Lizzie Borden Society Forum

I was reading a post in the archives posted by Augusta on December 28, 2003 and it states,


"Andrew was supposed to be reading the paper when he was on the sofa when he was killed. Where did the paper go? Are there any photos that show it still clutched in his hand? Is it another Lizzie (alleged) lie?"

I went to look at the crime scenes photos in the crime scene photos, and I didn't see any newspaper any where around the sofa or in his hands.

What's up with this? Was it a lie or what?

I had always heard that Andrew Borden was reading a newspaper when he came in before 11 am on August 4th. Going to two primary sources, I found the following:

From the Inquest, page 74 of The Lizzie Borden Sourcebook: (Lizzie is being questioned.)

Q: When you went out to the barn, where did you leave your father?
A: He had laid down on the living room lounge, taken off his shoes and put on his slippers and taken off his coat and put on the reefer. I asked him if he wanted the window left that way.
Q: Where did you leave him?
A: On the sofa.
Q: Was he asleep?
A: No sir.
Q: Was he reading?
A: No sir.

This is from the Preliminary Hearing - page 160, Widdows/Koorey & Koorey, 2005, PearTree Press: (Bridget is on the stand)

A: He let the window down, it was up with the screen in. He took a chair and sat down near the window with a book or paper in his hand.
Q: Which window was that?
A: The sitting room.
.........
Q: He sat down with a book or paper near the window of the sitting room?
A: Yes Sir.
Q: In a rocking chair?
A: An easy chair I guess.

Yes, Snokkums. In his murder photo, there isn't a newspaper anywhere in sight.
The testimony I cited didn't say "newspaper"; it just said "paper" or "book or paper".
Where did this "book or paper" go from the time Andrew was sitting by the window until he laid down on the sofa? Does it have anything to do with the cylindrical shaped object in the stove fire?

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Excellent observation snokkums and augusta! Dang, wish I would have spotted that

There's a difference between a "paper" and a "newspaper". I wish I knew which it was.

In the Elizabeth Montgomery movie, Andrew says he has a newspaper. When Lizzie is fussing about him, she asks if he's gonna take a nap. And he says, "Aftuh I read my paypuh." I may have it stuck in my head that it was a 'newspaper' because of watching the movie again and again and again ...

But he didn't bring the paper or the little book-shaped thing onto the sofa. I'd love to know what happened to these objects.

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If I'm not mistaken in some of the trial transcripts it's referred to as "reading material", which could be either.

augusta @ Sun Oct 18, 2009 9:15 am wrote:From the Inquest, page 74 of The Lizzie Borden Sourcebook: (Lizzie is being questioned.)

Q: When you went out to the barn, where did you leave your father?
A: He had laid down on the living room lounge, taken off his shoes and put on his slippers and taken off his coat and put on the reefer. I asked him if he wanted the window left that way.
Q: Where did you leave him?
A: On the sofa.
Q: Was he asleep?
A: No sir.
Q: Was he reading?
A: No sir.

--partial post

In the original inquest transcription it is written as "sitting room lounge" rightly, rather than "living room lounge" which is wrong in the Sourcebook.
The proper inquest material can be downloaded from the LizzieAndrewBorden.com website.
Accuracy is helpful to new posters and old posters alike. We can actually debate a single word in our discussions here!

Hi, I'm a longtime Lizzie Borden-phile from Dallas, and glad to finally be a member of this board.

Speaking of the newspaper Andrew was supposedly reading at the time of his death... I thought I've seen it mentioned on here before that there was a table (like a coffee table) in front of the sitting room lounge at the time of his death, and when the police came it was moved out of the way. Just a thought, but he may have set the paper down on it, which would explain why it was not on his person or in any of the crime scene photos. I could be wrong, but I think this table is shown in some obscure photograph (highlighting something else) and it is piled high with books or something. Does anyone else remember seeing this?

I have a vague memory. It may be a false memory. You all know how memories can overlap ? It may be the autopsy photo of Andrew. Books on a table.

Yes. It is the chancery house picture. I checked it out. Grisly, but could be a newspaper.

I looked at the autopsy photo as well; seems about right. But I remember someone on this board during a discussion say that there was a coffee table or something like it directly in front of the lounge, and that it had apparently been moved by police when they came onto the scene. I'm sure, if there was, Andrew set his paper down on it...

Welcome aboard, Brian!

The information regarding the object in front of the sofa is contained in Officer Allen's trial testimony (P438+):

"Q. Will you take that photograph and tell me if you noticed anything else?
A. I noticed the shoes were on, and how small the ankles was for the shoes.
Q. Well, anything else?
A. I noticed the face was badly cut.
Q. I am not speaking now with reference to anything about him, but to any piece of furniture.
A. I noticed a stand with two books on it standing nigh the sofa.
Q. Describe where that was standing by the sofa?
A. I should think it was standing about three feet from Mr. Borden's sofa, where the head was.
Q. Three feet in which direction?
A. In front of him, and there was a table over across the room by the two windows.
Q. Can you see in that photograph that table that you saw standing there?
A. There was the table.
Q. Will you point out with that pen-holder where that table was?
A. About here. (The witness indicated the location of the table, which was then shown to the jury.)
Q. Did you notice what the color of those books was?
A. No, sir, I do not.
Q. Did you notice whether there was anything on the books or on the table, any marks of any sort of fluid?
A. No, sir, there was not.
Q. Then I will ask you the direct question if there was any spattering of blood upon the books or table?
A. No, sir."

He's questioned further about it on pages 443+:

"Q. This table, was it a small stand?
A. Yes, sir.
Q. A marble top table?
A. No, sir; I think not.
Q. Did it have a cloth on it?
A. I think it did, some kind of cloth.
Q. And a few books?
A. Yes, sir.
Q. And you didn't notice anything about them?
A. No, sir.
Q. Was it near the middle of the room?
A. Not quite; nearer the sofa than it was nearer---
Q. Well, there was nothing unusual about that?
A. Oh no.
Q. And was it moved away from its place while you were there?
A. No, sir; there wasn't nothing out of place, as I should take it.
Q. You don't get my idea. Was the table moved?
A. It was not.
Q. While you were there?
A. No, sir.
Q. And set aside?
A. No, sir.
Q. The photograph shown you, then---
A. It has been since I was there.
Q. The picture does not show the table in it's proper position?
A. No, sir."

No mention of a paper or newspaper on the stand/table. We know that there were newspaper(s) in the house that morning. Morse in an interview he gave, cited in 3 or 4 newspapers on the 5th, said:

"That was the last I saw of him until Thursday morning. It was about 6 o'clock when I got up, and had breakfast about an hour later. Then Andrew and I read the papers, and we chatted until about 9 o'clock. I am not positive as to the exact time, and it may have been only 8:45 o'clock. While at the table I asked Andrew why he did not buy Gould's yacht for $200,000, at which price it was advertised and he laughed, saying what little good it would do him if he really did have it. We also talked about business."

Is this the little tri-pod type table that is over by the parlour door?

Isn't there another table that would be closer to the lounge, and another across the room under the window?

The one mentioned here that had hat and books and lamp globe might be the table that was covered with a cloth which had been over by the window, that had been moved in front of the fireplace, and that we see in the autopsy photo.

Wow, I don't know how you, Kat, and Harry remember where to look for these things - and Kat, remembering such details. You guys are amazing.

Welcome, Brian! I hope you have a lot of fun here and enjoy this Forum. Friendly folk all.

Kat, when you say that in one inquest transcription it says 'living room lounge' and the other 'sitting room lounge', are they the same room? Or was the parlor considered also by the name of 'living room'?

It's amazing, in a crazy sort of way, how one transcript has different stuff in it than the other. Didn't Stefani and Terance Doniho do an article in an LBQ on this? How in the heck did they determine which was the right copy? It's just incredible how meticulous you, Stef and Harry have researched.

So no blood noticed on that table that was nearer the sofa. I wonder what the books were that were on that table. Where was that book on poisons that someone saw when they came to the house, that's spine was cracked to the part about - was it poison in general? Was that book ever mentioned in a courtroom? Or is it one of Spiering's spun stories? (Sorry, my CD player is busted and I have no idea where to look for this answer at.)

The download copy at the website asks that other versions be discarded. When we all work from the same, accepted, version, then we can be on the same page. We've, at different times, compared testimonies from the Standard Times to, say Knowlton's speech, and find lots of differences. It's best to adhere to a single document.

I compared The Sourcebook's version with the verified version and gave you the difference.

The possible story about a book opening to the page on prussic acid in the Borden home is from Pearson.
(Plz see next post, after I have found the quote):

FIVE MURDERS, taken from Forum Magazine, March 1928, pp 370-380.

"THE END OF THE BORDEN CASE"

Edmund Pearson


..."The attorneys for the Commonwealth did not share the opinion already quoted that Miss Emma was without any knowledge of the murder. They held that she was in no doubt whatever about the identity of the assassin. They hoped that the horror of the killings would affect her - as the weaker-willed of the two sisters - and cause her to make admissions which would tend to clear up the mystery. This never happened. One of these attorneys on entering the Borden house for the first time found a book of recipes and prescriptions. He took it up, and it fell open in his hand - at a passage devoted to the subject of prussic acid. It is also said that there was evidence of an earlier attempt to procure this poison, earlier than the one made in Fall River the day before the murders. This one took place in New Bedford, and here again, the clerk in the pharmacy identified Miss Lizzie as the applicant."

Thanks for the post from Edmund Pearson, Kat. I hadn't read it there - I'm thinking I read it in Radin's book.

I wish there were some follow-up to that. It's just that sentence, then the subject is dropped - lost.

Yes, Radin did write about it, but he was discussing Pearson in that section:

Pearson also added some touches to the poison legend. He has written, and apparently seriously, that when an official entered the Borden home he happened to pick up a book that contained recipes, or perhaps household hints, and the book immediately opened to a page discussing prussic acid. If anybody in the Borden house, or elsewhere, ever thought of committing murder with prussic acid and took the trouble to read about it first, he or she would change his mind fast. It is always described as one of the quickest-acting poisons known, one which can kill in twenty seconds to a minute.

--Radin, Edward. Lizzie Borden: The Untold Story. NY: Simon & Schuster, 1961.

I thought you had read Pearson's Five Murders?

Thanks, Kat. I've read where people who aim to kill with prussic acid can very well die themselves before they can kill their victim, it acts so quickly.

I do have Pearson's "Five Murders" but only read part of the book.

If this were true, I wonder if the prosecution at least tried to get it in as evidence, even if didn't make it into the trial because the poison issue was thrown out?

Did anyone even testify that they saw this book in any of the transcripts?