Lizzie Borden

For other uses, see Lizzie Borden (disambiguation).

Lizzie Borden
Borden c. 1890
Born	Lizzie Andrew Borden (1860-07-19)July 19, 1860 Fall River, Massachusetts, U.S.
Died	June 1, 1927(1927-06-01) (aged 66) Fall River, Massachusetts, U.S.
Resting place	Oak Grove Cemetery
Other names	Lizbeth Borden
Known for	Suspected homicide of father and step mother
Signature

Lizzie Andrew Borden (July 19, 1860 – June 1, 1927) was an American woman who was tried and acquitted of the August 4, 1892 axe murders of her father and stepmother in Fall River, Massachusetts. No one else was charged in the murders and, despite ostracism from other residents, Borden spent the remainder of her life in Fall River. She died of pneumonia at age 66, just days before the death of her older sister Emma.

The Borden murders and trial received widespread publicity in the United States, and have remained a topic in American popular culture depicted in numerous films, theatrical productions, literary works, and folk rhymes around the Fall River area.

Early life

The Borden house at 92 Second Street in Fall River, Massachusetts
41.6989°N 71.1562°W / 41.6989; -71.1562

Lizzie Andrew Borden was born on July 19, 1860 in Fall River, Massachusetts to Sarah Anthony Borden (née Morse; 1823–1863) and Andrew Jackson Borden (1822–1892). Her father was of English and Welsh descent. He grew up in very modest surroundings and struggled financially as a young man, despite being the descendant of a wealthy and influential family. He eventually prospered in the manufacture and sale of furniture and caskets, then became a successful property developer. He was a director of several textile mills and owned considerable commercial property. He was also president of the Union Savings Bank and a director of the Durfee Safe Deposit and Trust Co. At the time of his murder, his estate was valued at $300,000 ($10,000,000 in 2024).

Despite his wealth, Borden was known for his frugality; the Borden residence lacked indoor plumbing even though it was a common feature for the wealthy at that time. The house stood in an affluent area, but the wealthiest residents of Fall River generally lived in the more fashionable neighborhood called The Hill, which was farther from the industrial areas of the city.

Lizzie and her older sister Emma Lenora Borden (1851–1927) had a relatively religious upbringing and attended Central Congregational Church. As a young woman, Lizzie was very involved in church activities, including teaching Sunday school to children of recent immigrants. She was involved in religious organizations such as the Christian Endeavor Society, for which she served as secretary-treasurer, and contemporary social movements such as the Woman's Christian Temperance Union. She was also a member of the Ladies' Fruit and Flower Mission.

Andrew Borden married Abby Durfee Gray (1828–1892) three years after the death of Lizzie's mother. Lizzie later stated that she called her stepmother "Mrs. Borden" and demurred on whether they had a cordial relationship; she believed that Abby had married her father for his wealth. Bridget Sullivan was the Bordens' 25 year-old live-in maid who had immigrated from Ireland, and she testified that Lizzie and Emma rarely ate meals with their parents. In May 1892, Andrew killed multiple pigeons in his barn with a hatchet, believing that they were attracting local children to hunt them. Lizzie had recently built a roost for the pigeons, and it has been commonly recounted that she was upset over his killing them, though the veracity of this has been disputed. A family argument in July 1892 prompted both sisters to take extended vacations in New Bedford. They returned to Fall River a week before the murders, and Lizzie chose to stay in a local rooming house for four days before returning to the Borden residence.

Tension had been growing within the Borden family in the months before the murders, especially over Andrew's gifts of real estate to various branches of Abby's family. Their stepmother's sister received a house, so Lizzie and Emma demanded a rental property, the house which they had lived in until their mother died; they purchased it from their father for one dollar. A few weeks before the murders, they sold the property back to their father for $5,000 ($170,993 in 2023). John Vinnicum Morse, Lizzie and Emma's maternal uncle, visited the Borden home the night before the murders, and Andrew invited him to stay for a few days to discuss business matters. This has led to speculation that their conversation may have aggravated an already tense situation, particularly about property transfer.

The entire household had been violently ill for several days before the murders. A family friend later speculated that it was caused by mutton that had been left on the stove to use in meals over several days. Abby had feared poison, given that Andrew had not been a popular man in Fall River.

Murders of Andrew and Abby

Thursday, August 4, 1892

Abby Borden's body

Andrew Borden's body

Morse arrived in the evening of August 3 and slept in the guest room that night. Andrew, Abby, Morse, and Sullivan were present at breakfast the next morning, after which Andrew and Morse went to the sitting room where they chatted for nearly an hour. Morse left around 8:48 am to buy a pair of oxen and visit his niece in Fall River, planning to return to the Borden home for lunch at noon. Andrew left for his morning walk sometime after 9 am.

One of Lizzie and Emma's regular chores was to clean the guest room, but this morning Abby went upstairs sometime between 9:00 am and 10:30 am to make the bed. According to the forensic investigation, Abby was facing her killer at the time of the attack. She was first struck on the side of the head with a hatchet which cut her just above the ear, causing her to turn and fall face down on the floor and creating contusions on her nose and forehead. Her killer then struck her multiple times, delivering 17 more hits to the back of her head and killing her.

Andrew returned at around 10:30 am. His key failed to open the door, so he knocked. Sullivan went to unlock the door but found it jammed; she uttered a curse. She testified that she heard Lizzie laughing immediately after this; she did not see Lizzie, but stated that the laughter was coming from the top of the stairs. This was considered significant, as Abby was already dead by this time, and her body would have been visible to anyone on the second floor. Lizzie later denied being upstairs and testified that her father had asked her where Abby was, to which she replied that a messenger had delivered Abby a summons to visit a sick friend.

Sullivan stated that she then removed Andrew's boots and helped him into his slippers before he lay down on the sofa for a nap, a detail contradicted by the crime-scene photos which show Andrew wearing boots. She testified that she was in her third-floor room, resting from cleaning windows just before 11:10 am when she heard Lizzie call from downstairs, "Maggie, come quick! Father's dead. Somebody came in and killed him."

Andrew was slumped on a couch in the downstairs sitting room, struck 10 or 11 times with a hatchet-like weapon. One of his eyes had been split cleanly in two, suggesting that he had been asleep when attacked. His still-bleeding wounds suggested a very recent attack. Family physician Dr. Bowen arrived from his home across the street and pronounced both victims dead. Detectives estimated that Andrew's death had occurred at approximately 11:00 am.

Investigation

Lizzie's initial answers to the police officers' questions were at times strange and contradictory. Initially, she reported hearing a groan or a scraping noise or a distress call before entering the house. Two hours later, she told police that she had heard nothing and entered the house not realizing that anything was wrong. When asked where her stepmother was, she recounted Abby receiving a note asking her to visit a sick friend. She also stated that she thought that Abby had returned and asked if someone could go upstairs and look for her. Sullivan and neighbor Mrs. Churchill were half-way up the stairs, their eyes level with the floor, when they looked into the guest room and saw Abby lying face down on the floor.

Most of the officers who interviewed Lizzie reported that they disliked her "attitude"; some said she that was too calm and poised. Despite her behavior and changing alibis, she was not checked for bloodstains. Police did search her room, but it was a cursory inspection; at the trial, they admitted to not doing a proper search because Lizzie was not feeling well. They were subsequently criticized for their lack of diligence.

In the basement, police found two hatchets, two axes, and a hatchet-head with a broken handle. The hatchet-head was suspected of being the murder weapon, as the break in the handle appeared fresh and the ash and dust on the head appeared to have been deliberately applied to make it look as if it had been in the basement for some time. However, none of these tools were removed from the house. The victims' stomachs were removed during autopsies and tested for poison because of the mysterious illness that had stricken the household before the murders, but no poison was found. Residents suspected Lizzie of purchasing "hydrocyanic acid in a diluted form" from the local druggist. Her defense was that she inquired about using the acid to clean her furs, despite the local medical examiner's testimony that it did not have antiseptic properties.

Lizzie and Emma's friend Alice Russell decided to stay with the sisters the night following the murders. Police were stationed around the house on the night of August 4, during which an officer said that he had seen Lizzie enter the cellar with Russell, carrying a kerosene lamp and a slop pail. He stated that he saw both women exit the cellar, after which Lizzie returned alone. He was unable to see what she was doing, but he stated that it appeared that she was bent over the sink.

On August 5, Morse left the Borden residence and was mobbed by hundreds of people; police had to escort him back to the house. The following day, police conducted a more thorough search of the house, inspecting the sisters' clothing and confiscating the broken-handled hatchet head. That evening, a police officer and the mayor visited the house, and Lizzie was informed that she was a suspect in the murders. The next morning, Russell entered the kitchen to find Lizzie tearing up a dress. She explained that she was planning to put it on the fire because it was covered in paint. It was never determined whether it was the dress that she had been wearing on the day of the murders.

Inquest

Lizzie appeared at the inquest hearing on August 8. The court refused her request to have her family attorney present, citing a state statute providing that an inquest must be held in private. She had been prescribed regular doses of morphine to calm her nerves, and it is possible that her testimony was affected by this. Her behavior was erratic, and she often refused to answer a question even if the answer would be beneficial to her. She often contradicted herself and provided alternating accounts of the morning in question, such as saying that she was in the kitchen reading a magazine when her father arrived home, then saying that she was in the dining room doing some ironing, and then saying that she was coming down the stairs.

On August 11, Lizzie was served with a warrant of arrest and jailed. The inquest testimony, the basis for the modern debate regarding Lizzie's guilt or innocence, was later ruled inadmissible at her trial in June 1893. Contemporaneous newspaper articles noted that Lizzie possessed a "stolid demeanor" and "bit her lips, flushed, and bent toward attorney Adams;" it was also reported that the testimony provided in the inquest had "caused a change of opinion among her friends who have heretofore strongly maintained her innocence." The inquest received significant press attention nationwide, including a three-page article in The Boston Globe. A grand jury began hearing evidence on November 7, and Borden was indicted on December 2.

Trial and acquittal

Lizzie Borden during the trial, by Benjamin West Clinedinst

Lizzie's trial took place in New Bedford starting on June 5, 1893. Prosecuting attorneys were Hosea M. Knowlton and future United States Supreme Court Justice William H. Moody; defending were Andrew V. Jennings, Melvin O. Adams, and former Massachusetts Governor George D. Robinson.

Another axe-murder occurred in Fall River on June 1, five days before Borden's trial began. This time, the victim was Bertha Manchester who was found hacked to death in her kitchen. The similarities between the Manchester and Borden murders were striking and noted by jurors. Portuguese immigrant Jose Correa de Mello was convicted of Manchester's murder in 1894, but he was determined not to have been in the vicinity of Fall River at the time of the Borden murders.

A prominent point of discussion in the trial and press coverage was the hatchet-head found in the basement, which was not convincingly demonstrated by the prosecution to be the murder weapon. Prosecutors argued that the killer had removed the handle because it would have been covered in blood. One officer testified that a hatchet handle was found near the hatchet-head, but another officer contradicted this. No bloody clothing was found at the scene, but Russell testified that she had witnessed Lizzie burn a dress in the kitchen stove on August 8, 1892, saying that it had been ruined when she brushed against wet paint. During the course of the trial, the defense never attempted to challenge this statement.

The trial jury that acquitted Borden, 1893

Lizzie's presence at the home was also a point of dispute during the trial. According to testimony, Sullivan entered the second floor at around 10:58 am and left Lizzie and her father downstairs. Lizzie told several people that she went into the barn and was not in the house for "twenty minutes or possibly a half an hour". Hyman Lubinsky testified for the defense that he saw Lizzie leaving the barn at 11:03 am, and Charles Gardner confirmed the time. At 11:10 am, Lizzie called Sullivan downstairs, told her that Andrew had been murdered, and ordered her not to enter the room; instead, Lizzie sent her to get a doctor.

Both victims' heads had been removed during autopsy, and the skulls were admitted as evidence during the trial and presented on June 5, 1893. Upon seeing them in the courtroom, Lizzie fainted. Evidence was excluded that she had sought to purchase prussic acid (hydrogen cyanide) from the local druggist on the day before the murders, purportedly for cleaning a sealskin cloak. The judge ruled that the incident was too remote in time to have any connection.

Presiding Associate Justice Justin Dewey had been appointed by Robinson when he was governor, and he delivered a lengthy summary that supported the defense before the jury was sent to deliberate on June 20, 1893. After an hour and a half of deliberation, the jury acquitted Lizzie Borden of the murders. Upon exiting the courthouse, she told reporters that she was "the happiest woman in the world".

The trial has been compared to the later trials of Bruno Hauptmann, Ethel and Julius Rosenberg, and O.J. Simpson as a landmark in publicity and public interest in the history of American legal proceedings.

Theories

Lizzie Borden

Although acquitted at trial, Lizzie remained the prime suspect in her father's and stepmother's murders. Writer Victoria Lincoln proposed in 1967 that she might have committed the murders while in a fugue state. Another prominent suggestion was that she was physically and sexually abused by her father, which drove her to kill him. There is little evidence to support this, but incest is not a topic that would have been discussed at the time, and the methods for collecting physical evidence would have been quite different in 1892. This belief was intimated in local papers at the time of the murders, and was revisited by scholar Marcia Carlisle in a 1992 essay.

Mystery author Evan Hunter, better known as Ed McBain, in his 1984 novel Lizzie, suggested that Lizzie committed the murders after being caught in a tryst with Sullivan. McBain elaborated on his speculation in a 1999 interview, speculating that Abby had caught the two together and had reacted with horror and disgust, and that Lizzie had killed Abby with a candlestick. She made a confession to Andrew when he returned home but killed him in a rage with a hatchet when he reacted exactly as Abby had. He further speculated that Sullivan disposed of the hatchet somewhere afterwards.

In her later years, Lizzie was rumored to be a lesbian, but there was no such speculation about Sullivan, who later married a man she met while working as a maid in Butte, Montana. Sullivan died in Butte in 1948. Allegedly, she gave a death-bed confession to her sister in which she stated that she had changed her testimony on the stand to protect Lizzie.

John Morse

Another significant suspect is John Morse, Lizzie's maternal uncle, who rarely met with the family after his sister died but had slept in the house the night before the murders; according to law enforcement, he had provided an "absurdly perfect and over-detailed alibi for the death of Abby Borden". Morse was considered a suspect by police for a period.

"William Borden"

A man named William Borden, suspected to be Andrew's illegitimate son, was noted as a possible suspect by author Arnold Brown, who surmised that William had tried and failed to extort money from his alleged father. Author Leonard Rebello, after extensive research on William, proved he was not Andrew's son.

Emma Borden

Although Emma had an alibi at Fairhaven, about 15 miles (24 km) from Fall River, crime writer Frank Spiering proposed in his 1984 book Lizzie that she might have secretly visited the residence to kill her parents before returning to Fairhaven in time to receive the telegram informing her of the murders.

Later life

After the trial, the Borden sisters moved into a large, modern house in The Hill neighborhood in Fall River. Around this time, Lizzie began using the name Lizbeth A. Borden. At their new house, which Lizbeth dubbed "Maplecroft", they had a staff that included live-in maids, a housekeeper and a coachman. Because Abby was ruled to have died before Andrew, her estate went first to Andrew and then, at his death, passed to his daughters as part of his estate. A considerable settlement, however, was paid to settle claims by Abby's family.

Despite the acquittal, Lizzie was ostracized by Fall River society. Her name was again brought into the public eye when she was accused of shoplifting in Providence, Rhode Island, in 1897. In 1905, shortly after an argument over a party that Lizbeth had given for actress Nance O'Neil, Emma moved out of the house and never saw her sister again.

Death

Lizzie was ill in her last year following the removal of her gallbladder; she died of pneumonia on June 1, 1927, in Fall River at age 66. Funeral details were not published and few attended. Nine days later, Emma died from chronic nephritis in a nursing home in Newmarket, New Hampshire, having moved to this location in 1923 both for health reasons and to avoid renewed attention following the publication of another book about the murders. The Borden sisters, neither of whom had ever married, were buried side by side in the family plot in Oak Grove Cemetery.

At the time of her death, Borden was worth over $250,000 (equivalent to $6,073,000 in 2024). She owned a house on the corner of French Street and Belmont Street, several office buildings, shares in several utilities, two cars and a large amount of jewelry. She left $30,000 (equivalent to $729,000 in 2024) to the Fall River Animal Rescue League and $500 ($12,000 in 2024) in trust for perpetual care of her father's grave. Her closest friend and a cousin each received $6,000 ($146,000 today)—substantial sums at the time of the estate's distribution in 1927—and numerous friends and family members each received between $1,000 ($24,000 in 2024) and $5,000 ($121,000 in 2024).

In culture

Scholar Ann Schofield notes that "Borden's story has tended to take one or the other of two fictional forms: the tragic romance and the feminist quest ...  As the story of Lizzie Borden has been created and re-created through rhyme and fiction it has taken on the qualities of a popular American myth or legend that effectively links the present to the past."

The Borden house became a museum, and operates a bed and breakfast with 1890s styling. Pieces of evidence used in the trial, including the hatchet-head, are preserved at the Fall River Historical Society.

Folk rhyme

The case was memorialized in a popular skipping-rope rhyme, sung to the tune of the then-popular song "Ta-ra-ra Boom-de-ay."

Lizzie Borden took an axe
and gave her mother forty whacks.
When she saw what she had done,
she gave her father forty-one.

Folklore says that the rhyme was made up by an anonymous writer as a tune to sell newspapers. Others attribute it to the ubiquitous, but anonymous, "Mother Goose".

In reality, Lizzie's stepmother suffered eighteen or 19 blows; her father suffered eleven blows.

The rhyme has a less well-known second verse:

Andrew Borden now is dead,
Lizzie hit him on the head.
Up in heaven he will sing,
on the gallows she will swing.

Depictions

Lizzie Borden has been depicted in music, radio, film, theater, and television, often in association with the murders of which she was acquitted.

Among the earlier portrayals on stage was John Colton and Carleton Miles's 1933 play Nine Pine Street, in which Lillian Gish played Effie Holden, a character who is based on Borden. The play was not a success and ran for only twenty-eight performances. In 1947 Lillian de la Torre wrote a one-act play, Goodbye, Miss Lizzie Borden.

Other retellings include New Faces of 1952, a 1952 Broadway musical with a number titled Lizzie Borden, which depicts the crimes, as well as Agnes de Mille's ballet Fall River Legend (1948) and the Jack Beeson opera Lizzie Borden (1965), both works being based on Borden and the murders of her father and stepmother. Other plays based on Borden include Blood Relations (1980), a Canadian production written by Sharon Pollock that recounts events leading up to the murders, which was made into a television movie in Calgary. Lizzie Borden, another musical adaptation, was also made starring Tony nominee Alison Fraser.

A March 24, 1957, episode of Omnibus presented two different adaptations of the Lizzie Borden story: the first a play, "The Trial of Lizzie Borden", with Katharine Bard as Lizzie; the second a production of the Fall River Legend ballet with Nora Kaye as "The Accused". In 1959, The Legend of Lizzie by Reginald Lawrence attracted praise for Anne Meacham in the title role, but still closed after just two performances.

A January 21, 1956, episode of Alfred Hitchcock Presents, entitled "The Older Sister", presents a fictionalized account, occurring one year after the murders, where Lizzie and Emma have a conversation revealing who the murderer was.

The folk singing group The Chad Mitchell Trio recorded a black comedy song, Lizzie Borden by Michael Brown, for their live 1961 album Mighty Day on Campus. Released as a single, it reached 44 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in 1962.

ABC commissioned The Legend of Lizzie Borden (1975), a television film starring Elizabeth Montgomery as Lizzie Borden, Katherine Helmond as Emma Borden, and Fionnula Flanagan as Bridget Sullivan; it was later discovered after Montgomery died that she and Borden were in fact sixth cousins once removed, both descending from 17th century Massachusetts resident John Luther. Rhonda McClure, the genealogist who documented the Montgomery-Borden connection, said: "I wonder how Elizabeth would have felt if she knew she was playing her own cousin."

Lizzie: The Musical premiered in 2009, with book by Tim Maner, music by Steven Cheslik-deMeyer and Alan Stevens Hewitt, and lyrics by Cheslik-deMeyer and Maner. The musical had its origins in a 1990 song cycle, and focuses on a secret romance between Borden and her neighbour, Alice, as well as her abuse at home.

Lifetime produced Lizzie Borden Took an Ax (2014), a speculative television film with Christina Ricci portraying Borden, which was followed by The Lizzie Borden Chronicles (2015)—a limited series and a sequel to the television film, which presents a fictionalized account of Borden's life after the trial. A feature film, Lizzie (2018), with Chloë Sevigny as Borden and Kristen Stewart as Bridget Sullivan, depicts a lesbian tryst between Borden and Sullivan, which leads to the murders.

The events of the murders and the trial, with actors portraying the people who were involved in them, have been reenacted on a number of documentary programs. In 1936, the radio program Unsolved Mysteries broadcast a 15-minute dramatization titled "The Lizzie Borden Case", which presented a possible scenario in which the murders were committed during a botched robbery attempt by a tramp, who then escaped. Television recreations have included episodes of Biography, Second Verdict, History's Mysteries, Case Reopened (1999), and Mysteries Decoded (2019). The Lizzie Borden case was partly dramatized on an episode of the 2022 BBC Radio podcast series Lucy Worsley's Lady Killers.

Lizzy Borden, an American heavy metal band, is named after her. The American film director Lizzie Borden also took her name from the historical figure.

In literature

• In Agatha Christie's mystery novel Sleeping Murder, the main character Miss Marple says that murder "was not proven in the case of Madeleine Smith and Lizzie was acquitted‍—‌but many people believe both of those women were guilty." Christie's And Then There Were None, After the Funeral, and Ordeal by Innocence also reference the case.
• "The Fall River Axe Murders", a short story by Angela Carter, was published in her collection Black Venus (1985). "Lizzie's Tiger", also by Carter, depicts Borden, imagined as a four-year-old, having an extraordinary encounter at the circus. The story was published posthumously in 1993 in her collection American Ghosts and Old World Wonders.
• Miss Lizzie, a 1989 novel by Walter Satterthwait, takes place thirty years after the murders and recounts an unlikely friendship between Borden and a child, and the suspicions that arise from a murder.
• Maplecroft: The Borden Dispatches, a 2014 novel by Cherie Priest. The first in a series of novels, where Priest adds elements of Lovecraftian horror to the tale of Lizzie Borden.
• See What I Have Done, 2017 novel by Australian writer Sarah Schmidt, tells the story of the murders and their aftermath from the points of view of Lizzie and Emma Borden, Bridget Sullivan, and an imagined stranger. It won the MUD Literary Prize for a debut novel.
• Erika Mailman's 2017 novel The Murderer's Maid is told from the points of view of Bridget Sullivan in 1892 and a young woman with a connection to the case in the modern day. It won a gold medal for historical fiction in the Independent Publisher Book Awards.

See also

• A. J. Borden Building
• Corky Row Historic District
• List of unsolved murders

Works cited

• Bartle, Ronald (2017). Lizzie Borden and the Massachusetts Axe Murders. Sherfield-on-Loddon, Hampshire: Waterside Press. ISBN 978-1-909-97643-6.
• Chiasson, Lloyd Jr. (1997). The Press on Trial: Crimes and Trials as Media Events. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press. ISBN 978-0-313-30022-6.
• Brown, Arnold (1991). Lizzie Borden: The Legend, the Truth, the Final Chapter. Nashville, TN: Rutledge Hill Press. ISBN 978-1-558-53099-7.
• Douglas, John E.; Olshaker, Mark (2001). The Cases That Haunt Us: From Jack the Ripper to Jon Benet Ramsey, The FBI's Legendary Mindhunter Sheds New Light on the Mysteries That Won't Go Away. Simon and Schuster. ISBN 978-0-7432-1239-7.
• Green, Kay, ed. (1996). Broadway Musicals, Show by Show. Milwaukee: Hal Leonard Corporation. ISBN 978-0-793-57750-7.
• Hoffman, Paul Dennis (2000). Yesterday in Old Fall River: A Lizzie Borden Companion. Durham, NC: Carolina Academic Press. ISBN 978-0-890-89799-7.
• Holmes, Ronald M.; Holmes, Stephen T. (2008). Profiling Violent Crimes: An Investigative Tool (4th ed.). Sage Publications. ISBN 978-1-452-27681-6.
• Fanthorpe, R. Lionel; Fanthorpe, Patricia (2003). The World's Most Mysterious Murders. Dundurn. ISBN 978-1-55002-439-5.
• Katz, Hélèna (2010). Cold Cases: Famous Unsolved Mysteries, Crimes, and Disappearances in America. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO. ISBN 978-0-313-37692-4.
• Kent, David (1992). Forty Whacks: New Evidence in the Life and Legend of Lizzie Borden (1st ed.). Emmaus, PA: Yankee Books. ISBN 978-0-89909-351-2.
• Kent, David; Flynn, Robert A., eds. (1992). The Lizzie Borden Sourcebook. Wellesley, MA: Branden Books. ISBN 978-0-8283-1950-8.
• King, Florence (1996). The Florence King Reader. Macmillan. ISBN 978-0-312-14337-4.
• King, Florence. WASP, Where is Thy Sting? Chapter 15, "One WASP's Family, or the Ties That Bind." Stein & Day, 1977, ISBN 0-552-99377-8 (1990 Reprint ed.).
• Knox, Sara L. (1998). Murder: A Tale of Modern American Life. Durham, NC: Duke University Press. ISBN 978-0-8223-2053-1.
• Lincoln, Victoria (1967). A Private Disgrace: Lizzie Borden by Daylight (Book Club ed.). New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons. ISBN 978-0-930330-35-4.
• Masterton, William L. Lizzie Didn't Do It! Boston: Branden Publishing Company, 2000, ISBN 0-8283-2052-7.
• Miller, Sarah (2016). The Borden Murders: Lizzie Borden and the Trial of the Century. New York: Random House. ISBN 978-0-553-49808-0.
• Miller, Wilbur R., ed. (2012). The Social History of Crime and Punishment in America: An Encyclopedia. Sage Publications. ISBN 978-1-4129-8876-6.
• Newton, Michael (2009). The Encyclopedia of Unsolved Crimes. New York: Infobase Publishing. ISBN 978-1-438-11914-4.
• Pearson, Edmund Lester. Studies in Murder Ohio State University Press, 1924.
• Pearson, Edmund (1937). Trial of Lizzie Borden, edited, with a History of the Case. New York: Doubleday-Doran. OCLC 20790872.
• Philbin, Tom; Philbin, Michael (2011). The Killer Book of Infamous Murders: Incredible Stories, Facts, and Trivia from the World's Most Notorious Murders. Sourcebooks, Inc. ISBN 978-1-4022-3746-1.
• Porter, Edwin H. (2006) [1893]. The Fall River Tragedy: A History of the Borden Murders. Clark, NJ: The Lawbook Exchange, Ltd. ISBN 978-1-584-77546-1.
• Radin, Edward D. Lizzie Borden: The Untold Story Simon and Schuster, 1961.
• Rebello, Leonard (1999). Lizzie Borden: Past & Present (1st ed.). Fall River, Massachusetts: Al-Zach Press. ISBN 978-0-9670739-0-3.
• Robbins, Trina (2003). Tender Murderers: Women Who Kill. York Beach, Maine: Conari Press. ISBN 978-1-57324-821-1.
• Schmidt, Sarah (2017). See What I Have Done. Atlantic Monthly Press. ISBN 978-0-802126597.
• Schofield, Ann (1993). "Lizzie Borden Took an Axe: History, Feminism and American Culture". American Studies. 34 (1): 91–103. ISSN 0026-3079. JSTOR 40642497.
• Scott, Gini Graham (2005). Homicide By The Rich And Famous: A Century Of Prominent Killers. Greenwood Publishing Group. ISBN 978-0-275-98346-8.
• Spiering, Frank (1984). Lizzie (1st ed.). New York: Dorset Press. ISBN 978-0-88029-685-4.
• Williams, Joyce; Smithburn, J. Eric; Peterson, M. Jeanne, eds. (1981). Lizzie Borden, a Case Book of Family and Crime in the 1890s. Bloomington, IN: T.I.S. Publications Division. ISBN 978-0-89917-302-3.
• Verstraete, C.A. (2018). Lizzie Borden, Zombie Hunter. CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform. ISBN 978-1717351654.

Further reading

• Asher, Robert, Lawrence B. Goodheart and Alan Rogers. Murder on Trial: 1620–2002 New York: State University of New York Press, 2005, ISBN 978-0-7914-6377-2.
• Davidson, Avram. "The Deed of the Deft-Footed Dragon" in several collections, most recently The Other Nineteenth Century, ed. Grania Davis and Henry Wessels. New York; TOR, 2001.
• de Mille, Agnes. Lizzie Borden: A Dance of Death. Boston: Little, Brown and Co., 1968.
• Martins, Michael and Dennis Binette. Parallel Lives: A Social History of Lizzie A. Borden and Her Fall River. Fall River: Fall River Historical Society, 2011. 1,138 pages with much previously unavailable information including letters written by Lizzie Borden while in jail and photographs of her in later life. ISBN 978-0-9641248-1-3
• Robertson, Cara. The Trial of Lizzie Borden. New York: Simon and Schuster, 2019. ISBN 1501168371
• Sullivan, Robert. Goodbye Lizzie Borden. Brattleboro, VT: Stephen Greene Press, 1974. ISBN 0-14-011416-5.
• Jordan, Jim d, "The Fall River Murders and the Trial of Lizzie Borden Vols. I & II. The Fall River Murders: and the Trial of Lizzie Borden Vol. IVol. I, The Fall River Murders: and the Trial of Lizzie Borden Vol. II Vol. II

External links

• Works by or about Lizzie Borden at the Internet Archive
• The Lizzie Andrew Borden Virtual Museum & Library
• Tattered Fabric: Fall River's Lizzie Borden
• The Fall River Tragedy: A History of the Borden Murders Archived February 23, 2021, at the Wayback Machine (1893), full text detailing crimes
• Lizzie Borden Moot Court, with tribunal made up of U.S. Supreme Court justices and Stanford University Law School professors. September 16, 1997