Do you believe Lizzie Borden killed her father and stepmother even though she was found no guilty by a jury? There are a lot of different thoughts and opinions about her guilt or innocence and the ways she was treated after she was found innocent of the charges.
Condemned By Public Opinion
Woman Once Accused of Crime Is Shunned by Her Neighbors
Lizzie Borden’s Lonely Life
Fall River, Mass. — Twenty years ago Lizzie Borden, accused of the murder of her father and her stepmother, stood up in the court room at New Bedford and heard a jury of her peers pronounce the verdict of acquittal — heard them declare to all the world that she was “not guilty” of two of the most brutal and atrocious murders that ever shocked the country.
Today that same Lizzie Borden lives a recluse, as damned by public opinion and as ostracized by former friends and enemies alike as if that same jury had pronounced the one word “Guilty.”
Lizzie Borden still lives in Fall River, but as far as Fall River is concerned, an Ishmael, a social parish. Her name is uttered with contempt, and ever her friends and relatives who comforted her during the months of her imprisonment and throughout the ordeal of her trial have long since ceased their visits. Today her nearest neighbors pass her by without a nod or sign of recognition, writes Gertrude Stevenson in the Boston Herald.
Twelve jurymen found Lizzie Borden guiltless. Nevertheless, she has been punished, and persecuted as no other innocent woman in history. She has lived to know the tragedy of a verdict of acquittal. She has come to realize that Andrew J. Jennings, her counsel and friend, was a true prophet when, in addressing Judge Blaisdell at her preliminary trial he declared:
“Don’t, your honor, don’t put the stigma of guilt upon this woman, reared as she has been and with a past character beyond reproach. Don’t let it go out in the world as the decision of a just judge that she is probably guilty.”
Murder Still Unavenged
After 20 years, when the deaths of Andrew J. Borden and his wife are still unavenged – when the double tragedy still heads the list of New England’s unsolved murder mysteries – with Lizzie Borden banished from society, shunned by all who were once near and dear to her, the words of Andrew J. Jennings may well be remembered as an example of masterly and farsighted prophecy.
After 20 years, Lizzie Borden lives as shut off from the world as if she were behind prison bars – condemned to solitude by barriers stronger than any prison wall could be – less tangible but a hundred times more effective than any bars of iron – the silent, inexorable censure of her fellow men and women.
This woman, who for two decades has maintained the silence of a Sphinx, who has never asked for mercy, never pleaded to be understood, never by any word or sign expressed indignation at the treatment accorded her by the people of Fall River, lives in the great silent home she purchased with her share of her murdered father’s half million, knowing no human companionship save that which she can hire – no friendships except those of occasional strangers who turn a cold shoulder upon her advances when they find that she is Lizzie Borden once tried for murder – no affection save that of the dumb beasts with which she has surrounded herself now that human attachments are denied her.
When Lizzie Borden was acquitted it was commonly believed that she would soon shake the dust of Fall River from her feet, and that under an assumed name she would try to live down the accusation that had been made against her – that in new places and among new people she would attempt to find new interests and new pleasures.
Bought House In Home City
But Lizzie Borden apparently never contemplated such a procedure. As soon as the affairs of her father’s estate were adjusted, she proceeded to purchase a handsome mansion in the exclusive “hill section” of Fall River – the very neighborhood she had long and futilely tried to induce her father to enter.
To all intents and purposes the woman planned to live among her friends and acquaintances, just as she had always lived, continuing to attend the same fashionable Congregation church, entertaining and being entertained, only now she had the added advantage of several hundred thousands of dollars in her own right. She had her horses and carriages, the beautiful clothes she had always longed for and which the thrift of her father and his second wife had previously denied her. Apparently, aside from the shadow of the tragic deaths of her father and stepmother over her life, everything that heart or mind could desire was Lizzie Borden’s.
It was while reveling in the luxury and power that the possession of a large amount of money cannot fail to give Lizzie Borden read the writing on the wall. It was then she first began to feel the pressure of public opinion – that she first realized that former cordial greetings were growing colder and more cold – that friends who once would stop for a chat or drop in for an informal visit passed her by with scant nods and averted eyes – that she came to understand the tremendous force of unexpressed criticism – that the conviction came home to her than which no earthly situation is more crushing or more annihilating – that she was being shunned by every human being, with an occasional rare exception, who had formerly made up her life and happiness. It was all the more terrifying because it was so indefinable. There was no tangible finger of scorn – no open declaration of hostility – just that insistent, maddening, universal aloofness.
Never Wore Mourning
She was criticized because she did not wear mourning for her parents. Her every going in and coming out was discussed, and all manner and kind of construction placed upon every ordinary, unimportant detail of her mode of living and acting. Some thought she drove her horses too rapidly and recklessly down the main street. Some averred that she had never shown the proper grief over her father’s death. Others insisted that she was making altogether too sudden and too blatant display of the money that had come to her with the murder of her father. She could do nothing right. If she tried to be happy and forget the awful shadow that had come into her life her critics called her heartless. If she appeared on the streets in a sober, subdued frame of mind there were all sorts of gossiping and predictions and clacking of tongues – such an attitude could mean but one thing to their minds!
So the years went on, one after another of her friends dropping away from her, until today Lizzie Borden, looking for all the world like any other stout, matronly woman you might meet on the street, is without a doubt the most isolated free woman in New England.
Seems Without Emotion
She is today just what she was described as being when she faced trial for her life twenty years ago – an immobile, unemotional appearing woman – her large, strong features expressing the same determination that characterized her when she faced her accusers on the charge of parricide. If this woman has ever had an emotion it can honestly be said that she has invariably succeeded in concealing it from any human eye.
She goes about today just as she went her way, firm mouthed, direct eyes and baffling of understanding during the days following the discovery of the mutilated bodies of her father and her stepmother, during the inquest that resulted in her arrest, day after day during the preliminary trial, at the end of which Judge Blaisdell found her probably guilty – throughout the grand jury hearing when twenty out of twenty-one grand jurymen voted to indict her – all during the eight months of her confinement in Taunton jail while she waited the sitting of the superior court and during the long hours of her thirteen days’ trial by jury which ended in her acquittal and release.
Months Without a Visitor
Not in fifteen years has Lizzie Borden attended the church where up to her thirty-third year she was a leader – working for charity – presiding at meetings of the Christian Endeavor, singing in the choir – active in all church socials and gatherings. Not in years has she entered any store or shop in the city where se was born and spent her girlhood and young womanhood as the younger daughter of one of the city’s richest and most respected business men. Not to the knowledge of anyone has se engaged in any charity for the past ten years.
Months pass by without a human foot crossing her threshold other than those of menials and tradespeople. A visitor at the Borden door is such a rare and curious sight as to occasion comment throughout the neighborhood.
Not only the house of tragedy on Second street, where she was born and brought up and which is still in er possession, but also her present beautiful residence high on the hill overlooking the business section of Fall River, is the mecca of innumerable curious sightseers year after year. Apparently the interest in the Borden murders and the personality of the daughter upon whose shoulders guilt first fell never abated. A round dozen prominent Fall River people tell me that, no matter where they go, the minute they mention that their home town is Fall River, they are greeted with but one inevitable question:
“Whatever became of Lizzie Borden?”
Put Lizzie Borden First
Fall River is noted for its mills – its industries – its prominent people; but they rank second in interest and importance to the question:
“What about Lizzie Borden?”
Lizzie Borden comes and goes about the city and in and out of it, unquestioning and unquestioned. A few years ago she discarded her carriage and handsome pair for the finest limousine that money could buy. Secure from observation in its richly upholstered interior, she drives about the city at dusk or goes to and from the trains and takes trips around the surrounding country. All her shopping is done out of town. She is a frequent visitor in Boston, where she makes her home at the Bellevue, registering as “Lisbeth Borden,” although her story is well known to the hotel attaches.
Crimes Never Forgotten
The real attitude of Fall River toward Lizzie Borden is perhaps best reflected in its newspapers. Every years, on the anniversary of the crimes, the Fall River Globe prints a vigorous article in regard to the murders, the perpetrator and the fact that the crimes remain an unavenged blot on the community. The articles are pointed so strongly and so openly at one and only one person as to invite suits for criminal libel, but if the woman ever sees them or hears of them, she has made no sign.
Source: Fort Mill Times. Newspaper. April 24, 1913.
