southard Miller. He and Miller were on the same spot in the one moment hearing Bridget's words. In front of two witnesses, then, Bridget said both the Bordens were dead.

Indeed the way Southard Miller tells it, when he has Bridget repeat herself to Coggeshall it's as if he purposively intends to make him a witness.

Again, one could argue that Southard Miller's memory would be faulty by November of that year. But it is his recollection of what Bridget came running to tell him, just as it is Coggeshall's own recollection in August. One could say that hindsight upped the murder-count from one to two - but now we have two individuals who'd be making the error. Two individuals who agree, whether interviewed in August or November.

On the murder morning itself Bridget goes running into the Miller house a little after 11.10, according to Coggeshall, who's 'just then stopped to talk with Mrs Buffington.' I really would like to check everyone's account and see if there is basic agreement as to the time Bridget went running into that house opposite.

You might be thinking, Well where does it take us if she did say it. Any reasonable person might assume there were two murders, any distressed person might fear both parties to be dead... But Bridget is recorded as saying it is so, not that she fears it is so. This would demonstrate that a little after 11.10 that day Bridget Sullivan believed Abby Borden to be in the house - not just at that moment but all along.
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Re: Did Bridget say it..?

Post by InterestedReader »

Coggeshall didn't give evidence at the Trial. I've just been looking for him! So neither Coggeshall nor Southard Miller appeared in court to repeat Bridget's words and the jurors never heard their account.

In fact, Coggeshall doesn't appear at the Inquest either, so when Southard Miller says Alex Coggeshall 'was a witness', what he witnessed didn't go further than the police paperwork.

Unless... Coggeshall spoke at the Preliminary. Does anyone know if he did? My Preliminary is in a packing-box somewhere.

Southard Miller was 82 and his wife Esther died in October 1892, so one can understand why he'd no wish to be involved in the trial. Alex Coggeshall was about 52 - probably in possession of his faculties.
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Last edited by InterestedReader on Wed Jul 05, 2017 3:55 am, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: Did Bridget say it..?

Post by InterestedReader »

So now it's almost a year later and Bridget is giving evidence at the trial. I am wondering if she does something very strange, and if she's aided and abetted by the Prosecution. Whether knowingly or unknowingly.

In this excerpt you see how it is being acknowledged that Bridget made two trips across the road - with, here, an emphasis on her attempt to speak to Bowen. The first trip, Bowen was not at home and this, they ascertain, was before Mrs Borden's body is found. The second trip, again 'to the Bowen house', is after Mrs Borden is found dead. Bridget has been upstairs with Mrs Churchill, discovered the body, come downstairs again, and crossed the street to the Bowens for the second time.

Q: While you were speaking to Mrs Bowen the second time you went to the house, did you see anyone else, did anyone else come there?
A: To Mrs Bowen's?
Q: Yes, or the adjoining door.
A: Mr Miller spoke to me and wanted to know what was the matter.
Q: I don't care what he said.
A: Mr Miller spoke to me. That was all, I guess.


Moody 'doesn't care' what Miller said, and moves on.

At the prompt 'did anyone else come there? [...] to the adjoining door', Bridget, surely, reshapes events. In this new, revised account she didn't go 'running' or 'into' Southard Miller's house, it is Miller who appears at his door and asks what is the matter of her. More importantly, Bridget has shifted her exchange with Miller from before Abby Borden's body is found to after it has been found. And all Moody does is helpfully underscore the fact she made two trips, the first and then 'another time', both to the Bowens, neither one to Southard Miller's. (Didn't the Millers and the Bowens all live in the one house anyway? Mrs Phoebe Bowen being Southard Miller's daughter. Or was it just adjoining buildings?)

It's almost as if Moody is well aware there's a problem and is himself steering the ship clear to 'the second time you went to the house', when Bridget would know both Bordens are dead. Bridget, certainly, seems to be trying to divert attention from the first, the initial crossing of the street - it was then that she spoke to Southard Miller and Alex Coggeshall, according to the men themselves.

There is a big discrepancy between their version of events and Bridget's. But Bridget's version suffered no comparison in the minds' of the jurors because Southard Miller and Alex Coggeshall never gave evidence in court.

If Bridget Sullivan did report Abby Borden to be dead before the body was found then her performance here on the stand might indicate she was conscious of the mistake.

The Trial passage opens from this image. (Apologies for not typing it out, but unable to type much at present.)
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