The Murders That Haunt The Lizzie Borden House

**"The Murders That Haunt The Lizzie Borden House"** is a video made by Ryan Bergara and Shane Madej, uploaded onto YouTube on May 12, 2017. It is the sixth episode of the second season of *BuzzFeed Unsolved: Supernatural*, and the twenty-fifth episode overall. You can watch it here.

## Description

We investigated the house of a hundred-year-old murder mystery.

## Background

On August 4, 1892 in Fall River, Massachusetts the bodies of Andrew and Abby Borden were found hacked to death in their home. Both of the Borden's were believed to be killed with a hatchet or an ax. Abby Borden had been axed 18 times and Andrew Borden had been axed 11 times. Their bodies were found in different spots in the house. As far as evidence only one thing concrete was found: a handleless hatchet in the basement that was clean of blood.

Let's establish who lived in the house at the time. There was 32 year old Lizzie Borden, her 41 year old sister Emma Borden, her father Andrew Borden, her stepmother Abby Borden, her uncle John Morse who was visiting from out of town and the family maid Bridget Sullivan who the family called Maggie. It's worth mentioning that Emma Borden was out of town at the time of the murders.

Now let's examine the timeline of the day of the murder according to eyewitness testimony. At around 10:40 AM Andrew Borden takes a nap on the living room couch. At this time Mrs. Borden was believed to be at the doctor's office. At about 10:50 to 10:55 AM Lizzie claims she is in the backyard barn. Maggie the family maid claimed to be taking a nap in her room upstairs. At around 11:15 AM Lizzie in the back yard reportedly heard a "heavy fall and a subdued groaning". According to Lizzie on her approach to the house she noticed the screen door was now open and goes inside. Maggie the maid had not yet fallen asleep when she heard Lizzie Borden crying out, "Come down quick! Father's dead! Somebody's come in and killed him." Maggie ran down the stairs to see the brutal murder scene of Andrew Borden laying across the couch. Maggie also noted that the distraught Lizzie Borden was wearing a blue unstained dress. There was no sign of a struggle as Mr. Borden was believed to be asleep when he was murdered.

Shortly after, Lizzie asks Maggie to go find the doctor across the street. At this time the whereabouts of Mrs. Borden were unknown. Maggie returned to the house with a neighbor and claimed that Lizzie said this about Abby Borden: "Oh Maggie! I'm almost sure I heard her come in. Go upstairs and see if she is there." Maggie and the neighbor walked upstairs to discover to their horror the body of Abby Borden laying face down on the floor of the guest bedroom. It was thought that Mrs. Borden may have been present for the murder of Mr. Borden and fled to the guest bedroom where she was also murdered.

## Theories

* **The top suspect is Lizzie Borden.** To this day many believe that Lizzie is guilty. Both of the Borden's were struck in the head multiple times suggesting a crime of passion.
	+ At the time of his death Andrew Borden was very wealthy. His net worth at the time would be around 10 million in today's standards. However, despite this wealth, Andrew was reportedly a bit of a penny pincher. In trial, Maggie testified that the Borden family lived frugally and ate a mutton-based diet Lizzie reportedly smiled as this was being described.
	+ Five years before the murders Lizzie had a falling out with her stepmother Abby that resulted in Lizzie going from calling Abby mother to Mrs. Borden. The dispute was over Mr. Borden buying a house for Abby's half-sister, rather than Lizzie and her sister Emma. And sure enough, after Mr. and Mrs. Borden's murders 32 year old Lizzie and her 41 year old sister Emma inherited the estate and later bought a house on the hill in a wealthy neighborhood in Fall River. When asked if her father had previously mentioned a will to her Lizzie said, "He did not."
	+ Moving on from motive during her inquest testimony Lizzie's answers were sometimes wildly inconsistent. Lizzie also reportedly burned a dress of hers after the murders, claiming there was paint on it. However, this was not the dress she was seen wearing the day of the murders. That dress was actually handed over to the policw. The day of the murders, the house maid Maggie saw Lizzie wearing an unstained blue dress. Lizzie could perhaps have committed the murder and then changed while Maggie was reportedly sleeping. But the timeframe for that would have been extremely slim and dresses in that time period were a bit of a process to take on and off. So this seems unlikely.
	+ Another damning detail came from a pharmacist who testified at Lizzie's trial that she had tried to buy a poison called prussic acid the day before her father and stepmother were killed. However, this testimony was dismissed. Other than a possible motive and circumstantial pieces of evidence there was no physical evidence that implicated Lizzie in the murders. The hatchet that was found in the basement was clean. At the end of the trial Lizzie was found not guilty. However, many people still believed Lizzie was guilty. In fact there was even a creepy schoolyard rhyme that goes "Lizzie Borden took an ax, and gave her mother 40 whacks and when she saw what she had done, she gave her father 41."
* **The second suspect is Jon Vinnicum Morse**, a theory recently made popular by a Massachusetts math teacher named Richard Little who wrote a book on the case that listed John Morse as the possible killer.
	+ John Morse was the brother of Mr. Borden's first wife and Lizzie's uncle. Interestingly, according to Lizzie in the case timeline Morse was not seen from 9:00 AM until noon after the murders had occurred. According to Little, John Morse's alibi to the police was that he was visiting a sick relative down the road during the time of the murders along with the town doctor. However, the same town doctor was also looking over the bodies of Mr. and Mrs. Borden. A bizarre contradiction in his story. Furthermore, Mrs. Borden was found dead in the guest bedroom that Morse had reportedly slept in the night before.
	+ Little also cites a failing livestock business between Morse and Mr. Borden as a possible motive. Little additionally believed that Morse may have used a meat cleaver to kill the Borden's as John Morse was also a butcher for his profession. Also, according to Lizzie's inquest testimony Morse may have known about her father's will. Here's a transcript of that interaction:

**Q:** Did you know of your father making a will?
**A:** No, sir, except I heard somebody say once that there was one several years ago. That is all I ever heard.
**Q:** Who did you hear say so?
**A:** I think it was Mr. Morse.
**Q:** What Morse?
**A:** Uncle John V. Morse.
* **The third suspect is the family maid Maggie.** Maggie had gone upstairs to sleep in her bedroom a floor above the guest room where Mrs. Borden was murdered.
	+ Maggie in her own testimony claims she may not have been fully asleep at the time of the murders. Yet somehow she did not hear the brutal murder only one floor below.
* Piggybacking on the previous theory, some feel that it is too coincidental that a person could sneak into the house in broad daylight with two people inside or around the house at the time, which brings us to our fourth and final suspect, or rather suspects, with the unsubstantiated theory that **Lizzie and Maggie the maid conspired to kill the Borden's together.**
	+ This theory has been the subject of many fan fiction where Lizzie and Maggie were romantically involved. Some versions have Lizzie's stepmother discovering the romance to which they kill her and then kill her father to cover it up. Fans of this theory point to the fact that Lizzie later in her life reportedly had a crush on an actress, a point that some feel caused her sister Emma to move out of the home they shared. Other than that, this theory has no evidence backing it.