Why did Lizzie Borden murder her parents?

Answer 1

To understand the motive behind the murders one has to understand the dynamics in the Borden household.

Andrew Borden, self-made man, frugal to a fault and not the easiest man to get along with. Supporting two old maid daughters and his second wife and some of her family also.

Abbey Borden, the step-mother to Andrew's daughters Emma and Lizzie, not on the best of terms with either one of the 'girls'. As step-mothers go, she seemed like a descent person.

Emma Borden, older by 10 years, the quiet sister, she was typical for an unmarried woman of the time period.

Lizzie, the youngest Borden, was by outward appearences also typical. She was not though. Never niave to their social status in Fall River society, Lizzie believed they should have lived in a bigger and fancier home. She felt they should entertain. On an almost daily basis Lizzie clashed with her father on how he spent, or actually did not spend, the family money.

The catalyst for the murders was a transfer of a piece of real estate and a change in Andrew's will that was to be carried out the day after the murders. Andrew was giving to Abbey's family the farm that had been in the Borden family for decades. Lizzie especially was adament that the property go to her and Emma following her father's death.

Andrew's plans for the farm and his everyday frugelness came to a head in those first days of August of 1892. Of course this is a simplified version but it gives an idea of the growing crisis in the lives of the Bordens. Resentments had grown and festered for years, to the point where the Bordens did not even dine together. Lizzie and Emma took their meals in their rooms upstairs. This is a very telling fact for late 19th century Americans. Meals were much more formal than today, and were eaten in the dining room with all family members present. But it does show the fractures that existed in this family group.

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The story of the Borden murders was so horrifying that it was, in its time, given the media equivalent of modern trials like the OJ Simpson case, and the Rosenberg spy trial. It has gone down in history thanks to the children's rhyme that was invented at the time of the case. Virtually every child has heard of Lizzie Borden and knows what she did - she murdered her mother and father by hitting them 40 and 41 times with an axe. But did she?

The Myth: Lizzie Did the Deed

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

The short answer to the question posed in the introduction is "no" - Lizzie Borden did not kill her father (Andrew) and step-mother (Abby). Also untrue is the number of blows each received from the famous axe used to kill them. Her father was hit 11 times and her stepmother 18 or 19 times. Lizzie was seen minutes after the murders and had no blood on her at all. Furthermore, a month previous, a man had committed axe murders very similar in style to the Borden killings. He claimed to have been outside of the country when Andrew and Abby were killed but it seems too much a coincidence to make his story believable.

The Trial

Lizzie was put on trial for the murder but after only one hour of jury deliberations she was found innocent. No one else was ever tried for the murders and Lizzie went on to live a relatively peaceful life and died 35 years after the famous case. She left $30,000 to an animal welfare league and the remainder of her estate (which was quite large for the time) was left to a friend and cousin. You can stay in the house where the Bordens were killed as it is now a bed and breakfast and the home that Lizzie lived in after the murders until her death offers tours (by appointment only).

Some circumstantial evidence does seem to suggest that Lizzie may have killed her parents, but no evidence was ever given to prove it. While her clothing had no blood on it, she did burn a dress after the killings because she said it had paint on it. She also tried to purchase poison a week before the murders and the entire household became very sick the day before - this was put down to food poisoning. At the time, forensics were not as trusted as today and so the axe was not fingerprinted even though the technology to do so existed at the time and could have given proof that Lizzie was innocent (or guilty)

Interesting Fact: Lizzie Borden and actress Elizabeth Montgomery (of Bewitched fame), who coincidentally portrayed Lizzie in a television movie about the murders and trial, were sixth cousins once removed. Both women descended 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."

by Jamie Frater