Bridget & Maggie

[Catbooks]

i was poking around and came across a copy of bridget's death certificate.

while it doesN'T* specifically say eugene sullivan and margaret leary (maiden) name are her mother and father, i'm assuming that's the case since that info is usually on them.

two things occurred to me. one, it's always seemed odd that lizzie and emma called her maggie, although her name was bridget. what, to them all maids were called maggie, and so generic that you just call them all by the same name? if i were she, that wouldn't exactly endear the sisters to me, yet she genuinely didn't seem to mind.

well if her mother's name was margaret, no wonder! it's conjecture, but i could see lizzie or emma accidentally calling her by the name of their former maid in the beginning, perhaps them asking her if she minded, and her responding, 'oh no, me mum's name was margaret [or maggie], it'll remind me of her.'

another thing of note, who knew bridget was vain? she shaved about a decade off of her age. she was 26 in 1892, yet according to her birth year here, she'd have been only 17.

*edited so's i wasn't saying the opposite of what i meant

[Curryong]

I remember reading somewhere in the testimony, (have to rake it up) that a previous maid of the Borden's (the one who worked for them before Bridget arrived) was called 'Maggie' or Margaret. While Mr and Mrs Borden always called Bridget by her correct name neither Emma nor Lizzie could be bothered. Says something about their attitude, doesn't it?

[Catbooks]

that's what i recall, that their maid right before bridget was maggie. but that's what i mean. it would be easy to accidentally call bridget maggie in the beginning.

if emma and lizzie apologized and asked if she minded, she could very well have responded the way i wrote above. lizzie and bridget were only 6 years apart in age, so they'd see one another as more or less contemporaries, and it'd be natural to be less formal with one another. emma less so, but still not the age (and position) gap as with abby and andrew, who were her employers.

what if it became more like a somewhat affectionate nickname? she did after all like lizzie and emma. if it bugged her, she wouldn't have.

it sure would be interesting to know what the original, real maggie thought of the borden household, and the murders!

[Curryong]

Isn't the age-changing thing cute. I wonder if she told the Bordens her correct age when she got the job? Of course, in many poor families of the time, in Ireland and elsewhere, birthdays were often disregarded and if you didn't have a birth certificate it was sometimes a case of guessing, even on census forms and other documents. Perhaps, as she got older she genuinely couldn't remember or never mentioned it, so whoever gave the information to the registrar just took a guess.
Yes, she didn't seem to mind being called 'Maggie'. Perhaps she preferred it to Bridget!

[debbiediablo]

It may be Bridget lied to appear old enough to get her first job and it just carried over. A friend of mine's great-grandfather lied to enlist in the Confederate Army and was leading a cavalry company at age fourteen! Later in life she didn't value those extra years. Or it was a clerical error at some point.

As for Bridget being called 'Maggie', I doubt she cared so long as the job paid and she wasn't verbally abused or physically overworked. It does provide a clearer picture of how both Emma and Lizzie objectified other people. I do not entertain either of them asking Bridget for permission to do anything or holding her in any type of affection. This rarely happened between employer-servant, and when it did the circumstances were more along the line of a beloved nanny or a respected tutor.

[Mara]

Another yes on Maggie having been a former (if not the former) maid's name. And who knows? Maybe Lizzie affected the French habit of calling maids "Marie," no matter what their actual names were. I think that was done somewhat in England, too. I'll have to dip back into my stacks of Sherlockiana for that -- remember "the Saunders" and so on?

Edited to add: It was common for people to either not know their ages, or to lie about them for work. Of course, census records are famous for being sketchy that way. My own father got into the Army at 16. His military paperwork is a hodgepodge of dates. At least they got it right on his tombstone at Arlington Cemetery.

EXTRA SPECIAL BONUS EDIT: When the Etruria docked and released its passengers from the US with whom Lizzie crossed for her Grand Tour, she was listed as 16. She was 30, according to her passport application.

[Curryong]

Lol, that sounds rather like something Lizzie would do! Her maids at Maplecroft liked her I believe, as she was kind to them, but I wonder whether she had a Marie there, too!

[Curryong]

I know sea voyages can do wonders for the complexion but, Gosh Mara, with the best will in the world I can't imagine the 30 year old Lizzie passing for a teenager! Maybe she took a chance and put down 26 on the passenger list and the Etruria's purser muddled it up and put 16.

[Mara]

I'm sure it's some sort of mistake. (Do I have the right Lizzie A. Borden?) Here, let me post the document and you can see what you think. It's from UK, Incoming Passenger Lists, 1878-1960 on Ancestry.com.

[Curryong]

Yes Mara that is certainly a 16, can't be anything else. How bizarre! Perhaps the officer was thinking of his teenage daughter at home that he'd soon be seeing at that moment!

[debbiediablo]

What is the date of that roster?

[Catbooks]

i did notice the day and month of her birth were missing, so i'm sure you're right, it wasn't uncommon for people (especially those not living in large cities) to not know their birthdays/years. but there's a pretty big difference between a 17-year-old and a 26-year-old. when i look at the photo we have of bridget, she doesn't look 17 to me. she does look 26, or thereabouts.

if she were lying about her age to get a job, i wouldn't think she'd add a whole 9 years. there's no reason for her to. women, or girls, started working as maids at a young age. child labor laws were still in the future, and in any event, children 12-16 would have been fair game as a domestic.

can't be about immigration, because there wasn't any age restriction, not that i know of. i had a friend whose great grandmother came here from russia as a small child around that time, all by herself, in steerage, with only a note pinned to her for (i assume) ship personnel and relatives awaiting her here! (can you imagine? she must have been scared to death.) i wouldn't think it'd be different for someone coming from ireland.

Postby Curryong » Mon Feb 10, 2014 6:37 pm

I know sea voyages can do wonders for the complexion but, Gosh Mara, with the best will in the world I can't imagine the 30 year old Lizzie passing for a teenager!

got to be a clerical error. i noticed they have her down as a spinster, along with another supposed 16-year-old. looks like the only 3 options were child, spinster, and matron.