Lizzie Borden Society Forum

I have always accepted what seems to be "common knowledge" that the Bengaline silk Lizzie turned over to authorities was decidedly not the dress she was wearing in the hour after the murders. I had seen Mrs. Churchill's testimony of course, it is everywhere, as is Doherty's. But I wanted to track down who else testified that it wasn't the dress, so first I went through William Spencer's excellent account of who entered the house during that hour before Lizzie went upstairs to change, and wrote down everyone who saw Lizzie. I came up with a total of 13 people: Bridget, of course, Mrs. Churchill, Alice Russell, Dr. Bowen, Mrs. Bowen, George Allen, Sawyer, Dohertym Mullaly, John Morse, and the reporters Manning, Stevens and Porter. (Wixon and Pettey were there too but apparently didn't set eyes on Lizzie) I then went searching through the trial transcripts, preliminary hearing, witness statements, etc to see what those witnesses said.

Of those 13 people, three of them (Bridget, Alice Russell, and George Sawyer) would testify that they had no memory at all of what Lizzie was wearing, while four more of them (John Morse, Geroge Allen, Mullaly and Manning) were not even asked if they could describe what Lizzie was wearing. Two of the reporters weren’t called to testify during the trial. Ultimately, it seems only four of those 13 witnesses attempted to describe for the jury what Lizzie was wearing that morning. Dr. Bowen, who initially described that “drab”-colored “morning calico,” was shown the Bengaline silk but declared he could not say one way or the other whether it was the dress Lizzie was wearing, despite some heavy pressuring by the prosecution to reject it. Mrs. Bowen, however, did agree that the dress matched her memory of Lizzie wearing a “dark”-colored dress. (As Hyman Lubinsky would also say) Officer Doherty and Mrs. Churchill were the only ones who definitively said they didn’t believe Lizzie was wearing the Bengaline silk.

Only two out of the 13 people who were in the Borden House with Lizzie that morning were willing and/or able to say the silk was the wrong dress? This is considered “proof” that Lizzie tried to deceive the police, and is thus, likely guilty? Is this a justified conclusion? Especially when two others remembered a dark dress and not light blue?

Is my math wrong? What am I missing?

Excellent analysis!!

When it comes to her dress, here are what I think are accepted as facts in reverse order of occurrence.
1. Lizzie burned a stained, worn dress Sunday morning, August 7.
2. The evening before (Saturday), Lizzie had been informed by the mayor that she was suspected of committing the murders.
3. Saturday morning, the police made what has been described as an extensive and thorough search of the house while the family was at the funeral.
The search was attempting to find a murder weapon and bloody clothing.
4. On August 4, roughly 30-45 minutes after Andrew's body was discovered, Lizzie chose to go to her room and change what she was wearing. She
claimed 'they' had suggested she do so. The 'they' were never identified and no one testified or stated that such a conversation with Lizzie had
occurred.

Questions or observations that arise:
[*]Why with the slaughter of her father and step-mother literally just discovered did Lizzie feel compelled to take the time to change her outfit Possible answer - Lizzie noticed a blemish or worried about such.
[*]Emma tells us the dress was sufficiently stained and worn to warrant its destruction, why didn't the police find this same dress during their search? Certainly an unidentified stain would be exactly what they were searching for. Possible answer - it had been hidden.
[*]She burned the dress just hours after being informed that she was officially a suspect.
[*]Dress was burned in kitchen, Bridget's domain, but Bridget spent the night elsewhere.

Testimony describing the dress:
I tend to put minimal weight on police testimony (Doherty in this case). For me, they made too many mistakes and had conflicting testimony to base a strong opinion upon.
That basically leaves us with the Churchill and Mrs. Bowen preliminary hearing testimonies. I'm assuming your 2nd testimony for the Bengaline dress is Lubinsky. He would have only seen the lady, from a relatively distant view, for a split second. For me, his sighting doesn't factor into the Bengaline discussion.

Bowen does mention that the dress was a 'morning' dress. From what I've read on-line, Bengaline silk seems to have been a material for daytime dress for 'going out', not what would normally be considered a comfortable morning dress for doing around the house in the company of family.

Mrs. Bowen was in the presence of Lizzie for mere moments that morning....her husband told her to leave after she made a noise upon hearing of Mrs. Borden's demise. Comparatively, Mrs. Churchill had extensive time with Lizzie that morning.

I view the testimony math as 1 vs 1. Churchill vs Bowen.

After weighing the circumstances of their testimony within the context of Lizzie burning the dress, I do not think Lizzie wore the Bengaline dress on August 4.

Also an excellent analysis! And sound reasoning. I've always read how a certain number of witnesses said it wasn't the Bengaline, and was surprised to find it was only two, and I wanted to be sure I wasn't missing pertinent information or testimony.

I agree that Doherty's "faint recollection" cannot be relied on, I think being a police officer, he might allow his recollection to lean toward what the prosecution needed, whether consciously or not. And yeah, Lubinsky was just skimming by. So I agree that it is basically 1 v 1, Churchill vs. Bowen. Mrs. Churchill was so specific, very hard to dismiss her. But I am also swayed by Mrs. Bowen's memory of how pale Lizzie looked when she arrived. “especially her hands.” Mrs. Bowen described “how very white they were… as they laid against her dark dress in her lap.” Very strong visual, pale hands against a dark dress. So Mrs. Bowen thought the Bengaline was the dress -- or rather she thought the blouse half matched her recollection -- and she also said she had seen Lizzie wearing it before, in the mornings. (I think Jennings tried to remind Hilliard in the preliminary when he was on the stand that the blouse or waist half was not silk, but cotton?)

For me, the biggest problem is a logic one. Why would Lizzie hand over a dress she didn't wear when there were SO many witnesses that could potentially say otherwise? It seems a tacit admission of guilt, which I guess is your point. But what a gamble! She had no idea so many of the people who saw her that morning would conveniently be unable to remember what she was wearing. Or that the prosecution wouldn't even ask half of them on the stand. (a little suspicious that, with the dress right there in the courtroom.)

If you believe Lizzie handed over the wrong dress, do you think it was because it so betrayed her guilt that she thought it was the lesser of the evils in trying to save herself from the gallows? If so, then it was a gamble that clearly paid off! (This is fun, don't know why I never posted before!)

The dress ended up being inconsequential at the trial, so if intentionally provided a dress that she didn't wear murder morning, she made a good chess move. I don't think she had a choice if she suspected that the dress might reveal something, or if she wasn't sure.

Last thought on this.....I don't think Lizzie just randomly decided to dispose of her worn out dress 3 days after her dad was slaughtered and the day after she was told she was a suspect.

If she was the murderer, I believe whatever dress she wore during the killings was covered by the Prince Albert coat or an apron. So probably no noticeable blood....she was just nervous it might reveal something.