Lizzie Borden Society Forum

Hi all!

Please know that a couple of us keep an eye on the forum to make sure that any posts are responded to relatively quickly. The forum hasn't had much activity this past year, but don't let that make you think that a post won't get read and engaged.

If anyone has a particular case topic they'd just like thoughts shared on...let us know.

I appreciate what the regulars here do...and they really are the repository of information on the Borden case. I am going to give some thought to how to try to breathe the tiniest spark of interest into this. I run a youtube channel and my audience is small to moderate in size, but usually very active in what we do in true crime. I am going to try to lead them here to get involved with their questions...try to get them to plunge deeper into the case. I'm going to take a few days or weeks to try to come up with something.

Did Lizzie have anything to do with the club under the bed that scared Alice R.?

If it wasn’t Nance, then what living conditions became so bad that Emma would leave her younger sister?
Does this show a character flaw of Lizzie, that she would allow things to “become unbearable?”
It seems Lizzie was ready, or perhaps working towards the split, and kept pushing Emma away in this mysterious manner, knowing that Emma wouldn’t tolerate it much longer.

We know nothing about the club under the elder Borden's bed that Alice Russell found. I presume it wasn't a walking stick, so that leaves self-defense as the other plausible explanation for its existence. That does give us a clear indicator that Andrew had concerns about intruders.

What is striking about the sister split is that it lasted for the duration of their lives. Moving out could have been caused by any number of squabbles....but literally becoming estranged for over 20 years and (to our knowledge), never speaking again is super extreme.

I don't think it was something that Emma likely would have eventually gotten 'her head around'....like having an affair with the chauffeur, sipping on adult beverages or throwing a periodic party. Seems like it had to be something that Emma found so socially unacceptable or personally heinous that reestablishing their sisterhood was not an option.

So I tend to think it was due to a lesbian affair w/ Nance (or whomever) or Emma learned conclusively that Lizzie had killed their father.

It is interesting that Emma never purchased a home of her own and seemed to adopt a nomadic lifestyle....just like her Uncle John.

Tons of oddities throughout this case, and I agree if Emma found out Lizzie had anything to do with the murders, that would be unbearable, especially seeing the inheritance spent on things unapproved.
The more I think about the case, the more, I can’t figure if Lizzie had help , or did she have a great hiding place for the clothing. It seems she didn’t have time, or was unsure about how to get rid of the bloody towels.
Also, something I was pondering, if Lizzie loved animals, and we know she had a dog from the older photo at Maplecroft, did Andrew not allow pets in the home at Second Street?

Nothing indicates the Borden's had a dog at their Second St. house. I can envision a cat, but that is just an opinion.

Right, I read somewhere that she had a cat, killed a cat etc..

There is a newspaper article with pharmacist Brow recalling her purchasing chloroform to put down a cat. FYI. The Brow's owned the pharmacies closest to the Borden home.

So that certainly suggests she may have personally had a cat.

I wonder if it was her attempt to put the cat down in a humane way.

I agree that it was probably how old, sickly cats were put down the in late 1800's.