Lizzie Borden House

At the time of the murders, Fall River was a textile mill town about 50 miles south of Boston ². Andrew Borden, a wealthy investor, lived on Second Street in a modest house one block from the city's business district, and the building now operates as a bed and breakfast ².

The area south of downtown Fall River is known as Corky Row, a workers' neighborhood for more than a century, and its name comes from the Irish immigrant population that dominated it after 1845 ⁴. The Corky Row Historic District, listed on the National Register under reference 83000656, covers the part of the city roughly bounded by Plymouth Avenue, Interstate 195 and Second Street ⁵.

Andrew and Abby Borden were killed in their home on the morning of August 4, 1892 ^{1, 2}. Abby Borden, 64, was struck 19 times, and 69-year-old Andrew Borden was struck 10 or 11 times ². The weapon was a hatchet, not the ax of the popular rhyme ².

The two killings came roughly an hour and a half apart ². Abby Borden was killed in the second-floor guest room while the household's servant washed windows outside, and Andrew Borden was killed in the first-floor sitting room after he returned home ². The servant was Bridget "Maggie" Sullivan, a 26-year-old Irish immigrant, and Lizzie Borden, then 32, was living at her father's house ². According to the house's official site, Sullivan and Lizzie Borden were the only two people in the house when Andrew and Abby were killed ³.

Police found that Borden had tried to buy prussic acid at a nearby drugstore the day before the murders ². An inquest opened five days after the killings, and Borden testified on each of its three days, the only time she testified in court under oath ². In the days after the murders the victims' bodies lay on mortician boards in the dining room of the house, where family friend Alice Russell slept ².

Police arrested Borden in Fall River on August 11, 1892, for the murders of her father and stepmother ^{1, 2}. The arrest made front pages across the country, including "Lizzie Borden Arrested" in The Sun of New York on August 12, 1892 ⁶. Borden spent nine months in a county jail cell measuring 9.5 by 7.5 feet ². Russell told the grand jury that Borden had burned a dress in the coal stove the Sunday after the murders, and that testimony led to Borden's indictment the following day ².

Borden's murder trial began on June 5, 1893, in New Bedford, Massachusetts ¹. Bridget Sullivan testified on June 7 and Alice M. Russell on June 8, and Emma L. Borden testified for the defense on June 16 ⁷. On June 20, 1893, the jury found Borden not guilty and the court acquitted her ^{1, 2}.

Two months after the acquittal the Borden sisters left the Second Street house for a large Victorian house on the Hill, and both sisters died in 1927 ². The Fall River Historical Society describes itself as the central repository for material on Lizzie Borden and the Commonwealth's case against her, and says its holdings include original trial exhibits, crime scene photographs and the alleged murder weapon ⁸.

The house's official website markets the property as "America's Most Haunted House" and says it is known for unexplained haunting activity ³. The operator's tour page says daytime house tours include stories of hauntings told by guests who have stayed there ⁹. Writing about the case, Smithsonian magazine described the former Borden home as a bed and breakfast and embedded a video titled "Haunted 'Lizzie Borden' House Welcomes Brave Tourists" ².

The evening ghost hunts run on the first floor and in the basement ⁹. The official site identifies the basement as where the broken hatchet was discovered, and the first floor as where the autopsies were performed and where Andrew Borden's body was found ⁹.

Visitors commonly describe footsteps and doors moving on the second floor at night, and voices or a woman's weeping with no one nearby. Overnight guests in the Morse room, where Abby Borden was killed, report waking to the sense of someone standing beside the bed or pressing on the mattress, and some say small objects shift while they are out of the room. In the basement, people on the late tours describe cold drafts, footsteps on the stairs above, and equipment readings they cannot account for.

The official site states that the house is open daily from 10 a.m. to midnight as an inn and museum ³. House tours run 90 minutes, daily from 10:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., and are the only tours that cover every room in the house ⁹. Ghost hunts inside the house run two hours, nightly from 10 p.m. to midnight ⁹. The operator splits each hunt into two groups of 13 people, one on the first floor and one in the dim basement, and includes equipment ⁹.

The outdoor Fall River ghost tour is offered nightly and walks the exterior of the house and other local sites ⁹. A guided Oak Grove Cemetery tour lasting one hour is listed daily from 7 a.m. to 3 p.m., and the Victorian tea party experience runs Saturdays and Sundays at 4:30 p.m. ⁹. An unguided overnight basement ghost hunt starts at 12 a.m., with check-in at 12:15 a.m. and checkout at 8 a.m. ⁹. The operator schedules an "In Mourning" Victorian funeral event every Sunday in October at 6 p.m. ³.

Overnight lodging consists of two suites and four rooms ³. The guest rooms carry the names of figures in the case, including the Morse (Murder) Room, the Bridget Sullivan Room, the Andrew Jennings Room and the Hosea Knowlton Room ³. Breakfast costs an extra $20 per person and is a modernized version of what the Bordens ate that morning ³. Check-in is 5:30 p.m. and check-out is a strict 10 a.m., and guests staying more than one night must vacate their room between 10 a.m. and 5:30 p.m. for daily tours ¹⁰.

House rules prohibit outside alcohol and Ouija boards on the property ¹⁰. A zero-tolerance policy bars candles, incense, vaping and any smoke or fire inside the house, with heavy fines and removal for violations ¹⁰. The house cannot accommodate pets, including emotional support animals, and permits only well-behaved children over 7 for overnight stays, with quiet time beginning at 11 p.m. ¹⁰. The gift shop in the barn behind the house is open 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., displays artifacts found on the property along with original newspapers, and contains a public restroom ¹⁰.