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Lizzie Borden Took an Ax… But Did She Really? The True Story · 10 Minute Murder | Bingeable True Crime Stories

• 0:27
  Speaker 1: Today's episode takes us back to the summer of eighteen
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: ninety two in Fall River, Massachusetts, where the heat wasn't
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: the only thing driving people. Matt picture this Lizzie Borden,
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: a well behaved, church going daughter living in a house
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: divide it literally, where the staircase on one side leads
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: to her father and stepmother's bedroom and the other side
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: leads to hers. The Burdens are an odd bunch. They've
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: got more money than they know what to do with,
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: yet they're living in a house with no indoor plumbing.
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: Even as Andrew Borden hoards his wealth like some kind
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: of Victorian scrooge, his daughters are stuck fuming over mutton
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: stew that's been left out for far too long. And
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: then the unthinkable happens. On a sweltering August morning. A
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: brutal axe murder leaves Andrew and his wife Abby hacked
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: to death in their own home, and it doesn't take
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: long for the whispers to start. The maids in shock,
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: the doctor's clueless, and Lizzie, well, Lizzie's story is changing
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: by the minute. So what drove the wedge deep enough
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: to split this family and maybe a few skulls wide open.
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: Was it the resentment over their stepmother's inheritance, a mysterious
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: illness that may have been more arsenic than mutton, or
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: something even darker blurking behind those parlor doors. Today we're
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: peeling back the layers of a case that's fueled speculation
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: for more than a century, sparking nursery rhymes and ghost stories.
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: Was Lizzie Borden the Victorian axe wielding terror she's been
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: made out to be, or was there more at play
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: than meets the eye. Welcome to ten minute Murder. Lizzie
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: Borden took an axe and gave her mother forty wax.
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: When she saw what she had done, she gave her
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: father forty one. Immortalized for the savage and sickingly cold
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: killing of her parents, Lizzie Borden has gone down in
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: history as one of the most cruel members America has
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: ever seen. She is the Boogeyman, the nightmare that the
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: parents all over the country fear. Only in this case
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: we know that for Andrew Jackson Borden it became a
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: brutal reality. Andrew Borden himself was no stranger to hard
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: circumstances and even harder times. Born to a moderately well
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: off family in eighteen twenty two, Andrew was left to
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: his own devices and to make his own way in life.
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: He struggled and worked hard for every penny that he made,
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: which led him to becoming a crafty and successful businessman
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: who preferred to save money rather than to spend it.
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: When Lizzie Borden came into the world at Fall River, Massachusetts,
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: just over ten years after her older sister Emma, she
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: was born to a man who would soon be worth
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: about ten million dollars in today's money. Where the other
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: wealthy inhabitants of Fall River lived on what was called
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: the Hill, the Bordens lived in the industrial part of
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: town in a house with no indoor plumbing and no
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: trappings to display Andrew's incredible wealth. Before Lizzie's birth, her mother,
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: Sarah Borden, had another daughter she called Baby Alice. Baby
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: Alice died shortly after her birth, and Sarah had been
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: struck by a malicious, mysterious condition we might call some
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: of the symptoms a result of postpartum depression today. She
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: would often have to spend long periods of time in
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: bed and would frequently lament over baby Alice's fate. Sarah's
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: heart or her condition, however, did not improve after Lizzie,
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: healthy and hearty came into the world. Instead, she died
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: only three years later of a mysterious condition called uterine congestion. Emma,
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: the oldest child, still a child herself, stepped into the
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: role of being a mother and began looking after Lizzie.
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: She would say decades later that she'd made a promise
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: to their mother before she died, and that she would
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: spend the rest of her life looking after baby Lizzie,
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: And for the most part, Emma seemed to do her
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: job really well. Lizzie grew into a conscientious young woman
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: who attended church regularly, even taught immigrant children at Sunday School.
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: On the outside, both Emma and Lizzie were poised, pious
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: and charitable, the picture of respectable nineteenth century women, but
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: behind closed doors another matter Entirely three years passed Andrew
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: married again. Abby durfy Gray was younger than Andrew and
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: younger than Sarah had been. She was pretty and came
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: from good enough stock to be considered a respectable woman
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: in her own right, But the Bordon girls would quickly
• 5:09
  Speaker 1: learn to call a spade a spade. Emma and Lizzie
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: believed that Abby had married their father for one reason
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: and one reason only say it with me money, and
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: soon after Abbey stepped into their lives, things began to
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: drastically change. Though he still owned the property that he'd
• 5:28
  Speaker 1: shared with their mother, Andrew bought a new house for
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: his new family. Long and narrow, the new Bordon household
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: still lacked all the modern amenities and was focused around
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: a common room. From there, you could go up one
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: flight of stairs and reach Andrew and Abbey's bedroom, or
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: you could go up the other on the opposite side
• 5:47
  Speaker 1: of the house and go to the girls. His new
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: house was literally divided. Tensions only continued to build as
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: the girls grew older. Andrew, still never a man to
• 5:57
  Speaker 1: lavish anyone with expensive gifts, did by Abby and her
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: sister a house and drove the wedge deeper. Appalled that
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: their stepmother and her family were being given their own
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: properties while his own daughters were being forced to live
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: with no indoor plumbing, the board and girls revolted. They
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: demanded that they be allowed to finally live in their
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: own household, and they knew which one of Andrew's existing
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: properties they wanted to be in. Instead of simply making
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: it a gift. However, Andrew sold the house he'd lived
• 6:28
  Speaker 1: in with Sarah to his daughters for one dollar. Emma,
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: now around the age of forty, made the controversial decision
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: to move out, even though she was unmarried and had
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: no real means of supporting herself. Lizzie, now close to thirty,
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: joined Emma for a while before the pair of them
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: were coaxed back home. They rented rooms at a nearby
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: boarding house before they could be convinced that the family
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: feud was finally over. Emma then decided to move back
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: into her own home, leaving Lizzie to return to the
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: Bordon house alone. There, the family maid, Bridget Sullivan, said
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: that Lizzie very rarely interacted with her father or stepmother.
• 7:09
  Speaker 1: They would often eat separately, and Lizzie would later say
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: that she mainly kept to her own room and out
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: of everyone else's way. But that was going to change,
• 7:18
  Speaker 1: and it was going to change quickly. In the blistering
• 7:20
  Speaker 1: and stifling heat of summer in eighteen ninety two, the
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: Bordons had a pretty unexpected guest. His name was John Morse,
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: and he was Sarah's brother, Emma and Lizzie's uncle. Rarely visited,
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: but his arrival landed dead center in the middle of
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: the family dispute over properties, including the very same house
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: that his sister had died in. John stayed the night,
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: and on the morning of August fourth, he and Andrew
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: retired to Andrew's study to talk business. The men were
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: in there for over an hour before John left and
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: headed into town to run some errands. Andrew left shortly
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: after that as well, which followed his usual morning routine,
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: and were also take him into town to follow up
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: on some of his remaining businesses. That left his wife,
• 8:05
  Speaker 1: forty five year old Abbey, his younger daughter Lizzie, and
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: the maid Bridget at the house, and by the time
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: he'd returned later that morning, one of them would be dead.
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: Even though they had a maid and it was technically
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: Lizzie's chore to do. For some reason, Abby decided to
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: clean the guest bedroom there. She was interrupted and turned
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: face to face with someone in the doorway. She was
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: then suddenly struck across her cheek with an axe, stunning
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: the woman and turning her in the air as she fell.
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: Her attacker then began striking again, hitting Abby a total
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: of seventeen times in the back of the head. Abby
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: was dead, her body clearly visible from the second store landing.
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: Around ten thirty, a short while after he'd left for town,
• 8:52
  Speaker 1: Andrew returned, not knowing that his own wife was laying
• 8:55
  Speaker 1: on the very floor right above his head. Tired, he
• 8:59
  Speaker 1: then sat on the sofa of the parlor and closed
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: his eyes for a nap. It was then that he
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: was struck across the face with an axe, slicing one
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: of his eyes clean in two. His attacker struck again
• 9:11
  Speaker 1: and again, killing Andrew before he had a chance to
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: fight back. According to their own accounts, it was about
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: thirteen minutes later that Lizzie discovered her father's body. She
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: claimed that she'd been outside in the barn and had
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: come back in to find her father laying there. Come quick,
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: She shouted for Bridget, father's dead. Somebody came in and
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: killed him. Bridget, who said that she'd been in her
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: own room resting, then came rushing, only to be sent
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: across the street to the family physician doctor Bowen. Doctor
• 9:40
  Speaker 1: Bowen arrived in the scene and declared Andrew dead. No
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: one at this point had ventured upstairs. No one had
• 9:47
  Speaker 1: gone even later, when the police arrived to begin their investigation.
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: It was only when one of Lizzie's and Emma's friends
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: and neighbors came over to help keep the women company
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: that Abbey's remains were found. Lizzie he explained that she
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: had not gone looking for Abbey because she believed that
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: Abby had gone to visit one of her relatives. That morning,
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: a panic gripped the town. One of the most affluent
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: and successful businessmen had been attacked and killed in his
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: own home. Worse still, his respectable wife had been murdered
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: right along with him. There was no telling where the
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: killer would strike next, and no knowing how high their
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: victim count would rise. The Fall River Police found themselves
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: buckling under the mounting pressure to solve the case and
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: find the person responsible, and it was shortly after that
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: that the community divided. While others blamed a mysterious disgruntled
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: Portuguese worker, others placed the blame far closer to the
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: Borden family home. The house itself had no signs of
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: break in or struggle, which begged a simple question, what
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: if one of the two women already inside the house
• 10:54
  Speaker 1: had been the killer. What if it had been Lizzie
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: Borden herself. The Burdens had collectively suffered from food poisoning
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: about a week before the murders. The same doctor, doctor Bowen,
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: had diagnosed them and determined that it had come from
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: mutton and that had been left out for far too
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: long on the stove. But what if instead of food poisoning,
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: their mysterious sickness had just been a case of actual poisoning.
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: Lizzie had actually been purchasing a well known poison from
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: the chemist earlier that week, claiming that she was going
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: to clean a cloak with it. And you know how
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: the story goes. Andrew Borden is now dead. Lizzie hit
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: him on the head up in heaven. He will sing
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: on the gallows, she will swing. At trial, the prosecution
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: laid out a dazzling case of circumstantial evidence that painted
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: Lizzie a cold and callous killer who'd been after one thing,
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: and one thing, only Andrew's money. The defense put forth
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: understated but devastating clever rebuttals. How could it be possible
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: that Lizzie would have had time to kill any and
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: be seen by witnesses only thirteen minutes later in a
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: clean dress with no blood spatter on her How could
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: her own statements be admissible in court when she'd given
• 12:11
  Speaker 1: them under the influence of morphine and without her lawyers
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: being present. Why was her purchase of poison relevant to
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: the trial when she could have very well been using
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: it to clean her cloak. After about an hour and
• 12:23
  Speaker 1: a half of deliberation, the jury agreed with the defense
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: and acquitted Lizzie of all charges. She and Emma then
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: inherited their father's substantial estate and they built a new
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: life for themselves. They finally moved to an enormous property
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: on the hill. Lizzie then changed her name to Lizabeth
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: and began patroning the local theaters. She surrounded herself with actresses, artists,
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: and creatives, and she distanced herself from Emma. Unable to
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: keep up with her sister's new lavish lifestyle, Emma moved
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: out and never saw Lizzie again, but maybe strangers still.
• 12:59
  Speaker 1: In nighteth teen twenty seven, the two Bordon daughters, still estranged,
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: died just days after each other. Lizzy went first, after
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: battling complications with a gallbladder and pneumonia. Emma quickly followed
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: after suffering from several kidney conditions. They were buried together
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: on the family plot in Oak Grove Cemetery, right next
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: to their parents. That is ten minute murder for today
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: Brief and bingeable True Crime. I'm Joe, I'm the host,
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: and thank you for taking the time to listen to
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: the podcast today. Not enough time to really fill in
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: some of the theories of what people over the years have
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: thought about Lizzie Borden and the killing of her father
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: and stepmother. I will quickly tell you a couple of
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: those theories. I'm not going to go into big detail
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: about it, but I will tell you what they are.
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: The main one probably is that Lizzie Borden was a
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: lesbian and she was together with the maid and that
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: Abby walked in found out what was going on. One
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: thing led to another and what happened happened. There are
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: many people that believe that. Also, they think that possibly
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: Lizzie was the victim of physical and sexual abuse by
• 14:16
  Speaker 1: her father and that's what prompted her to do what
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: she did. Obviously, I don't know the answer to that,
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: but those are a couple of the bigger theories when
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: I read up on this case that people think might
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: have been the reason for it. Now, I'll be honest,
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: knowing about this story before I did any deep dive
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: research on it, I assumed because I'd always heard about
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: the mutton that was old and spoiled and was making
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: them all sick. I don't know why. I just assumed
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: that had something to do because you always hear about
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: that when it comes to this case. I assumed that
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: it kind of made her crazy, like there was some
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: kind of toxin in there that made her crazy and
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: she snapped and possibly did this. But I didn't really
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: see that in what I read, So who knows. It's
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: a very interesting story, and thank you for taking the
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: time to listen to it today. If you've got anything
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: that you want to talk to me about, any story, suggestions, questions, comments,
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: anything like that, you can go to ten minute murder
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: dot com. There you'll find my email, you'll find a blog,
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: and all all kinds of other things, And that's going
• 15:14
  Speaker 1: to do it. That is your episode for today. Thank
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: you for listening to ten Minute Murder.