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1. "Laurana Harrington"
Posted by Susan on May-9th-02 at 9:49 PM

Is it just me or has anyone else ever been disturbed by the fact that Andrew's only sister never came to house on the day of the murders.  And did not show up for the funeral either?

I would like to think that after Sarah died and before Andrew married Abby that Laurana was there to comfort her nieces and instruct them in ladylike ways as they had no mother to do this for them.  I realize that Emma was twelve or so when Sarah died and promised her mother to care for baby Lizzie, she was still awful young to be without female guidance.  Could you imagine Andrew trying to explain the facts of menstruation to Emma?  Ooops, pardon me, having fleas?

But, it seems that before the murders there was a falling out between Andrew, Lizzie and Hiram and they did not visit him anymore, though Emma did.  In fact, Emma was questioned about this on the stand.

Though on the day of the murders, Hiram came to visit, if only for a few minutes, but, not Laurana?  She just lost a blood relative and her nieces just lost a father and stepmother, I would think she would have come over to console the two orphan 'girls' and possibly have a good cry with them.

And it seems that no one ever asked after Laurana at the trial except for a brief mention of her by Emma as Mrs. Harrington.  I just find it strange.  Do you think that Hiram forbade her to go to the Borden's house?  I'm curious to know what others think about this.

So far, I can only point you to "THE PRIVY"
"Proceedings" Topic page #1
Post #4
Items listed in Hip-bath collection see ITEM "K".

It says that Hiram states Lurana is "sick" at the time of the murders and he wants to go home and tell her himself.
This is from Jenning's notes...

I believe there are also MORSE relations in Fall River and they aren't mentioned as having much to do with the girls, or vise versa.

I THINK women weren't expected at the gravesite in those days...that's why the women involved stayed in the carriage.
At least that's the way it was in England for a long time.

Thanks for the info, Kat!    So, she was supposedly home sick, according to Hiram.  Did anyone check on that story?  Plus, I can't even tell you how many different spellings I have found of the poor woman's name.  She seems to be such an insignificant nothing, but, she was part of the Borden clan!  I'm sure she could have shed some light on the family in general.  I still have to wonder why she wasn't asked to testify in court?

Interesting that Andrew's sister, living close by, was "sick" that day.  Wasn't there some infamous note Abby got saying something about somebody being sick and she was going out because of it?  HA HA That would be a twist, Abby intending to go out to visit Hiram's wife while Hiram might have had something to do with sending someone over to kill Abby's husband but before she could get changed and go out she ran into the murderer herself. That is if you are into conspiracy theories. 

Another thought would be if Laurana did send a note for Abby to come attend her being sick the prosecution wouldn't have wanted that known so would not have wanted to call her. And if she did not get along with Lizzie she would not have testified for her. 

I wonder also about the relationships and personality of Laurana, was she like her brother or did she not get along with her brother?
Interesting subject.  

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What an interesting concept, Carol!  I've never put that two and two together before!  Really makes me think.

All I've ever seen written about Laurana is that she was Andrew's only sister and she deferred to him, because he was older or just because he was a male, I don't know which?

She is a cypher to me, but, may only be a red herring.  I still can't help to think if they only had interviewed her. 

Okay!  Wow, I was having problems with the site and apparently each time it denied me access, it was also posting my message!  Sorry for that gang! 

Since your face is so red, you MIGHT be able to go back and "EDIT" 7 of those duplicates out, if you want to try.

You could click on "EDIT", beginning with the first stutter, and Erase it all, for each one.  Then it would only show as "edit, May 10th at whatever time", in parenthesis.

Totally up to you, Red.



Seems more like something that would happen to Me!
BTW:  How are you at programming VCR'S?  (joke)

Thanks, Kat!  I'm still having the problem though!  After i type out a post and click post message, I get a screen that says that I am not authorized to view this page.  So what I had done before was go back and forth from that page and every time I did, voila, a new post!

And believe it or not, Kat, I did hook-up and programmed my own vcr!  I guess thats what comes of having three brothers! 

Write Stefani at "Contact Moderator" below in the red section. She'll help you all she can.

I have 3 brothers and BECAUSE of that I can do nothing handy except hold the flashlight for them...or hand over a screwdriver etc.!
Oh!  I DO know how to MOW!

This is all very funny. One of you learned to things by herself because she had three brothers and the other didn't learn to do things herself because she had three brothers.  I like to do things myself but have no idea if it was or was not because I had NO brothers. All I know is I wouldn't have wanted a brother like Andrew.

Amen to that, Carol!  Could youimagine what their relationship was like?  That whole deal with their father's house, having Laurana pay half of the debt when it sounds like she really didn't have the money?  Shes such an elusive figure in the story which of course intrigues me.
And my brothers always would show me things they were working on, like cars and such.  I can change oil and gap spark plugs, etc. due to their showing and explaning how and why they were doing what they were doing.  Its great to be a self sufficiant woman! 

After the sale of their Father's house, Lauranna chose her half in cash. Andy then tried to get her to pay half of the water bill, but she refused. Nothing about any expensive debts!

If the house had been rented, the tenant would have paid the water bill. Andy was just trying to cheat his sister.

That's how I remember it: Andy as a grasping miser again!

You are right, Rays!  My bad, but, that is what I was referring to, the water bill.  From what I have read, I'll have to check the source, but, that after a length of time, Laurana did pay off her half of the water bill, my guess would be to keep family peace?  Andrew does come across as being a mean, young or old, skin flint!:-P

They never mentioned the amount of the bill. Maybe $2-3?
I also think that this was as much a game for Andy as for greed. Like him selling his cracked eggs to his tenants (Buy or Hit the Road?).

A R Brown mentions that $10 was a weeks pay (80 hours!) for a good worker. Bridget got $5, the same allowance for Lizzie and Emma.
A loaf of bread cost a nickel (weight or size not mentioned).

If my memory is faulty, please post a correction.

You are correct, Rays!  I also seem to recall reading somewhere that Andrew would give Laurana a gift of $10 dollars on her birthday or on Christmas.  Yet, he had to have her half of the water bill?!  I think that maybe you have hit on something, Andrew liked to play power struggle games, rich men's games.  And I'm sure that he made sure that he always won! 

Here's the citation about the $ gift, but I have never understood it:

WITNESS STATEMENTS, pg. 17.
Harrington, sometime between Wednesday and Friday the 19th, notes:

"Mrs. Phebe Warner of Second street, with whom Mrs. Currier, Mr. Borden's sister, lived and said, knew nothing substantial.  During her sickness which was quite long, the Bank street Church took care of her.  Mr. Borden and the girls called once in a while.  Mr. Borden gave her $10. each Christmas.  She heard things were not pleasant there, but knew nothing about them."

I took this "sister" to mean Sister-in-law, as they would haphazardly call them that back then.  I thought this may be a Morse connection, not a Harrington one.

BTW:  What's the source of the EGG-SELLING that keeps being repeated?

Thanks, Kat.  The only place I can recall ever reading about the egg selling was in the Lincoln book myself.  But, a quick search came up with something interesting in The Fall River Tragedy, A History of the Borden Murders by Edwin Porter:

CHAPTER III.  pg.21

The Borden Family

(this is in reference to Andrew)
He was a thrifty Yankee in every sense of the word, and nothing that represented money was ever wasted by him.  No other man knew the worth of a dollar better than he, and none were more thoroughly convinced that a dollar properly invested would bring its returns many times over.

But the murdered man was never too busy counting his money to stop and do a day's work.  He owned farms across the Taunton river in Somerset and took the greatest interest in superintending the work thereon.

So, even if we can't find it elsewhere, the egg selling doesn't sound so far fetched to me.                   

I believe the "egg selling" IS mentioned in a source document but I retain the impression that it was a rare occurrance, not a continually repeated one.

Thanks for the reference to Porter.
Porter, though, mistakenly puts Andrew's farms at "Somerset" when they really are at Swansea.

Yes, I know, Porter got the farms' locations wrong.  I should have typed in 'sic', which I don't know exactly what it stands for, but, I know means 'this is how I found it'.

Perhaps it is a rare occurance?  But, it does go along with the thrifty Yankee image.  And can't you just picture Andrew with a basket on his arm pushing those eggs?    It makes for a great story!

My memory is of a book I read in 1965 (published a few years earlier? - maybe a revised edition of Pearson).
Andrew would take the cracked eggs from his farm (unsalable) and sell them to his tenants at a price 1 cent higher than in the store! A forced sale - "buy or hit the road"?
Note that "cracked" nowadays could mean something almost not noticable today (my parents used to buy these from an egg factory many years ago at a very low price).
Health regulations forbid selling them to the general public.

When Andy foreclosed on that 92 Second St house, he converted it from a two to a one family home. Granite block foundation, post and beam construction - he knew good construction.
That 1965 book also said he looked up all the carpenters whose mortgage he held, and told them to come to that house to work on it. For free, else he would foreclose on their mortgage too!
Not only a miser, but an avaricious exploiter of working men.
I've also heard that modern banks do not overlook the effects of holding a mortgage, but there may be too much competition (and laws!) to let them have this much power today.

Was the village of Swansea located in the county of Somerset? Could there have also been a place with that name?
For example, there is a place called "Hopelawn" that is part of "Fords" which is itself part of "Woodbridge Township". Confusing to outsiders, but derived from historical place names.

Rays,
Until you can figure out this 1965? book you *remember* reading, how can we credit anything it says about selling cracked eggs and "foreclosing" on the 92 Second Street property?
Is this stuff anywhere else....?  It should be verified, before we pass more inaccuracies into *Legend*, don't you think?

PS:  I've read all the Pearson on the subject of Borden and this is Not there...

That was a good question about the county.
I looked at my Atlas and Swansea is still Bristol County.
It seems to be about 3 or 4 miles from the town of Somerset as the crow flies, but looks longer by road.

I recall participating in a discussion (I believe on the old LBMB) about the Mrs. Currier who was supposed to be related to the Bordens.  I remembered that John Morse had referred to a "Phoebe Curry" in one of his testimonies, saying that she had been very ill and then died.  I think somebody (Terence?) mentioned that Len Rebello was researching who she was.  He believed she was the person who cared for Emma and Lizzie after their mother died.  Therefore Andrew probably felt indebted to her and gave her a little money on occasion. Len actually had figured out what type of family connection she was (not a sister of Andrew's, of course).  I had tried to guess and had guessed totally wrong.  Anyway, when Len Rebello publishes his next book, all will be revealed to us!

Gosh!  I sure wish those archives were available!

And I'm SOOO Glad you came back with that information, Edisto!  I was wracking my brains about that connection, only barely recalled....
Thanks. 

Boy, everyone keeps on refering to the Rebello book, and now there is a new one coming out?  I have got to seriously update my library! 

I think Len Rebello has probably been researching his next book since the day after the last one went to the printer.  Given the kind of research he does, we'll probably have a bit of a wait for the next one!  Does anybody here remember what connection the Currier woman was to Andrew?  (I don't think she was related to the Morse side of the family.)

Was hoping someone would do "Word Search" of the Trial, for Phoebe Curry or Currier....
Guess who THAT would be....

This is from page 17 of the Witness statements.

Harrington. Visited Mrs. Jane Gray, Mrs. Borden's step mother. Her statement. "Things were not as pleasant at the Borden house as they might be. That is the reason I did not call on Mrs. Borden as often as I would have liked to. I told Mrs. Borden I would not change places with her for all her money. What I know about them is all hearsay. Mrs. Borden was a very close mouthed woman. She would bear a great deal, and say nothing. She told me she and the girls were allowed an equal monthly allowance, but they had more out of it than I for I had to furnish the table coverings, towelling, and other small things for the house out of mine." Mrs Phebe Warner of Second street, with whom Mrs. Currier, Mr. Borden's sister, lived and said, knew nothing substantial. During her sickness which was quite long, the Bank street Church took care of her. Mr. Borden and the girls called once in a while. Mr. Borden gave her $10. each Christmas. She heard things were not pleasant there, but knew nothing about them."

Obviously Mrs. Currier was not Andrew's sister which is the way that reads. I could not find Curry or Currie in the Trial or in any of the books.

She is referred to in the Inquest, Pg. 96, by Morse:

Q.  Before that, can you recall the last time you were there?
A.  It was somewhere the last of June. I know Phebe Curry was sick at that time, she died a little afterwards, I think about the last of June.

Is she mentioned in Hoffman's book, "Yesterday in Old Fall River"?

Too many Phebe's or Phoebe's!


(Message last edited May-19th-02  7:54 AM.)

Wow! Harry, you sure came through on that HINT!
I hope Edisto finds your post...that was excellent.
I just checked Rebello, Knowlton (including Glossarys) and Hoffman for WARNER or CURRY (or CURRIER), at your suggestion, and the only listing is for Warner in Hoffman, which doesn't say much:
pg. 360

"WARNER, PHOEBE
Phoebe Warner was the widow of Sumner Warner and resided at 30 Second Street, a block or two north of the Borden home.  Police officers Philip Harrington and Patrick Doherty interviewed Mrs. Warner on August 17, 1892 in an attempt to investigate every lead.

Phoebe Warner knew Andrew and Abby Borden as well as their two daughters, who came to call on her at her home during an illnes.  Warner told investigators that she heard rumors but knew nothing that would help the authorities in their efforts to solve the murders."

--It took a lot of words to signify nothing of much help...
--We used to know more about this...it's locked away in the LBMB "Cellar" Archives!

The inquest reference is the one to which I was referring.  I knew Morse used the name "Curry," although that could simply be an error by the stenographer.  I think Hoffman's reference is a bit off, because I don't believe Ms. Warner herself is the person visited by Andrew, Emma and Lizzie and to whom they gave money.  Perhaps (confusingly) both Ms. Currier and Ms. Warner had the same first name, Phoebe/Phebe.  There do seem to be lots of Phoebes in the case, which is one reason I got confused about the identity of this supposed "sister" of Andrew Borden.  I certainly wish those LBMB archives were available, even if the site itself is defunct.