Help! Hoffman and Mrs. Kingsley

[nbcatlover]

I haven't had much time to spend on Lizzie stuff lately, so I started exploring Hoffman which I only bought last summer.

I came across the entry for Mrs. Horace A. Kingsley and went Huh? (p.194).

Mrs. Horace A. Kingsley confirmed to Fall River authorities that John Vinnicum Morse was visiting his niece on Pine Street at the time the Bordens were murdered and could not have been the killers. She lived at 82 Pine Street on the first floor of the building where the Emerys, who Morse had gone to visit also lived...

I thought the Emerys lived at 4 Weybosset Street, which is not near Pine. Can someone help me out here?

[mbhenty]

Yes, NBCATLOVER:


Great question........

That is a little confusing. Someone messed up somewhere.

Mrs. Kingsley lived at number 4 Weybosset, today renumbered 24. But sometime before 1892 she lived at number 82 Pine.

She must have just moved to Weybosset street. Someone got her address mixed up back then, or perhaps she gave the press the wrong address in error.

But, if you go searching you will find that Mrs kingsley did live at 4 Weybosset, and if you check some more, you will find she lived on Pine Street sometime in 1892 and before.

[chuckciao]

I haven't had much time to spend on Lizzie stuff lately, so I started exploring Hoffman which I only bought last summer.

I came across the entry for Mrs. Horace A. Kingsley and went Huh? (p.194).

Mrs. Horace A. Kingsley confirmed to Fall River authorities that John Vinnicum Morse was visiting his niece on Pine Street at the time the Bordens were murdered and could not have been the killers. She lived at 82 Pine Street on the first floor of the building where the Emerys, who Morse had gone to visit also lived...

I thought the Emerys lived at 4 Weybosset Street, which is not near Pine. Can someone help me out here?

Could you please give me the title of this book by Hoffman. I am new to the forum and would like to read as much as possible about the case.
Thanks

[diana]

The Hoffman book is called 'Yesterday in Old Fall River' and is available on Amazon.com for around $27. It is basically alphabetically listed mini-bios of almost everyone connected to the Borden case. It is a very good quick-reference book if a name comes up and you want to see how that person featured into the case -- but unfortunately has a few too many errors to consider it a good source on its own -- so any information taken from there should be checked against other sources, i.e. primary documents or Rebello before accepting it as gospel. (Not that anything to do with this case should ever be remotely construed as gospel.)

[doug65oh]

Paul Dennis Hoffman is the author of the book, and you can get it from the Fall River Historical Society as well for about the same price as Amazon. I'd recommend the FRHS myself - they take good care of folks. I bought my copy of Len Rebello's book from them about four years ago. Marvelous folks to deal with - even over the phone.

[Kat]

Rebello, 121:
"Mr. Morse's niece confirms this story and Mrs. Horace G. Kingsley, who resides on the first floor apartment [at Emerys], says that she saw Mr. Morse come to the house early in the forenoon, and that she heard the trouble he had at the door and saw him as he was going away. She was getting her dinner at the time, and it was after 11 o'clock, although she did not notice him as he was going away."

-- I don't see the source but there is more on the page.
The 1892 Directory says Horace G. Kingsley, machinist, Fall River Mfg. Co., 82 Pine. The 1896 Directory says Horace G. Kingsley, machinist, 24 Weybosset. The address numbers were changed in 1896.
I thought she was in the Witness Statements- but I don't find her there.

[nbcatlover]

I'm trying to remember...I believe Pine Street was mentioned as the location of a homestead of some family in the case.

P. S. I'm looking through old posts and it wasn't the Holmes family that I was trying to remember.

[Kat]

Harry has Mrs. Mary A. Raymond, dressmaker, at 53 Pine 1892- and 134 Pine (1896 after the numbers changed).

Good memory!

[snokkums]

You can also get the book on the barnes and noble website for 17.95 on the used and out of print section of the website.

[nbcatlover]

Mary Raymond is the dressmaker who made the famous Bedford cord, is she not? There was a lot of confusion about her speaking with Detective Shaw or Shea. Supposedly she talked to the detective about the dresses she made for Lizzie, but Victoria Lincoln said, in her book, that she (Raymond) was there when the same detective came to speak to Lizzie about the robbery the year before the murder.

I don't believe that Mrs. Raymond made dresses for Lizzie after the murders.

[diana]

Mary Raymond is the dressmaker who made the famous Bedford cord, is she not? There was a lot of confusion about her speaking with Detective Shaw or Shea. Supposedly she talked to the detective about the dresses she made for Lizzie, but Victoria Lincoln said, in her book, that she (Raymond) was there when the same detective came to speak to Lizzie about the robbery the year before the murder.

I don't believe that Mrs. Raymond made dresses for Lizzie after the murders.

That bit about Detective Shaw and the dressmaker has always created confusion -- principally as a result of Victoria Lincoln's book. Using Volume II of the trial as her source for this information, Lincoln 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 -- and Lincoln tries to link the visit from Shaw to one of Lizzie's "spells". (Lincoln, 58+)

BUT, in the trial transcript, Mrs. Raymond is testifying as to the color of the dress she made for Lizzie and how she described this dress to Detective Shaw. And it's obvious that she is talking about a visit made by Shaw 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.
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.
Q. That is about all you know of that?
A. That is all I know about it anyway; yes, sir. (Trial 1582+)

[nbcatlover]

Searching the forum, I found what I think made Pine Street familiar to me.

The David Anthony home was on the corner of North Main and Pine Sreets. This is David Anthony whose 2nd wife was Mary Borden--the deacon, mill owner, and bank president---not to be confused with David M. Anthony, the "boyfriend", who's a distant relative.

A picture of it is on this thread
viewtopic.php?t=1779&highlight=charles+horton

It was posted by Kat on May 06, 2006.

[Kat]

Thanks Diana for the extra info on Mrs. Raymond and Detective Shaw from her testimony.

I'm glad you found what you were looking for, Cynthia!
I wasn't sure that Mary Raymond was who you wanted - since you said "homestead" of a "family."
But she, and Holmes, were all that I could find on Harry's list on Pine.

Thanks for the link!

[diana]

You're welcome! Lincoln's twisting of that testimony has always bothered me.

Speaking of David Anthony -- I just ran across something the other day that was new information to me. In her Pictorial History of Fall River, Judith Boss talks about the Fall River Historical Society being built on Columbia Street near the harbor in 1843 and dismantled in 1870 and moved "stone by stone" to its present location on Rock Street.

She goes on to say: "David Anthony, who purchased the house in 1878, was the last private owner. His grandson turned the building over the Fall River Historical Society in 1936." (Boss, 50)

[Kat]

It may be David Brayton.
Try the link to the FRHS- here- and see what they have on the history of the building?
(It's weird to double-check Judith Boss)

http://www.lizzieborden.org/

[diana]

Nice one, Kat!

Well, I'd been warned about errors in Boss. And, you're right. According the the FRHS site it is David Anthony Brayton -- Ms. Boss just omits the surname for some reason.

[Kat]

Well I think it is good you brought this up so people can realize this kind of mix-up can happen in Boss's book. It's a nice picture book, but I can't rely on it. I only found that out recently.

[mbhenty]

Though Boss was an historian, she was not specifically a Fall River Historian. Not sure where she was from, but Boss wrote 3 similar books on the history of Fall River, New Bedford and Newport R.I..

It is easy to get all the David Anthonys mixed up through Fall River history, since I believe there were 5 or 6 of them. The two most popular is Lizzie's David and the founder of the first textile mill in Fall River, which I believe was his grandfather.

The two story colonial which stood where the YMCA is today, the David Anthony House, was a grand old home. Many such colonials stood in Fall River before the textile industrial age here. Very little of them survived. A great example is the Lafayette House which stands on Cherry Street.

I believe that colonial belong to the first David Anthony. His son built a grand brick victorian about 2 blocks north, where Lizzie's David was born.

I think, I think..........a little light on the subject. From what I remember, but I would need to research to make sure.

[mbhenty]

David Anthony House.

[Kat]

Here is an "Anthony" tree view I just drew based upon information from our member "gramma." I have not verified the relationships. Note Anthony of the newspaper, Anthony the banker, David Brayton (of FRHS building?) and David Mason Anthony, Jr, Of "Lizzie Boyfriend" fame.
Also note Elizabeth Hitchcock Brayton.

If the view exceeds your screen size, please click on pic in box:

[mbhenty]

Yes, thanks Kat:

As you can see, even on this one branch of the Anthony tree there are "four" David Anthonys.

[Kat]

And "Lizzie's" David Anthony's grandfather's sister was the mother of the great newspaperman Edmund Anthony.

One might think there would be some serious suppression of news about any relationship...

[snokkums]

Just out of curiousity, how does David Anthony and David M Anthony figure into the Lizzie story? Maybe the hired gun?