I have heard that Lizzie was a cleptomaniac. Is there any truth to this? 
My only explanation for this was that her father was so tight with money she had to steal to get things. He sure wasn't buying anythingLizzie a clepto?
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snokkums
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Lizzie a clepto?
I have heard that Lizzie was a cleptomaniac. Is there any truth to this? My only explanation for this was that her father was so tight with money she had to steal to get things. He sure wasn't buying anything-
Kat
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I used to think that this was a malignment against Lizzie that had not much basis in factual evidence. But there is anecdotal material on this, plus the question of the Tilden-Thurber incident.
Do you have The Casebook of Family and Crime in the 1890's? The editor, Williams, has correspondence with Fall Riverites on this question.
Do you have The Casebook of Family and Crime in the 1890's? The editor, Williams, has correspondence with Fall Riverites on this question.
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snokkums
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lizzie the clepto
thanks for the info think I 'll have to get the book-
Kat
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What do you have so far?
That book I mentioned has interview & correspondence material at the back, and the rest is news accounts with commentary by the editor.
Correction:
The shoplifting was a chapter treatment in Proceedings, by Williams, not Casebook.
In Rebello, pg 500:
"Lizzie Borden: Did She Do It?"Hartford Courant, Hartford, CT, August 16, 1971: 2.
"Interview with eighty-five year old Mrs. Ellis Gifford, curator of the Fall River Historical Society, recalled Lizzie as a kleptomaniac. She knew Lizzie but didn't like her much. Mrs. Gifford said, 'She [Lizzie] wasn't ostracized, but, she was ignored ... people didn't mingle with her.' Mrs. Gifford's husband owned Gifford's Jewelry Store in Fall River. He watched Lizzie 'very carefully' when she came to the store. Mrs. Gifford went on to state that 'the clerks would watch her carefully if my husband was busy. She had plenty of money to buy everything she wanted. It was a compulsion.' Mrs. Gifford believed Lizzie murdered her parents. She said, 'Nobody thought about it [Borden murders] once it was over. It was only when people came in and started to write books about it that anybody got interested in it.'"
That book I mentioned has interview & correspondence material at the back, and the rest is news accounts with commentary by the editor.
Correction:
The shoplifting was a chapter treatment in Proceedings, by Williams, not Casebook.
In Rebello, pg 500:
"Lizzie Borden: Did She Do It?"Hartford Courant, Hartford, CT, August 16, 1971: 2.
"Interview with eighty-five year old Mrs. Ellis Gifford, curator of the Fall River Historical Society, recalled Lizzie as a kleptomaniac. She knew Lizzie but didn't like her much. Mrs. Gifford said, 'She [Lizzie] wasn't ostracized, but, she was ignored ... people didn't mingle with her.' Mrs. Gifford's husband owned Gifford's Jewelry Store in Fall River. He watched Lizzie 'very carefully' when she came to the store. Mrs. Gifford went on to state that 'the clerks would watch her carefully if my husband was busy. She had plenty of money to buy everything she wanted. It was a compulsion.' Mrs. Gifford believed Lizzie murdered her parents. She said, 'Nobody thought about it [Borden murders] once it was over. It was only when people came in and started to write books about it that anybody got interested in it.'"
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Kat
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LIZZIE BORDEN: A Case Book of Family and
Crime in the 1890s, Joyce G. Williams, J. Eric Smithburn,
M. Jeanne Peterson, editors, 1980 T.I.S. Publications, pg. 270:
"In 1959 Edward Rowe Snow published Piracy, Mutiny and Murder, a collection of sixteen true stories of violence set mainly in New England. He includes a section on Lizzie Borden and recounts, for the first time, the story of Lizzie's shoplifting in 1897. He reports that Lizzie signed a murder confession in exchange for the dropping of the shoplifting charges."
--This is a controversial topic, but a very interesting story and the book might be acquired through Inter-Library Loan.
Crime in the 1890s, Joyce G. Williams, J. Eric Smithburn,
M. Jeanne Peterson, editors, 1980 T.I.S. Publications, pg. 270:
"In 1959 Edward Rowe Snow published Piracy, Mutiny and Murder, a collection of sixteen true stories of violence set mainly in New England. He includes a section on Lizzie Borden and recounts, for the first time, the story of Lizzie's shoplifting in 1897. He reports that Lizzie signed a murder confession in exchange for the dropping of the shoplifting charges."
--This is a controversial topic, but a very interesting story and the book might be acquired through Inter-Library Loan.