Lizzie Borden Society Forum

There are MANY instances of contradiction in Lizzie's various testimonies.

Q. Had you got a fish line?
A. Not here; we had some at the farm.
Q. Had you got a fish hook?
A. No sir.
Q. Had you got any apparatus for fishing at all?
A. Yes, over there.
Q. Had you any sinkers over there?
A. I think there were some. It is so long since I have been there; I think there were some.
Q. You had no reason to suppose you were lacking sinkers?

LATER IN THE TESTIMONY:
A. I went up to get some sinkers, if I could find them. I did not intend to go to the farm for lines; I
was going to buy some lines here.
Q. You then had no intention of using your own lines at Marion?
A. I could not get them.
Q. You had no intention of using your own line and hooks at the farm?
A. No sir.
Q. What was the use of telling me a little while ago you had no sinkers on your line at the farm?
A. I thought I made you understand that those lines at the farm were no good to use.
....
Q. You had no fishing apparatus you were proposing to use the next Monday until then?
A. No sir, not until I bought it.
Q. You had not bought anything?
A. No sir.
Q. Had not started to buy anything?
A. No sir.

ALICE RUSSELL TESTIMONY:
A. Yes Sir, I asked her what she went to the barn to do. She says my screen and window--- she gave me to
understand they did not come together right, or something,
Q. What did she say she went to get?
A. A piece of tin or iron to fix the screen.
Q. A piece of tin for the screen for which window?
A. A piece of tin or iron. She says “you know there is everything up there, and I went to see if I could not get a
piece of tin or iron to fix it. The screen or the window, I don't know which she was going to fix

-----------------------------
Then the "Stairs testimony" where she swore in several places that she was upstairs basting a strip into a garment, finished, was coming downstairs and heard Bridget open the door for Mr. Borden.
Then later she swears that she was never upstairs but was in the kitchen when Mr. Borden returns.
In reading the many, many contradictions, quite a few can be chalked up to misremembering or confusion from the rapid-fire questioning but there are some that are just too obviously conscious changing of her story.
Thoughts?

Was she asked this when she was taking the single dose of that morphine medication or when Dr. B doubled the dose ?

Steve, do u not know the answer to your question or are you asking rhetorically?

It was a rhetorical question. I know very well that she was taking a double dose of sulphate of morphine up to the time of her arrest: Trial Transcript Vol 1 - page 265.

I just answered you on the blood spatter thread about this page number: there's nothing there.

Posted feedback on morphine on the Blood and Splatter thread.

Steve-what do u think happened that morning?

I haven't the slightest idea what drugs did to Lizzie, if anything. So looking at the steps that Lizzie testified to during the inquest while she has been on 1/4 grain of sulphate of morphine ( 2x the dose stated by Dr. B. ) starting the prior Friday. I personally think she washed her hands or she did not go into the barn at all and touch all of those dusty things. Then the only thing would be left would be that she killed her father and called for the maid - while she went to the screen door with spotless hands / hair / dress/shoes. -Was anything looked at by the police as far as the sink - towels - soap, to see if they were recently used ?
Yea I'm convinced she did it...

Kat wrote: ↑Sun Oct 17, 2021 11:34 pm I just answered you on the blood spatter thread about this page number: there's nothing there.

Revision here: found the testimony of Dr Bowen at trial, and am posting the whole thing:
Page 326

Q. Did you subsequently see her in her room up stairs?
A. Miss Lizzie?

Q. Yes.
A. Yes, sir.

Q. How long after was that, do you think?
A. Some time between one and two.

Q. The same day?
A. The same day.

Q. Did you get a message, or did Miss Alice Russell come to you with word from Miss Lizzie?
A. Yes, sir, I went to her room.

Q. What did you prescribe?
A. I did not prescribe.

Q. What did you give?
A. I gave a preparation called bromo caffeine.

Q. For what purpose?
A. For quieting nervous excitement and headache.

Q. To bring on quiet. to allay nervous excitement?
A. Yes, sir.

Q. Did you give any directions as to how frequently that medicine should be given?
A. I left a second dose to be repeated in about an hour.

Q. Did you subsequently give other medicine of that kind that day?
A. Yes, sir.

Q. In what way?
A. In the same doses.

Q. Did you carry some bromo caffeine over there?
A. I carried some in a bottle over there to be taken.

Q. That was Thursday night. Did you have occasion to prescribe for her on account of this medical distress and nervous excitement after that?
A. Yes, sir.

MR. MOODY. I should like to know how far you are going on that?

Page 327

MR. ADAMS. I am going to the end.

Q. I understand you to say on Friday you directed that the bromo caffeine be given?
A. No, sir, Thursday.

Q. Not on Friday. You prescribed a second dose and took over from your office a bottle of it with directions how to be taken. I wish to know if, after that, you had occasion to prescribe for her on account of this mental distress and nervous excitement?
A. Yes, sir.

Q. When was it?
A. Friday.

Q. The next day?
A. Yes, sir.

Q. Was the prescription or medicine the same as the other?
A. It was different.

Q. What was it?
A. Sulphate of morphine.

Q. Well, what is commonly called morphine?
A. Yes, sir.

Q. You directed morphine to be taken?
A. Yes, sir.

Q. In what doses?
A. One-eighth of a grain.

Q. When?
A. Friday night, at bed-time.

Q. The next day you changed that?
A. I did not change the medicine, but doubled the dose.

Q. That was on Saturday?
A. On Saturday.

Q. Did you continue the dose on Sunday?
A. Yes, sir.

Q. Did you continue it Monday?
A. Yes, sir.

Q. And on Tuesday?
A. Yes, sir.

Q. Now something has been said about your being a witness at the secret hearing, this inquest at Fall River. Do you remember when you went or when you were summoned as a witness?
A. I don't remember what day.

Page 328

Q. Was it not in the early part of the week following this tragedy?
A. I think it was; I do not know.

Q. Don't you know that Miss Lizzie was there some days in attendance at the Court House?
A. She was called before I was.

Q. You know that as a matter of fact she was called before you and testified before her arrest?
A. I presume so; I suppose so.

Q. You know when she was arrested?
A. I know the date, but not the day.

Q. Was she not arrested Thursday, the week following, that is a week from the day of the tragedy?
A. I don't remember that.

Q. I ask you about the morphine that you were giving her and you tell me on Friday you gave one-eighth of a grain, which is the ordinary dose, I understand, mild dose, and on Saturday you doubled it, you gave it, sent it, and she had it on Monday and Tuesday, and how long did she continue to have that?
A. She continued to have that all the time she was in the station house.

Q. After her arrest, was it not?
A. And before.

Q. In other words she had it all the time up to the time of her arrest, the hearing and while in the station house?
A. Yes, sir.

Q. So that if before the arrest, she was one, two, or three days before the private inquest, she was there when she had been given for several days this double dose of morphine?
A. Yes, sir.

Q. I suppose physicians well understand the effect of morphine

Page 329

on the mind and on the recollection, don't they?
A. Supposed to, yes, sir.

Q. Is there any question about it?
A. No, sir.

Q. Do you know whether she had ever had occasion before to have morphine prescribed for her, as far as you know?
A. I don't remember that she had.

Q. Does not morphine given in double doses to allay mental distress and nervous excitement somewhat effect the memory and change and alter the view of things and give people hallucinations?
A. Yes, sir.

Q. There is no doubt about it, is there?
A. No, sir.

MR. ADAMS. I have no further question.


RE-DIRECT.


Q. (By Mr. Moody.) How many times did you personally see her take the medication?
A. Not more than twice, I think.

Q. When were those two times?
A. Between one and two in the afternoon, of Thursday.

Q. And that was bromo caffeine?
A. Yes, sir.

Q. Is bromo caffeine a medicine which has a tendency to create hallucinations a week or so after it has been taken?
A. No, sir.

Page 330

--Everyone is somewhat right.
That dosage of morphine can cause recollection problems and hallucinations according to Dr Bowen, but he only saw her actually take 2 doses of Bromo Caffeine and that was the Thursday of the murders.

To be clear on morphine sulfate (MSO4) it's sometimes called, one could hunt through the potential side effects and perhaps find hallucinations, but understand that many side effects of medications listed are exceedingly rare...to the point of one person out of millions may have possibly had the side effect. One of the potential side effects of aspirin is hemorrhagic stroke!!
Hallucinations or memory loss due to opiates may occur as in the case of heroin in very large doses or a life-time of addiction, but are exceedingly rare in therapeutic doses. I've given a lot of MSO4 in my career and never had someone hallucinate, the closest I've seen was a man who took morphine, fell asleep and when he awoke he thought time seemed to be going slowly for a few minutes.
Don't get me wrong-morphine can cloud judgement or recollection in a case like Lizzies where people are firing questions at her. Certainly. But it doesn't cause psychoses such as hallucinations at therapeutic doses. It's addiction potential wasn't well known back then and it was used during the Civil War through the early 1900s like we use Advil today. Many people had secret addiction to it.

Of course everyone responds to the same drug and dosage in different ways. According some weight to certain effects should be considered while Lizzie was being questioned. And she'd been dosing for several days prior to her inquest. I was thinking last night whether she had become addicted, and do we know for how long she continued to be dosed? And did she have to detox while in jail? Or did she continue to take it...and how would she acquire her fix? And did that dependency follow her the rest of her life?

Kat wrote: ↑Tue Oct 19, 2021 6:01 pm Of course everyone responds to the same drug and dosage in different ways. According some weight to certain effects should be considered while Lizzie was being questioned. And she'd been dosing for several days prior to her inquest. I was thinking last night whether she had become addicted, and do we know for how long she continued to be dosed? And did she have to detox while in jail? Or did she continue to take it...and how would she acquire her fix? And did that dependency follow her the rest of her life?

All good points. Many people were addicted in the late 1800s. Going through life in a mellow state of bliss. Not a problem unless you keep upping the dose to keep the nice feeling, then you are in real trouble

Maybe her supplier was Eli Bence ?

Steve88778 wrote: ↑Tue Oct 19, 2021 7:40 pm Maybe her supplier was Eli Bence ?

Eli Bence
Rebello, pg 80. (I thought maybe he got rich, 'cause I remember he finally got his own store, but 1905?)

"Profile: Eli Bence was born in Braintree, Massachusetts, January 18, 1865. He was one of four children of William and Sarah J. (Hudson) Bence. Eli Bence spent his early life in Fall River and later learned the drug business. He worked for several drug stores in Fall River, one of which was D. R. Smith's. He was employed there from 1890 to 1895. It was Eli Bence who claimed Lizzie tried to purchase prussic acid. He testified at the inquest and preliminary hearing and gave testimony to what he witnessed. He was called to be a witness at the trial in 1893 but his testimony was ruled inadmissible and excluded. Eli left Fall River in 1894 to work in New Bedford, Massachusetts. He remained there until 1902. In 1903, he moved to Pittsfield, Massachusetts. Two years later, he became the owner of his first drug store. During his professional career, Eli became active in the national and state pharmaceutical associations, president of the Pittsfield Druggist Association, a member of the National Association of Retail Druggists, the Pittsfield Merchants Association, King Phillip Lodge of Masons of Fall River, Berkshire Knights of Templars, Melba Temple of the Mystic Shrine of Springfield, Massachusetts, and the Park Club.
Eli Bence was married twice. His first wife was Sarah J. Mayhurst of Fall River. He married his second wife, Annie Maxfield of Fairhaven, Massachusetts, on April 10, 1904.
Mr. Bence died in Pittsfield, Massachusetts, on May 5, 1915. He was stricken while motoring
with his wife. He was survived by his wife and two sons, Roy S. and Maxfield Bence of Pittsfield, two sisters, Mrs. Sarah Goff and Mrs. Minnie Dutton, and a brother, William Bence, all of Fall River. Mr. Bence was buried in Fairhaven, Massachusetts."

I remember that he died a tragic death.