The Trial of Lizzie Borden(70)
The Borden sisters’ lifelong friend Mary Brigham, “who betrayed much nervousness by her quick, short breathing,” nonetheless testified “in a clear, ringing voice” that Mrs. Reagan had told her, “It is a lie from beginning to end.” Mrs. Reagan claimed that she had been willing to sign the paper but the marshal would not let her do so.
These witnesses were critical for more than the Reagan story. They humanized Lizzie. Marianna Holmes, for example, listed Lizzie Borden’s charitable activities in such detail that Knowlton interjected to ask if it was necessary to present such an extensive résumé of good works. She was also prepared to testify that Lizzie had kissed her father as he lay in his casket. That was not permitted but she did manage to say that Lizzie “shed tears” when viewing her father’s body in the sitting room before the funeral began. In an echo of the testimony, Lizzie covered her face with her handkerchief “and when she took it away it was evident she had been crying.” Mrs. Holmes also gave an innocent explanation for Lizzie’s locked bedroom door, a fact noted and given sinister import by Assistant Marshal Fleet. According to Mrs. Holmes, “The house was full of men, and if we did not have that door locked, as they came up the stairs, they were apt to open it.” By then, Lizzie had rebounded, “leaning forward with her face close to ex-Gov. Robinson’s shoulder and now and then whispering to him, in an animated way, suggesting questions.”
But these witnesses were mere appetizers. Emma Borden was finally to appear. As Elizabeth Jordan put it, Emma’s testimony “was the event of the day.” Short of Lizzie herself, Emma Borden was the witness the audience craved. When word spread that Emma Borden would take the stand, “Everybody made a rush for the courthouse, but they might as well have rushed to the spire of the nearest church, for the good people already favored with seats knew a good thing when they had it, and not a soul stirred during the entire recess.” Within the courtroom, the women spectators “made such a stir,” said Julian Ralph, “that the sound of their dresses was like a whiff of wind in an open forest.”
Even though, as a witness, she had been absent from the courtroom prior to her testimony, there was no mistaking Emma Borden. To Julian Ralph, Emma looked like the slender “aged double of her sister.” Joe Howard amplified the portrait: “She is a little over 40 years of age, and looks it, a prim, little, old-fashioned New England maiden, dressed with an exceeding neatness in plain black with the impress of a Borden in every feature.” He hypothesized: “Self-reliance and personal dignity, I should say, are conspicuous factors in her composition.” Elizabeth Jordan, as she had throughout, added a plaintive note. “Much older than Lizzie in appearance,” Emma had a “curious almost weazened little face; a costume of deep mourning, and a composed melancholy bearing.” Jordan also observed that although “the sisters’ eyes met as they faced each other, no sign of recognition passed between them.”
By any measure, Emma Borden was the key defense witness. Most important, as the unsuspected daughter, she provided the most potent character support for her accused sister. Fortunately, Emma was up to the difficult task: “There was no swaying of her slender form, no dropping of her straight-cut eye, no quivering of her tight-shut mouth.” First, Emma repudiated the reported quarrel in Lizzie’s jail cell. Jennings took her through Mrs. Reagan’s statement sentence by sentence so that she could specifically deny every one. Between her testimony and that of the prior witnesses, most commentators on the trial considered Mrs. Reagan’s story “demolished.” According to Ralph, “The defense enjoyed perfect and overwhelming success in disposing of all these matters.”
The defense then sought to dispel the prosecution’s argument about Lizzie’s possible motive, her dissatisfaction with her financial circumstances, and her resentment of her father. At Jennings’s request, Emma listed all of Lizzie Borden’s property and other assets, comprising $2,811 in cash, two shares of the Fall River National Bank (issued in 1883), and nine shares of Merchants Manufacturing Company (two different issues, 1880 and 1881). Many thought if she had enough money to buy the accoutrements of respectable femininity, then she could not have had any motive to commit the murders. A desire for independence apparently did not enter into the calculation. Lizzie herself sounded this theme shortly after the deaths, showing her bankbooks to her friend Mary Brigham and asking why, in light of her healthy balance, she would commit murder. Emma also provided ammunition for the defense’s attack on the prosecution’s weakest point: the relationship of father and daughter. She testified that Lizzie had given her father a plain gold ring, a ring she had formerly worn and the only piece of jewelry he ever wore. She said he always wore it and it was “upon his finger at the time he was buried.”
Emma’s next task was to recast her sister’s actions after the murders in an innocent light. Regarding the search of the house, Jennings led Emma through each of the police sweeps to show how cooperative she and Lizzie had been. She quoted Dr. Dolan as saying “the search had been as thorough as the search could be made unless the paper was torn from the walls and the carpets taken from the floor.” Emma testified that she and Lizzie both helped the officers open a trunk in the attic. Jennings was also able to get his own comment about the search admitted into evidence. Emma testified that he had told her “everything had been examined, every box and bag.”