Blood & Ivy

by Paul Collins

174“Notices were published”: Ibid., 9.

  175“On the 30th of November”: Ibid., 10.

  175“Of the bones found in the furnace”: Ibid., 11.

  175“you will have placed for your inspection”: Ibid., 12.

  176The jury selection had gone better than he’d: JGB, 31 March 1850.

  176“if Dr. Parkman was murdered”: TJS, 13.

  176“This was the relation of those parties”: Ibid., 15.

  176“The last time I saw Dr. Parkman”: TGB, 42.

  177unimpressed with Sohier: JGB, 31 March 1850.

  177“What appearances,” he asked Shaw: BM, 20 March 1850.

  177“I saw appearances about these remains”: TGB, 43.

  177“well dressed females”: New-York Commercial Advertiser, 27 March 1850.

  177“Shall I relate the circumstance?”: TJS, 31.

  177“He came to my house early”: TGB, 43.

  177“On the 18th of April, 1848”: TJS, 31.

  178“Subsequently to this”: TGB, 44.

  179Abbot and Amos Lawrence, had also made a $1,500 loan: BB, 20 December 1850. A few additional details also appeared in the Emancipator & Republican (Boston) of 27 December 1850.

  179“He said that he would see Dr. Webster”: TGB, 45.

  19. The Catalog of Bones

  180the waiting prison carriage: BM, 20 March 1850.

  180“So much for one nob”: Ibid.

  180betting pools were already forming: BM, 21 March 1850.

  180“Public opinion is divided”: Ibid.

  180They’d spent the night sequestered: Crosby, Notes of James Crosby, 20 March 1850.

  180“seem like a pleasant set of men”: Ibid., 19 March 1850.

  181arrived at the courthouse at nine-thirty: Ibid., 20 March 1850.

  181a member of the bar: BM, 22 March 1850.

  181ticket was a forgery: BM, 21 March 1850.

  181“If tickets were ever at a premium”: BM, 22 March 1850.

  181“I am the City Marshal”: TGB, 46.

  181“It would have been impossible to make”: Ibid., 47.

  181a wooden model of the college: American Traveller (Boston), 23 March 1850. Hobbs went on to be the primary carver for the fittings for the Vermont State House, where they can still be seen today; see Vermont Legislative Directory (1898), 212.

  181Each floor lifted out: BT, 20 March 1850.

  182“When we arrived, from Mr. Littlefield’s apartments”: TGB, 49.

  182“various other things, which I now produce”: Ibid., 50.

  182setting the gallery abuzz: BH, 20 March 1850.

  182Professor Webster was laughing: Crosby, Notes of James Crosby, 21 March 1850.

  182Dr. Woodbridge Strong was rather amused: BH, 21 March 1850.

  183“no expression of surprise”: TGB, 96.

  183painstaking catalog of bones: Ibid., 89.

  183“I am a practicing physician in this city”: Ibid. 69.

  183“If I see a man with one shoulder higher”: BB, 21 March 1850.

  184“I had a pirate given to me”: TGB, 69.

  184“Sickening,” one juror wrote: Crosby, Notes of James Crosby, 20 March 1850.

  184“I was afraid of a visit by the police”: TGB, 69.

  184“After death, the elasticity of a body is gone”: Ibid., 70.

  184the windows were thrown open: BM, 21 March 1850.

  185“These remains were unusually bloodless”: TGB, 70.

  185“a monstrous size, a perfect barricade”: BM, 21 March 1850.

  185a triple-sized run of 37,880 copies: BH, 21 March 1850.

  185he was earnestly taking notes: BB, 20 March 1850.

  185Jackson was also a frustrated inventor: “Sketch of Dr. Charles T. Jackson,” 404–5.

  185“I knew the late Dr. George Parkman”: TGB, 73.

  186quarter-sized pieces: BJ, 21 March 1850.

  186a seemingly exonerating circumstance: E.g., BC, 6 December 1849.

  186“I think that with the proper quantity of acid”: TGB, 79.

  186“The largest kettle which I saw”: Ibid., 76.

  186nearly 174 grains, or $6.94 worth: Ibid., 77.

  187pioneering use of ether during Fanny Longfellow’s: Keep, “The Letheon Administered in a Case of Labor,” 226.

  187“artificial teeth of the most approved materials”: Columbian Centinel (Boston), 12 May 1824.

  187Dental evidence had never before been used: Senn, Forensic Dentistry, 13.

  187Paul Revere had used his metalworking sideline: Ibid., 13.

  187“These blocks, now shown before me”: TGB, 80.

  188“to have the set finished”: Ibid.

  188“The two sets were connected together by spiral springs”: Ibid., 83.

  188City hall wildly rang its bell: BH, 22 March 1850.

  188he was staying at the Tremont: BM, 21 March 1850. This is also noted in Bemis’s journal entry of 31 March 1850, as where he and Clifford worked in the previous week to prepare for the case.

  188Was it arson?: BH, 21 March 1850.

  189“we ought to have that model”: Frances Longfellow, Mrs. Longfellow: Selected Letters, 25 March 1850 letter to Nathan Appleton, 188.

  189I fear some could misinterpret your testimony: BH, 21 March 1850.

  189“It would be very difficult to make a man’s life”: BC, 4 December 1849.

  189“I employed Keep in my family”: DJW, no. 498.

  189a half hour later, his papers and bags moved: BT, 21 March 1850.

  189only people arrested were half a dozen pickpockets: BH, 21 March 1850.

  190“They hung along the stairs and lobbies”: BM, 20 March 1850.

  190knocked two officers off their feet: BH, 21 March 1850.

  190“He called on me the day before his disappearance”: TGB, 84.

  191“sat as unmoved as a rock”: BA, 22 March 1850.

  191“I have known such explosions to take place in new teeth”: TGB, 85.

  191crying into his handkerchief: BH, 21 March 1850.

  191“When Dr. Lewis showed the teeth to me”: TGB, 85.

  20. Mesmeric Revelation

  192a blue frock coat: BH, 22 March 1850.

  192“I have no middle name”: Ibid.

  192“I am janitor of the Medical College”: TGB, 99.

  193he’d given Littlefield something just last year: DJW, no. 518.

  194“Dr. George Hayman can say something”: Ibid., 380.

  194“Captain Stacy of the Custom House”: Ibid., 424.

  194His wife’s got a reputation: Ibid., 380.

  194“Where were you”: BH, 25 March 1850. Unusually for any of the trial coverage, the Herald’s coverage on this date included Sohier’s cross-examination of Littlefield in transcript form, rather than consolidating the witnesses’ responses into long paragraphs, as was typically done in both newspapers and subsequent trial transcripts. The remainder of this section of the chapter therefore draws on the Herald’s version, which does not differ substantively from Bemis’s but is more conversational.

  195“Every appearance has been in his favor”: Crosby, Notes of James Crosby, 23 March 1850.

  196Reverend Huntington’s in the morning: BT, 25 March 1850. The details in the remainder of this paragraph are drawn from this account.

  196“Been stared at to my heart’s content”: Crosby, Notes of James Crosby, 24 March 1850.

  196weather had turned improbably beautiful: Ibid.

  196Hawthorne’s new novel had landed: BJ, 25 March 1850.

  196“in the best vein of the author of Typee”: BT, 25 March 1850.

  196David Copperfield had arrived: Crosby, Notes of James Crosby, 28 March 1850.

  196“a hearty laugh”: Crosby, Notes of James Crosby, 23 March 1850. The Herald, for instance, had claimed that day that Greene was violently ill.

  197ad for his Waterman’s Patent Refrigerators: Boston Post, 22 March 1850.

  197“I have in my possession”: TGB, 194.

  197“I am a resident of this city�
��: Ibid., 197.

  197A trained violinist, Gould: Wilson and Fiske, Appleton’s Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 2:695.

  198handwriting guides and patent writing paper: BT, 13 February 1850. This was a notice for the latest edition of his various guides, which had been running for decades (e.g., in Boston’s Daily American Statesman, 12 June 1827).

  198“I know the prisoner by sight”: TGB, 197.

  198an alumnus of the medical school: Wyman, Biographical Memoirs, 95.

  198“I am familiar with his signature”: TGB, 197.

  198Gould himself had been one of the handwriting experts: BH, 12 October 1848.

  199the “Charlestown Incendiaries”: BH, 6 December 1849.

  199“has always been considered admissible”: TGB, 200.

  199engraver and calligrapher who published a popular: BT, 10 March 1846.

  199“I am acquainted with the defendant’s signature”: TGB, 208.

  200The carriage’s front axle had snapped: BB, 25 March 1850.

  200Franklin Dexter had turned him down: Willard, Half a Century with Judges and Lawyers, 153.

  200the renowned Rufus Choate: Parker, Reminiscences of Rufus Choate, 218.

  200Sohier’s quiet manner hid a droll: Willard, Half a Century with Judges and Lawyers, 331.

  201“May it please Your Honor”: TGB, 213.

  201Sohier walked quickly and with a habitual stoop: Willard, Half a Century with Judges and Lawyers, 194.

  201He hadn’t even wanted to be a jury foreman: TGB, 8.

  201“speaking in all frankness”: Ibid., 215.

  203“I reside in Cambridge”: Ibid., 246.

  203“his lucid manner of communicating”: Calhoun, The Papers of John C. Calhoun, Jared Sparks letter of 11 May 1824 to Calhoun, 9:85.

  203“No delicacy as to the college ought to interfere”: DJW, no.379.

  203running through ten of them in a single hour: BB, 28 March 1850.

  203appearance of the professor’s three daughters: BB, 29 March 1850.

  203“On Friday the 23rd, Father was home”: TGB, 250.

  204“I think one subject broached with Dr. Wyman”: Ibid., 249.

  204a onetime collaborator of Nathan Keep’s: Gay and Jackson, A Statement of the Claims of Charles T. Jackson, xvii.

  204“I mentioned it to my sister”: TGB, 262.

  205“I am a clerk”: Ibid., 263.

  205laughter began to run through the crowd: BH, 29 March 1850.

  205“I do not carry a magnifying glass”: TGB, 266.

  206“Reverend” Theophilus Fiske: BH, 31 January 1850. Fiske’s decidedly checkered career apparently later included getting sacked from a job in the Dead Letter Office, on account of his stealing money from the letters (Portland Daily Advertiser [Maine], 16 August 1861).

  206“Professor” J. S. Grimes: BB, 23 January 1850.

  206trendily renamed and using zinc-plated copper: Winter, Mesmerized, 281.

  206“for exhibiting for the public amusement”: BB, 8 February 1850.

  206“Rheumatism, Neuralgia, Deafness, Dimness of Sight”: BH, 6 February 1850. An additional example, of a different acolyte altogether, can be seen in BB, 16 March 1850.

  206“I simply carried the glass for others to use”: TGB, 266.

  206“appeared to be regularly purblind”: BH, 29 March 1850.

  21. Twelve Men in Massachusetts

  209law offices on Court Street: The Boston Directory (1849), 261.

  209bearing a Boston postmark: TGB, 598.

  209“Important Notice”: BH, 29 March 1850.

  210“Did you hear what they said”: BB, 30 March 1850.

  210“It was the regular practice”: Webster, John White Webster Papers, 1837–1850, letter of James Edward Oliver to Pliny Merrick, 27 March 1850.

  210one fumbled the evidence box: BH, 29 March 1850. The damage is also noted in other accounts, including TJS, 165.

  210“that there was an individual”: TJS, 167.

  211“a gentleman distinguished in railroad enterprises”: BM, 29 March 1850.

  211more than seven thousand spectators: BH, 29 March 1850.

  211walking down the exit stairs with a bloody nose: BH, 2 April 1850.

  211“They may indeed be mistaken”: TGB, 298.The remainder of this section is drawn from the Bemis transcript, pp. 282–374.

  213“a quantity of old brass”: BJ, 27 March 1850.

  213“Gentlemen of the jury”: TGB, 380. Except where noted, the remainder of the prosecution’s closing argument is from Bemis’s transcript.

  216the possibility that Dr. Parkman was insane: DJW, no. 380.

  216“Dr. Bell’s Lunatic Asylum perhaps knows something”: DJW, no. 397.

  216“Gentlemen . . . there is resting upon you”: TGB, 448.

  216Shaw began, and his voice broke: BJ, 1 April 1850.

  216“Before committing this cause”: TGB, 449.

  217Dr. Webster stood up, trembling: BJ, 1 April 1850.

  217“I am much obliged to Your Honors”: TGB, 449.

  217His voice turned scornful: Ohio Statesman, 1 April 1850.

  217“But in their superior wisdom”: TGB, 449.

  219a relatively modern standard: Waldman, “Origins of the Legal Doctrine of Reasonable Doubt,” 299.

  219Enlightenment philosophy epitomized: Ibid., 301.

  219“a fantastical incredulous fool”: Quoted in ibid., 303.

  219“To acquit upon light, trivial and fanciful suppositions”: Quoted in ibid., 314. The quote is from Starkie’s A Practical Treatise of the Law of Evidence (1824).

  220“This is to be proved beyond reasonable doubt”: TGB, 470. The remainder of this section is from the Bemis transcript.

  221“God help us to judge aright”: Crosby, Notes of James Crosby, 28 March 1850.

  221Jones led Dr. Webster to an anteroom: BJ, 1 April 1850.

  221tickets to the island of Fayal: BT, 1 April 1850.

  221Do you want some tea?: BJ, 1 April 1850.

  221knots of attorneys now formed: BA, 1 April 1850.

  222“definite character of the judge’s charge”: Ibid.

  222dead silence within: BJ, 1 April 1850.

  222ad began with the words “MURDER! MURDER!”: BH, 29 March 1850.

  222“PROFESSOR WEBSTER’S FATE”: BM, 29 March 1850.

  222transcripts that were already being hurriedly: BM, 30 March 1850.

  222getting the windows open: JGB, 31 March 1850.

  223“The jury have agreed”: BA, 1 April 1850.

  223the county coroner, slipping: JGB, 31 March 1850.

  223“He’s convicted”: BA, 1 April 1850.

  223“Ah! Do they?”: BJ, 1 April 1850.

  223judges entered through one side door: TDM, 63.

  223“Gentlemen of the jury, have you agreed”: TGB, 497.

  223“We have”: TNY, 73.

  223“Hold up your right hand!”: TGB, 497.

  22. Law Manufactured for the Occasion

  224“started as if shot”: Nathaniel Parker, quoted in Sullivan, The Disappearance of Dr. Parkman, 148.

  224fell to the bar with a dull thud: Boston Courier, 1 April 1850.

  224the sound of weeping: BH, 1 April 1850.

  224Merrick grasped Webster’s hand: Boston Courier, 1 April 1850.

  224his spectacles slightly askew: BT, 1 April 1850.

  224“Gentlemen of the jury, hearken to your verdict”: TGB, 497.

  224“What do you want to keep me here for?”: BJ, 1 April 1850.

  224“If I was conscious of having uttered one single word”: BA, 1 April 1850.

  225“I suppose I shall have meals”: BJ, 1 April 1850.

  225their old friend Judge Fay: Ibid.

  225His wife’s sister was chosen to deliver: Sibley, Diary, 31 March 1850.

  225sixty thousand visitors: TGB, 604.

  226seemed the greatest of all: BJ, 1 April 1850.

  226His eyelids grew heavy: BT, 1 April 1850.

  226“Every person who shall c
ommit the crime”: TGB, 500.

  226Officer Spurr showed: Trenton State Gazette, 8 April 1850.

  226voted to invite the public in: BA, 8 April 1850.

  227women could be spotted quietly slipping splinters: BT, 15 April 1850.

  227“another Eugene Aram”: JHL, 31 March 1850.

  227“an unbroken chain of indubitable proof”: Boston Courier, 1 April 1850.

  227the Mail agreed, the inevitable conclusion: BM, 2 April 1850.

  227In the view of the Evening Transcript: BT, 1 April 1850.

  227“the murderer and mangler”: BB, 6 April 1850.

  228“We have never seen an example of such baseness”: BH, 6 April 1850.

  228Webster had confessed to taking strychnine: Richmond Enquirer, 9 April 1850.

  228a medical student saw Webster’s crime: BM, 8 April 1850.

  228recanted her testimony: BT, 1 April 1850.

  228abandoned a woman in Edinburgh: BH, 8 April 1850.

  228Webster had tried triple-selling his mineral cabinet: BH, 6 April 1850.

  228“This is an utter falsehood”: Webster, John White Webster Papers, 1837–1850, letter of John W. Webster to Dr. Winslow Lewis, 11 April 1850.

  229Six competing editions:

  1.James W. Stone, ed., Report of the Trial of Prof. John W. Webster (Boston: Phillips, Sampson)

  2.The Parkman Murder: Trial of Prof. John W. Webster (Boston: Daily Mail Office)

  3.Trial of Professor John W. Webster . . . Reported Exclusively for the New York Daily Globe (New York: Stringer & Townsend)

  4.The Trial of Prof. John W. Webster, Indicted for the Murder of Dr. George Parkman, reported for the Boston Journal (Boston: Redding & Co.)

  5.John A. French, ed., Trial of Professor John W. Webster (Boston: Boston Herald Steam Press, 1850).

  6.The Twelve Days’ Trial of Dr. John W. Webster (London: James Gilbert)

  There would be later editions as well, not least George Bemis’s that fall.

  229“superior Engravings”: BH, 1 April 1850.

  229thirty thousand copies printed: BM, 8 April 1850.

  229educational reformers like Horace Mann: “Reading Reform,” 27.

  229“most of our unhappy arguments had already been cast in stereotype”: Webster, John White Webster Papers, 1837–1850, Edward Sohier letter [to Pliny Merrick], [April 1850]. From its context, and its reference to communicating with Clifford, Sohier’s letter is clearly one to Merrick written in early April.