Lizzie Borden Society Forum

I'm starting to browse through the forum from oldest to newest and I ran across an old post, I think from haulover:

My question is, based on the quoted information below, could Lizzie have purchased a new hatchet months before the murders, as a joke meant for the Marion girls? Her thought being that she would present it as a joke since the hatchet at the cottage was so dull and had caused them so much trouble?

If Abby was killed with a new hatchet (the gilt paint found in the wound) and Lizzie threw the hatchet onto the neighboring roof, not initially intending to kill her father - that would explain why there was no gilt in his wounds and why that particular handleless hatchet fit his wounds in the trial when another hatchet of the same blade size did not.

Here's something on the letter and the hatchet:

"... legend gives Lizzie a sour disposition, but it is quite likely that she had a sense of humor; others besides Kirby have commented upon it. In fact, a humorous note she had written caused a one-day sensation right after the murders when it was misinterpreted as meaning that the had bought a sharp ax. Several days before the murders Lizzie wrote to some friends that before coming up to visit them she would get a sharp ax to make certain she did not freeze. She was referring to an episode that had occurred the previous summer when they were together at the same cottage. On the first chilly evening they found that the logs on hand were too large for the fireplace and the ax so dull they could not chop the wood to fit. They had to search constantly for small branches and twigs in order to keep warm. A reporter who went to Marion to interview Lizzie's friends after the murders either misunderstood her reference in the letter or let his imagination run wild. He wrote that Lizzie had bought a sharp ax just prior to the murders. Before the police learned the real meaning of the letter, officers questioned every hardware merchant in Fall River and for miles around. They found no one to testify that Lizzie had purchased an ax." (Radin, 54)

Outside of including a lot of flawed or fabricated information, the most frustrating/irritating aspect of most of the 'Lizzie novels' is that the authors provide zero or weak sources. I've read Lincoln, Radin, Brown, Kent, Sullivan, etc, but I have never gone back to the books and use as a source. I rely 100% on contemporary newspaper articles, primary sources and other contemporary sources, such as diaries.

I like the question your post raises and will post some of the information that I've dug up on the Marion letter. Will do tonight or in the morning.

Lastly, if you are looking to purchase a single book to educate yourself on the case, I highly recommend "Case Against Lizzie Borden", by William Spencer. I've found a few technical errors, but that is almost expected with the crazy amount of detail this case presents to modern day sleuths.

Thanks, and I appreciate the book recommendation. I bought Spencer's book, Rebecca Pittman's, Victoria Lincoln's, and Cara Robertson's. I also have an unopened copy of Parallel Lives from the Fall River Historical Society.

I have some very basic questions:

1. Lizzie said something like: "He was a very indulgent father in that way. I never asked him for anything that he did not give me. Sometimes I had to ask him two or three times, but I always got it in the end."

Here's my issue...it is often said that the 42 and 32 year old women could not live alone because it was improper for their class. However, they did just that with the intent of being accepted by that neighborhood. They did not go to live with some male relative's family. This is the part that really bothers me - Maplecroft is basically a mansion in the best neighborhood in town, yet it would have been an investment of 4.3% of his net worth. 2.15% for each daughter. Why oh why did he not just buy them a house? He was too frugal for Maplecroft itself - but that makes the argument even stronger - it would have cost less than 4% of his money and he could have owned it as an investment and just let them live there for free.

2. People claim that the disagreement John had with Andrew and Abby could be a motive to brutally murder them the next morning. If that disagreement, if it even happened, was so monumental, why did he casually have breakfast with them the next morning and why did Andrew invite John back for dinner (lunch)? Plus, people thinking a rancher and butcher remembering details and being observant is suspicious. No, no it is not. Ranchers are specifically known for their extreme short term memory skill because part of their job is counting and grading moving livestock as it passes through a gate. John Chisum was said to be able to simultaneously keep running counts of 3 grades of cattle in his head as they passed through the gate.

3. People VASTLY underestimate the damage a man the size and strength of John would do swinging a hatchet in anger. I will post a 30 second clip of a History channel show where weapons are tested against forensic dummies. Feel free to remove it if it is too gruesome for this forum. It aired on the History channel and it is just plastic and food coloring, but it is extremely violent, but also it is a forensic dummy, so it is relevant for an honest assessment of the case. Also, notice where the blood splatters and how much he has on him at the end.

WARNING: This is a forensic dummy hatchet simulation from the History channel. Watch at your own discretion. https://www.youtube.com/shorts/S5imKHL7Jlg

4. I don't get the insistence that Lizzie couldn't be free of blood spatter. Women wore night caps, they owned winter scarves, they owned waterproof raincoats, there were old bedsheets - all of these things can be burned or wiped down easily.

I'm still new to the case, but I'll try to always keep Sherlock Holmes' warning in mind: "It is a capital mistake to theorize before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories, instead of theories to suit facts." - Sherlock Holmes, A Scandal in Bohemia

Feedback.

#1. This is one of those social enigmas that it is so hard for me (us) in the 21st century to get our head around. It does seem that wealthy ladies did live alone, but after their father died. Anna and Carrie Borden are just one example. That said, seems like they could have figured something out that did not entail massacring their parents.

#2. The only reason anyone can claim their was an argument was by enhancing Lizzie's comment at the inquest that she shut her bedroom door because their conversation bothered her. The "Morse did it" crowd have extrapolated that out into a full fledged, border line violent, verbal argument. Just like bullet 3, Morse is by far the favorite 'non lizzie' suspect by most folks.

#3. Good point. 10 and 18 full strikes by a strong, able bodied male sure seems would have done even more damage to the victims than what was done.

#4. We know Lizzie burned a stained dress, 2 aprons were buried with the death clothes and Andrew's Prince Albert coat was inexplicably and seemingly used as a pillow by Andrew. Any and all of these 3 items could have covered an assailant and limited exposure to blood splatter.

I've never viewed the lack of blood on Lizzie as a suggestion of innocence.

The lack of a definite murder weapon and Bridget not mentioning that Lizzie seemed out of breath are the only 2 items that give me pause on deciding that Lizzie was the sole perpetrator of the crimes.

Beyond what is provided below, there are more newspaper articles on the subject of the 'Marion letter', but these provide the gest of the story. The two letters from District Attorney Knowlton to Attorney General Pillsbury and the two witness statements submitted by Medley and Harrington are the only primary source documents I am aware of.

A common occurrence is the misspelling of Elizabeth Johnston's last name. Its often referred to as 'Johnson'.

One other thing to keep in mind...since the definitive murder weapon has never been identified, we can't be 100% sure that it was a hatchet. It seems to be the most likely answer, but some of the cuts (eyeball slicing for example) may indicate something thinner and sharper.

Boston Advertiser, August 24, 1893 (Rebello Page 64).
It was Miss Johnston who received a letter from Lizzie the day of the Borden murders. She destroyed the letter because it, “Contained reference to something which in the opinion of the young woman (Miss Johnston) …that might, in light of subsequent events, be misconstrued.”

Knowlton Papers. Page 73. Document HK065 dated September 8, 1892.
Fall River
Sept. 8, 1892
H.M. Knowlton, Esq.
Dear Sir –
Not knowing Marshal Hilliard’s whereabouts, I forward this to you.
The F. R. Daily Globe has another story of a letter sent by Lizzie Borden to her friends at Marion. They claim, that without any introduction to or comment upon, the following sentence appears: “When I come, I will chop all the wood, for I have a new sharper ax.”
To this I would not pay much attention, but my informant told me he thought the Globe could and would produce the letter.
Tomorrow or in a few days a representative of the F.R. Globe is to call on you and state the facts of the above. Possibly Mr. Thurston or Mr. Porter.
Yours etc.
Officer Phil Harrington

Witness Statements. Page 33-34
Officer William Medley. Fall River September 12,1892 (Monday).
I visited Miss Lizzie Johnson at Myrick’s on Saturday. She refused to make known to me the contents of the letter she received from Lizzie Borden on the day of the Borden murder, until she had consulted Mr. Jennings.
I talked with her for two hours but was unable to make her change her mind. She met Mr. Jennings on Saturday night. I saw her again today, when she informed me that Mr. Jennings told her she need not tell me the contents of the letter if she did not want to; and she did not want to. I have seen the other girls who were at Marion at the time. None of them will talk. I have made all this known to Mr. Knowlton, and that gentleman instructed me to procure all their names, and give them to you, in order that they may be summoned to appear before the Grand Jury. The names are as follows: Mary L. Holmes, Isabel J. Fraser, Lizzie Johnson, Louise Remington, Mabel H. Remington

Knowlton Papers. Page 76. Document HK069.
Letter from District Attorney Knowlton to Attorney General Pillsbury.
My Dear Pillsbury –
I have sent for the Sunday Herald. I know nothing of the authorship & I guess you can learn about it from the Boston fellows, more easily than I can. I neither wrote that nor any other word or line that has been printed, nor suggested or inspired anything that has been written.
I have noticed that the New York papers, the Herald particularly, thought more of the Gov’t case than the Boston papers did. It may have been an accident, or it may have been the result of the bribery you said would be done, that the Boston Herald & Globe, which purported to give my argument stenographically (sic), almost entirely omitted that part of it which dealt upon the attempt to purchase the poison.
It is doubtless true that Lizzie Borden wrote to her Marion friends the day before the murder that she should be over Monday; and would chop all their wood for them for she had been looking at the axes in the cellar and she had found one as sharp as a razor.
If this is so, it means insanity
Yours H. M. Knowlton
Sept. 12, 1892.

Boston Post. Wednesday, September 14, 1892. Page 1.
Lizzie Borden’s Hatchet.
Fall River, Sept. 13 – (special to the Post.) – The government has been working on the Borden case ever since the preliminary hearing ended, and for the most part the officers, assisted by Boston detectives, have confined their attention to New Bedford.
They have been attempting to gather information regarding Miss Borden’s movements prior to the tragedy, in the expectation that they might throw some light on the mystery.
As was reported yesterday, two letters appeared, or rather disappeared, early in the history of the case. One was the letter said to have been written to Mrs. Borden by a friend who was ill, and the other was the letter which Miss Borden wrote to one of a party of acquaintances camping at Marion.
As far as can be ascertained neither of the epistles have come to light, and Miss Borden’s supporters, it is said, are not willing to talk about the Marion letter.
Its contents, however, are known to the authorities. That is, they have learned on what they regard as reliable authority that Miss Borden wrote to the effect that she would chop wood for the house party at Marion and that she had a bright, sharp hatchet.
Up to last evening the detectives had not learned whether there was anything else in this letter or not. There was a rumor that it contained nothing except this reference to the wood and the hatchet, but it could not be verified.
One of Miss Borden’s friends admitted last evening that he had been informed that the prisoner wrote about the wood and the axe, but he explained that there was nothing singular about it, and that no special significance could be attached to it.
He said that Miss Borden visited the Marion party some little time before the murders, and that while she was there, she spoke of the household duties she would assume when she took her vacation. Among other things she said that she would chop the wood, and there was more or less joking about the hatchet on the premises, which was a dull affair. It was very natural, therefore, for her to allude to this incident when she wrote to her acquaintances.
When asked if the hatchet which is described in her letter corresponded to any of the hatchets found in the cellar, this friend said that he could not speak on that point. He had not seen the hatchets which were taken from the house. He thought, however, that if one of them was reasonably sharp, Miss Borden might mention it as a sharp weapon, recalling that the Marion axe was very dull.
It is evident that the police authorities are not fully satisfied that they have the hatchet which Miss Borden described, and they are hard at work on this clue.

Boston Globe, Tuesday September 20, 1892. Page 1.
Later they (police) gave their undivided attention to the Marion letter, and little by little learned so much of its contents as related to “the very sharp hatchet” and the wood chopping, with the explanation which robbed that reference of its significance.
As nearly as can be ascertained, the entire contents of the note addressed by the prisoner to Miss Lizzie Johnson (sic), has not been made public, as Miss Borden’s friends are extremely reticent.
Members of the Marion party have said repeatedly that this letter was destroyed and have added that Miss Johnson was in the habit of burning her letters.
On the other hand, in spite of these statements, it has been recently announced that the letter would be produced in court.

Witness Statements. Page 20.
Phil Harrington. Fall River. Sept. 25, 1892.
Elizabeth M. Johnson, No. 24 Ridge Street. “I have said all I think I should about that letter.”

Knowlton Papers. Page 185-186. Document HK183.
May 29, 1893. District Attorney Knowlton directs law enforcement to summon a list of potential witnesses for the upcoming Borden trial in June. Included in the list of people to be summoned is Elizabeth M. Johnston. She did not testify.

Per newspaper reports, Ms. Johnston also testified to the Grand Jury in November, 1892. As with all grand jury witnesses, we have no idea what she said.

You know, the fact that Mrs Johnston wouldn’t discuss the letter further, and that she destroyed it speaks for itself.
In the Knowlton Papers page 76
You referenced where Lizzie supposedly said she had been looking at the axes in the cellar.
The girls at Marion seemed to support Lizzie though.

Most women seem to have supported Lizzie at the start and as the case progressed, Fall River residents (including women) seemed to fall away by the time the trial started. Women from outside Fall River remained in her court until she was acquitted.

Elizabeth Johnston herself (recipient of the Marion letter) broke off from Lizzie's fan club by end of 1892. That is per Charles Well's diary. Charles and Elizabeth lived in separate quarters, but same building. He also wrote that Alice dropped her support of Lizzie, but of course that isn't a surprise.

Medley reported that Elizabeth didn't want to talk to him until she checked with Jennings. Jennings told her she didn't need to talk to Medley and she didn't. If that doesn't tell you that something in that letter wouldn't show good on Lizzie, I don't know what would.

I agree, too bad the letter was destroyed, I’d love to see the exact wording that Lizzie used.
Thanks for the Charles Wells info, I didn’t know about it.