Evan Hunter - Lizzie

I then went upstairs to the front bedroom — or spare bedroom, so-called — and saw Mrs. Borden laid dead between the bed and the dressing case, face downward, with her head all broke in or cut. She was covered with blood, and there was considerable blood under her head, and the blood was congealed and black. That is, of a dark color. The blood about Mr. Borden’s head was of a reddish color, and much thinner.

I came out the head of the stairs, and then went into the room where Miss Lizzie Borden was, sitting down on a lounge — or sofa — with Reverend Mr. Buck, Miss Russell being in the room.

I told Miss Borden who I was, made known who I was — I was then in citizens’ clothes, as I am now — and I asked her if she knew anything about the murders. She said that she did not. All she knew was that Mr. Borden — her father, as she put it — came home about half-past ten or quarter to eleven, went into the sitting room, sat down in the large chair, took out some papers and looked at them. She was ironing some handkerchiefs in the dining room, as she stated. She saw that her father was feeble, and she went to him and advised him and assisted him to lay down upon the sofa.

She then went into the dining room to her ironing, but left after her father was laid down and went out into the yard and up in the barn. I asked her how long she remained in the barn. She said she remained in the barn about a half hour. I then asked her what she meant by “up in the barn”. She said, “I mean up in the barn. Upstairs, sir.” She said after she had been there about half an hour, she came down again, went into the house, and found her father on the lounge, in the position in which she had left him.

But killed.

Or dead.

“Who was in the house this morning or last night?” I asked her.

“No one but my father, Mrs. Borden, Bridget, Mr. Morse and myself,” she said.

“Who’s this Mr. Morse?” I asked.

“He’s my uncle,” she said. “He came here yesterday, and slept in the room where Mrs. Borden was found dead.”

“Do you think Mr. Morse had anything to do with the killing of your parents?” I asked.

She said no, she didn’t think he had, because Mr. Morse left the house this morning before nine o’clock, and didn’t return until after the murder. I asked her if she thought Bridget could have done this, and she said she didn’t think that she could or did.

I should say here that I didn’t use the word Bridget at that time, because she’d given me the name as Maggie; I should say Maggie.

I asked her if she thought Maggie had anything to do with the killing of these. She said no, that Maggie had gone upstairs previous to her father’s lying down on the lounge, and when she came from the barn she called Maggie downstairs.

I then asked her if she had any idea who could have killed her father and mother.

“She’s not my mother, sir,” she said. “She’s my step mother. My mother died when I was a child.”

That’s about all the conversation I had with her at that time.

I then went downstairs in the cellar and found Officers Mullaly and Devine down there. When I got there, Officer Mullaly had two axes and two hatchets on the cellar floor. I looked around in the cellar to see if we could find any other instrument that might have been used for the purpose of killing, but failed to find anything. The two hatchets and axes were left there that day.

The largest hatchet, the claw-hammer hatchet — with the rust stain on it, and the red spot upon the handle that apparently had been washed or wiped — was placed behind some boxes in the cellar adjoining the wash cellar. I put it there, separating it from the other hatchet. I went out in the yard then, and instructed some of the men — who’d been sent by the marshal to me — to cover the different highways and depots, and then I went upstairs, the front hallway upstairs.

I went to Lizzie’s door and rapped on it.

Dr. Bowen came to it, holding open the door — opening the door, I should say — about six or eight inches, and asked what was wanted. I told him that we had come there as officers to search this room and search the building. He then turned around to Miss Borden and told me to wait a moment, and closed the door. He then opened the door again and said that Lizzie wanted to know if it was absolutely necessary for us to search that room. I told him as officers, murders having been committed, it was our duty to do so, and we wanted to get in there. He closed the door again, and said something to Miss Borden, and finally opened the door and admitted us.

We proceeded to search, looking through some drawers, and the closet and bedroom. While the search was still going on, I said to Lizzie, “You said that you were up in the barn for half an hour. Do you say that now?”

She said, “I don’t say half an hour. I say twenty minutes to half an hour.”

“Well, we’ll call it twenty minutes then,” I said.

“I say from twenty minutes to half an hour, sir,” she said.

I then asked her when was the last time that she saw her stepmother — when and where. She said that the last time she saw her was about nine o’clock and she was then in the room where she was found dead, and was making the bed.

That is to say, at nine o’clock she was making the bed in the room where she was found dead.

She then said that someone brought a letter or note to Mrs. Borden and she thought she had gone out and had not known of her return.

As we continued to search Lizzie Borden’s room, she said she hoped we should get through with this quick, that she was getting tired, or words to that effect — it was making her tired — and we told her we should get through as soon as we possibly could. It was an unpleasant duty — that is, considering that her father and stepmother were dead. We searched that room, and then we went to the room where Mrs. Borden was found dead.

I saw a door there which would lead into Lizzie Borden’s room and on Lizzie Borden’s side was a bookcase and, I think, desk combined. This was situated directly in front of the door, or in back of the door leading from where Mrs. Borden was found dead. The door was locked. I’m not sure on which side, but I think upon Lizzie Borden’s side.

I searched a clothespress that was in the room directly in front of Lizzie’s room, and then I searched Mr. Borden’s room, and went up to the attics and searched Bridget’s room, and the closet, together with the room adjoining the other rooms, and the west end of the attics. Then I came downstairs, went down in the cellar again, saw Dr. Dolan, saw Officer Mullaly, and asked where he got the axes and the hatchets, and he showed me.

I found — in a box in the middle cellar, on a shelf or a jog of an old-fashioned chimney — the head of a hatchet.

“Is this the hatchet you found?” Moody asked.

“This looks like the hatchet that I found there. Pretty sure that that’s the one. This piece of wood was in the head of the hatchet, broken off close.”

“Broken off close to the hatchet?”

“Very close to the hatchet.”

“Mr. Fleet, will you describe everything in respect to the appearance of that hatchet, if you can?”

“Don’t want anything but just what the hatchet was at that time,” Robinson said. “Don’t want any inferences.”

“I think he’ll be careful,” Moody said. “Any appearances that you noticed about the hatchet, you may describe.”

“Yes, sir, I don’t want to do anything else, Mr. Attorneys. The hatchet was covered with a heavy dust or ashes.”

“Describe the ashes as well as you can.”

“It was covered with white ashes, I should say, upon the blade of the hatchet. Not upon one side, but upon both.”