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Speaker 1: This view is amazing.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, you see this and this is very

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Speaker 2: all this property that we've looked at, so like you

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Speaker 2: could see that it's really something that's worthwhile and this

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Speaker 2: is what his legacy would be built on. If this

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Speaker 2: had stayed in the Cornell hands, it.

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Speaker 1: Would have been a pretty remarkable I'm assuming.

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Speaker 3: So they were able to recoup a good portion of

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Speaker 3: the property because.

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Speaker 1: It went to his sons.

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Speaker 3: They did take their tithe, I suppose you would say,

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Speaker 3: but he was able to stay here and the Cornells

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Speaker 3: did stay on for a while. But you know, in

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Speaker 3: terms of the status, status was so much.

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Speaker 4: We're back in sixteen seventy three in Portsmouth, Rhode Island,

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Speaker 4: learn the tragic story of Rebecca Briggs Cornell, her relative

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Speaker 4: Carrie Nolty, and I are on her land three hundred

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Speaker 4: and fifty years later, and Carrie is right. Status was

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Speaker 4: really important to Rebecca and to her son Thomas Cornell

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Speaker 4: Junior and his wife Sarah.

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Speaker 3: He had had several positions, like his father before him,

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Speaker 3: in the town of some import that showed that he

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Speaker 3: was a person of standing. He wasn't, you know, the highest,

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Speaker 3: He wasn't the richest, but he was a somebody, and

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Speaker 3: Sarah might have been someone who also felt that, just

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Speaker 3: by virtue of her standing, followed her husband's.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, and to constantly.

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Speaker 3: When he sees other men being the heads of their household,

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Speaker 3: to constantly be seen, you know, to feel as though

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Speaker 3: he was still under his mother's thumb.

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Speaker 4: It had been a difficult winter, with Thomas and Sarah

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Speaker 4: and their four children all packed into the cramped upper

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Speaker 4: floor of Rebecca's home, biding their time until they could

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Speaker 4: inherit the entire thing.

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Speaker 2: So you don't get the sense that the land and

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Speaker 2: whatever bad deal his mother would have given him was

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Speaker 2: still worth killing her.

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Speaker 3: I think, I mean, I think it would have been.

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Speaker 3: I think it was resentment over years. I mean, it's

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Speaker 3: never just the money. But she did have enough to

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Speaker 3: loan him the equivalent of twenty six thousand dollars that

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Speaker 3: he was not willing to pay back. So maybe it

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Speaker 3: was that his crops are failing, that his business wasn't

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Speaker 3: doing well that, you know, and he felt this was

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Speaker 3: his birthright and he had been waiting and waiting and

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Speaker 3: waiting for this, forgive the language, stupid old bitch to die,

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Speaker 3: and she just wouldn't do it.

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Speaker 4: On the cold went evening of December eighth, sixteen seventy three,

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Speaker 4: Rebecca's son, Thomas Junior, left his mother alone in her

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Speaker 4: room after chatting with her for more than an hour.

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Speaker 4: Local historian Gloria Schmidt says that there didn't seem to

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Speaker 4: be anything unusual about that night.

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Speaker 5: You know, I don't know what time they would have

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Speaker 5: had supper, but in February the light goes very quickly,

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Speaker 5: so I would assume that, you know, dinner would have

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Speaker 5: been about five or so, so if this was after dinner,

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Speaker 5: it would be after dark. Thomas was with his mother

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Speaker 5: alone before supper, and he said that he was helping

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Speaker 5: her with spinning, and he had this spindle.

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Speaker 4: Later. Thomas would have no more details to offer, but

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Speaker 4: most people knew that there had been acrimony between mother

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Speaker 4: and son for some time, mostly over money, and there

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Speaker 4: had also been troubles between Thomas's wife, Sarah Earle, and

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Speaker 4: her mother in law. Rebecca had been depressed, in fact,

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Speaker 4: she was so unhappy that she was secretly planning to

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Speaker 4: move in with a different son, and Thomas was miserable too.

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Speaker 4: He was in constant debt to his mother, who controlled

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Speaker 4: the land and the money that night, Thomas left his

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Speaker 4: mother as he often did, sitting by the fire, knitting

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Speaker 4: and puffing on a pipe that had been Rebecca's habit,

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Speaker 4: especially during the long winter months when she spent so

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Speaker 4: much more time inside. The seventy three year old spent

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Speaker 4: much of her time with the family, taking care of

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Speaker 4: her young grandchildren. Her daughter in law was pregnant and

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Speaker 4: ill tempered, at least according to her, Rebecca had greatly

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Speaker 4: preferred Thomas's first wife. She craved peace and quiet. Rebecca

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Speaker 4: complained to neighbors and friends that her son and Sarah

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Speaker 4: forced her to take care of the animals even when

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Speaker 4: it was frigid outside. The acrimony between the two was deep.

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Speaker 4: Something was bound to happen that night. Rebecca had rejected

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Speaker 4: Thomas's offer of dinner, which had featured salted mackerel, one

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Speaker 4: of her favorites. But Rebecca hadn't been feeling very well

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Speaker 4: after Thomas left the family ate supper. Soon, Sarah sent

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Speaker 4: her step son Edward, down to Rebecca's room to bring

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Speaker 4: her a glass of milk to settle her stomach.

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Speaker 5: And so after dinner he went in the sun. Edward

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Speaker 5: I think was going to go in and ask her

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Speaker 5: do you want some milk? And when he went in

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Speaker 5: he saw the fire.

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Speaker 4: Edward screamed for his family to come as he stood

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Speaker 4: over a body. Thomas Cornell and his wife Sarah rushed

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Speaker 4: inside and stared at the figure on the floor, smoldering

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Speaker 4: and partially on fire. It didn't move.

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Speaker 5: It came out and asked if my memory is correct.

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Speaker 5: He asked for something to light the way so that

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Speaker 5: they could see because everything was dark in the room.

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Speaker 4: One of the hired men, Harry Straight, reached down and

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Speaker 4: shook the person, speaking to them in a Native American language.

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Speaker 5: Henry thought that she was burned enough that he didn't

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Speaker 5: recognize who she was. Her head was facing the fireplace.

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Speaker 5: Some of the curtains on the bedding had been burned.

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Speaker 5: There was ashes on the floor, and Henry Strait talked

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Speaker 5: to this individual on the floor and spoke in a

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Speaker 5: native tongue, and Thomas said, oh lord, it is my mother.

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Speaker 4: It didn't make sense, and Sarah and Thomas seemed confused

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Speaker 4: at first. How could something like this have happened.

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Speaker 3: It's implied in the records that the way that Thomas

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Speaker 3: recognized her was.

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Speaker 1: From her shoes.

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Speaker 3: Wow, but it's also dark there's no lights. There's candle light,

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Speaker 3: and there's firelight. And at this point it's not a

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Speaker 3: roaring fire. It's kind of a smoldering fire in the

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Speaker 3: hearth and on Rebecca.

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Speaker 4: Thomas and his wife seemed shocked and panicked. It was

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Speaker 4: clear there was no use trying to save her at

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Speaker 4: this point. Even though Rebecca Cornell had been miserable in

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Speaker 4: her later years, she had found peace knowing that she

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Speaker 4: had done all she could for her friends and family.

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Speaker 4: She had had an eventful life. Rebecca had endured religious

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Speaker 4: persecution prior to adopting the Quaker faith. She had survived

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Speaker 4: a massacre, experiencing the brutal murder of her closest friend

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Speaker 4: and that woman's family, and she had suffered the death

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Speaker 4: of her beloved husband. But now her life had been

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Speaker 4: reduced to this, a charred body still smoldering on the

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Speaker 4: floor as her son stood over her. Rebecca Cornell's legacy

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Speaker 4: should be more than just her death, but regardless, that's

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Speaker 4: why so many New Englanders know about her today. Thomas

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Speaker 4: covered his mother with a sheet and shut the door

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Speaker 4: behind him, still seemingly working to process what happened to her.

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Speaker 4: Rebecca's relative Carrie Nolty says that her body was in

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Speaker 4: terrible condition and it was all a little confusing forensically,

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Speaker 4: but let's talk about that later.

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Speaker 3: They had found Rebecca Briggs Cornell laid on her left side,

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Speaker 3: burned from her torso to the tops of her legs.

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Speaker 1: And dead.

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Speaker 3: They had an inquest the next day to try and

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Speaker 3: see what might have caused this.

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Speaker 1: You know, what are the circumstances.

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Speaker 4: The next morning, Thomas called on the area's corner to

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Speaker 4: tell him that his mother had died in a fire

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Speaker 4: in her bedroom. The coroner shook his head, offered his condolences,

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Speaker 4: and recruited two Portsmouth residents to serve as the jury

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Speaker 4: for an inquest.

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Speaker 5: So the coroner would come and the coroner would have

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Speaker 5: a coroner's jury, so that would be you know, people

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Speaker 5: that would come in and they would look at the

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Speaker 5: body and determine whether or not it was an accident

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Speaker 5: or not.

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Speaker 4: Frankly, this does sound like an accident. And as we

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Speaker 4: said before, with fire being the primary heat source at

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Speaker 4: this time in history, it wasn't unheard of for women

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Speaker 4: or men to catch themselves on fire. Clothing was more

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Speaker 4: flammable than it is today. Most people smoked pipes, They

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Speaker 4: often used coal or oil as fuel. It was just

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Speaker 4: a significantly more dangerous situation. So very quickly the coroner's

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Speaker 4: jury seemed to be leaning toward it being an accident,

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Speaker 4: say historians Gloria Schmidt and Anne burn Burns.

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Speaker 5: So part of the idea that some have if they're

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Speaker 5: looking at it being an accident, is that this happened

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Speaker 5: a lot women had there. If they were by the fire,

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Speaker 5: their clothes might catch on fire. If they were smoking,

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Speaker 5: and she was known to smoke, ashes might fall on

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Speaker 5: the clothes and start a fire.

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Speaker 6: And she was known to smoke a pipe.

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Speaker 7: It kind of sounds like maybe she was sitting in

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Speaker 7: a chair smoking a pipe.

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Speaker 6: The curtain's cane on fire.

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Speaker 4: Historian Nel Darby agrees it did happen often, between the

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Speaker 4: prevalence of fire and homes and the sheer amount of

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Speaker 4: fabric and colonial clothing, especially during a New England winter.

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Speaker 8: Even the nineteenth century case. I looked out, there's been

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Speaker 8: so many cases of individuals dying by being set on fire,

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Speaker 8: and you know it's always accidental. You know, they've got

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Speaker 8: too close to a candle, they've got too close to

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Speaker 8: the fire, they've been cooking and a spark has condent

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Speaker 8: sept fire to that.

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Speaker 4: But soon there were questions because Rebecca wasn't the only

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Speaker 4: thing that was smoldering. There was also fire damage to

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Speaker 4: her bedding and the bed.

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Speaker 5: It was strange because her head is facing the fireplace,

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Speaker 5: but the curtains on the bed and the bedding was

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Speaker 5: behind her. So it's whether or not she's started in

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Speaker 5: the bed and caught fire in the bed and then

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Speaker 5: she tried to get up and get out. But it

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Speaker 5: was a very common thing for women's clothes to catch

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Speaker 5: on fire.

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Speaker 4: So rather than just sitting in the chair when it happened,

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Speaker 4: Rebecca might have been smoking her pipe in bed and

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Speaker 4: accidentally caught herself on fire, then stumbled out of bed

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Speaker 4: and fall into the floor, and there were other theories.

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Speaker 4: Joe Ochi, the owner of the Valley Inn, heard a

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Speaker 4: different story about what might have happened that.

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Speaker 9: Night, no hour or two later, when someone to want

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Speaker 9: to check on us dead and tripped and fell in

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Speaker 9: front of the fireplace in her room, which I have

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Speaker 9: since found out was apparently a fairly common way to die.

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Speaker 9: Back then, if you look at it that way in

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Speaker 9: terms of things that are common.

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Speaker 6: The bottom of the bed caught on fire. She went

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Speaker 6: to put it out. She may have fallen, you know.

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Speaker 4: So in this version, she tripped near the fireplace and

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Speaker 4: then the fire jumped from there to her clothes and

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Speaker 4: to the bed. Joe reminds us that the colonists dealt

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Speaker 4: with fire more often than we do.

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Speaker 9: We wouldn't think of it that way, but when you

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Speaker 9: really do think about it, there's no alternate form of heat.

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Speaker 9: So you're getting up every hour or two and feeding

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Speaker 9: the fire. And because the fireplaces were pretty inefficient, and

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Speaker 9: it's in the middle of winter, people were wearing to

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Speaker 9: bed things that we were outside, so you know, clothing

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Speaker 9: down to your ankles, and so a frail, older woman

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Speaker 9: without benefit of a light switch to turn on is

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Speaker 9: you know, trips, falls, dies. Probably should have been the

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Speaker 9: end of the story.

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Speaker 4: We'll get more into that soon, but first let's go

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Speaker 4: back to the theory that Rebecca accidentally set herself on fire.

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Speaker 5: You know, like when we think about a canopy bed,

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Speaker 5: there were curtains around the bed and then the bed

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Speaker 5: closed themselves and those were partially burned. But what quenched

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Speaker 5: the fire, Because you would have thought that the fire

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Speaker 5: would have gone on. But when Edward came into the room,

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Speaker 5: he saw some fire, but there really wasn't, you know,

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Speaker 5: a big conflagration. It was some fire, you know, he

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Speaker 5: couldn't see. He had to ask someone to, you know,

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Speaker 5: bring in candles or whatever so that they could see

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Speaker 5: what it was. So it was a very dark room,

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Speaker 5: so it wasn't an enormous fire.

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Speaker 4: Gloria's point is what actually stopped the fire from burning more?

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Speaker 4: Did someone else.

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Speaker 6: Put it out?

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Speaker 4: Or did Rebecca roll and something else bothers Gloria. The

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Speaker 4: types of fabrics that Rebecca wore, the specific pieces that

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Speaker 4: burned and those that didn't seem a little odd.

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Speaker 5: The only strange thing was that she had on wool

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Speaker 5: and cotton, and usually the wool will not burn, but

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Speaker 5: the cotton will, and in this case it was the opposite.

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Speaker 5: The wool burned but the cotton did not. And that

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Speaker 5: was a strange That was a strange finding. You would

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Speaker 5: think that if her clothes were of the two, it

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Speaker 5: would be the cotton that would have burned.

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Speaker 4: Local historian Anne Burns says that there were more strange findings,

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Speaker 4: like the timing of the accident.

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Speaker 10: If it was an accident, the little bit of that

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Speaker 10: makes me wonder that question is I guess she was

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Speaker 10: only alone for forty five minutes and she was on

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Speaker 10: fire and then but the fire was barely still going

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Speaker 10: when they went in there, Like, I just don't know.

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Speaker 7: It's really sad and it's gruesome, but I just don't

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Speaker 7: know about five lad.

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Speaker 6: That you're looking into that part of it.

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Speaker 7: Because of that, that kind of doesn't make a lot

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Speaker 7: of sense to me, Like, how did nobody smell it?

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Speaker 7: I guess house if you're cooking, I mean the house

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Speaker 7: in those days all just smelled smoky.

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Speaker 4: I asked Anne if we knew how long Thomas left

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Speaker 4: Rebecca alone.

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Speaker 6: It's multiple people are saying it.

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Speaker 7: Well, someone says an hour, one says forty five minutes,

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Speaker 7: but it's they basically Thomas left her room, they had dinner.

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Speaker 7: It was like forty five minutes to an hour, and

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Speaker 7: then Sarah sends her sent Edward in to the grandmother's

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Speaker 7: room to see issue wanted boiled milk, something different from dinner.

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Speaker 7: So everybody in that family kind of agrees like it

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Speaker 7: was during the time that they were having dinner.

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Speaker 4: Well, only the family says that's the timeline. It turns

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Speaker 4: out that the staff and the border weren't there for

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Speaker 4: the entirety of dinner. But we'll talk about that more

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Speaker 4: later in a little bit. We'll also learn more about

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Speaker 4: fire from some forensic experts, how it catches, how it consumes,

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Speaker 4: and how it kills. But for now, Gloria says, the

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Speaker 4: coroner's jury had a lot to consider was this really

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Speaker 4: an accident or could it have been murder?

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Speaker 5: So there are a lot of things that don't add up,

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Speaker 5: and you know, whether or not at the stage we

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Speaker 5: could ever get it to make sense. You know, we

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Speaker 5: have impressions of things, but whether or not we can

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Speaker 5: prove anything is another story.

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Speaker 4: Let's take a minute to talk about the idea of

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Speaker 4: coroner's juries, because they're still used today, although not as

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Speaker 4: often as they used to be. They started in medieval

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Speaker 4: England and they have always had a very specific purpose

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Speaker 4: to state as definitively as possible the person's cause of death.

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Speaker 4: A coroner's drue jury doesn't decide if someone goes on trial.

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Speaker 4: They are simply a panel of lay people who review

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Speaker 4: the medical evidence and make a determination. Critics of coroner's

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Speaker 4: juries say that typically the jurors don't have enough medical

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Speaker 4: knowledge to make such important decisions, and oftentimes they just

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Speaker 4: agree with the coroner's ruling anyway. And coroners, as many

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Speaker 4: of you know, are primarily elected officials, although some are

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Speaker 4: appointed in some areas. Coroners don't even need to have

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Speaker 4: vast medical knowledge, but they do have an edict to

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Speaker 4: hire an expert to conduct autopsies. About a third of

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Speaker 4: our states have medical examiners. All medical examiners are required

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Speaker 4: to have medical degrees. Many states have both coroners and

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Speaker 4: medical examiners. There are definitely cases where district attorneys pursue

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Speaker 4: murder charges despite the verdict of the coroner's jury. The

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Speaker 4: jury in the case of Rebecca Cornell was certainly not

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Speaker 4: a group of experts.

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Speaker 5: There's a list of names as to who they were,

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Speaker 5: and they would have been neighbors that they could get

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Speaker 5: a hold of easily, and it was Boston was the coroner,

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Speaker 5: and he was the person that they had bought the

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Speaker 5: cavern from.

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Speaker 4: So the coroner was William Balston. And the tavern Gloria

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Speaker 4: Mentions is the same tavern in Boston that Thomas Cornell

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Speaker 4: Senior had essentially lost years before for not following the rules.

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Speaker 4: William Boston was a tavern keeper who had been increasingly

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Speaker 4: politically active in Boston during the time the Cornells and

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Speaker 4: the Hutchinsons lived there. He was also one of those

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Speaker 4: people driven south to Portsmouth because of religious persecution. Boston

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Speaker 4: is considered another one of the founders of Portsmouth, like

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Speaker 4: the Cornells and the Hutchinson's and the Briggs, but as

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Speaker 4: a coroner, he appeared to have absolutely no medical background,

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Speaker 4: just political savvy and now here he was leading a

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Speaker 4: group of lay people in determining Rebecca Cornell's cause of death.

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Speaker 4: Thomas removed the sheet from his mother's corpse and the

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Speaker 4: group of men studied the elderly woman's body, which was

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Speaker 4: still fully clothed. They couldn't recognize her, even though they

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Speaker 4: all likely knew Rebecca by now. The Cornells had given

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Speaker 4: the news to Rebecca's younger brother, John Briggs. He had

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Speaker 4: adored his sister and now she was gone. In the meantime,

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Speaker 4: the coroner's jury asked Thomas Cornell and Henry Strait, the

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Speaker 4: farm hand, for statements. Thomas said he left his mother's

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Speaker 4: room so he could go eat dinner. The next time

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Speaker 4: he saw her, she was dead. Straight described finding the body,

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Speaker 4: and assuming it was a quote drunken Indian, let's talk

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Speaker 4: about that. How would anyone have ended up inside Rebecca

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Speaker 4: Cornell's room in the dead of winter with a house

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Speaker 4: full of family. Carrie Nolty says, it was isn't that

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Speaker 4: surprising to the two men on the jury or to

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Speaker 4: William Balston.

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Speaker 3: One of the things that was going on at this

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Speaker 3: time was a worsening of relations between Native Americans and

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Speaker 3: the colonists. So in just a few years later, King

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Speaker 3: Philip's War, where atrocities on both sides are committed, will erupt.

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Speaker 3: So there was another incident where a Native American was

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Speaker 3: drunk and burned someone's house down. So this is kind

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Speaker 3: of also, you know, they're sort of just expecting this.

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Speaker 4: Rebecca also had an outdoor, a door that led directly

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Speaker 4: to the outside inside her room, but one of the

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Speaker 4: witnesses that ran into the room checked that night and

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Speaker 4: the door was fast latched from the inside, meaning it

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Speaker 4: didn't require a key.

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Speaker 3: In the reports it said that it's fast latched by

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Speaker 3: one of the witnesses that runs into the room. Thomas

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Speaker 3: himself said there was no lock, but a lock and

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Speaker 3: a latch. They're not necessarily the same thing. Latched usually

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Speaker 3: would indicate some sort of wooden bar and string paraphernalia

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Speaker 3: to open it, and a lock usually would imply something metal.

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Speaker 3: So Thomas could be just saying there's no lock on

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Speaker 3: the door, but there is a latch, but there's no lock.

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Speaker 3: But it could also just be that he was lying.

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Speaker 4: This was the beginning of many inconsistencies in this case,

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Speaker 4: and soon it would.

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Speaker 1: Be a case.

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Speaker 4: The corner's jury did not fully examine Rebecca Cornell's body

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Speaker 4: out of customary propriety. Men in the seventeenth century would

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Speaker 4: find it inappropriate to view a woman without clothing, even.

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Speaker 6: If she were dead.

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Speaker 4: The jurors simply listened to Thomas's story, considered the evidence,

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Speaker 4: and issued a ruling on Rebecca's cause of death.

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Speaker 5: The coroner's verdict was she was brought to an untimely

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Speaker 5: death by an unhappy accident of fire. That was the

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Speaker 5: original coroner's verdict.

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Speaker 4: They never considered murder. Rebecca's death was not suspicious to

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Speaker 4: this group of men. She might have been smoking a

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Speaker 4: pipe in bed, which would account for why the bed

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Speaker 4: curtains were charred. She could have been sitting near the

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Speaker 4: fire in her rocking chair and a spark ignited her

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Speaker 4: flammable clothing. Maybe she tripped and fell into the fire,

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Speaker 4: as Joe Ochie suggested. Regardless of the cause, it was

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Speaker 4: clearly an accident. According to the jury, case closed, Thomas

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Speaker 4: and Sarah Cornell prepared to move on with their lives.

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Speaker 4: The matrons of the village prepared Rebecca's body for burial.

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Speaker 4: This was a custom going back centuries, one that actually

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Speaker 4: lasted into the twentieth century until funeral homes became more prevalent.

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Speaker 4: Historian Gloria Schmidt says that the women had accepted the

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Speaker 4: duty of readying Rebecca's corpse. It was a gruesome task

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Speaker 4: but necessary.

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Speaker 5: I know. They would have tried to wash her, you know,

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Speaker 5: make her clean, dressed her in something that would have

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Speaker 5: been clean. The habit of the women laying out the

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Speaker 5: dead is a long habit, but you know, and it

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Speaker 5: would have just been her neighbors that would have come

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Speaker 5: and you know, helped out.

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Speaker 4: The matrons undressed Rebecca, which must have been traumatizing considering

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Speaker 4: the state of the elderly woman's burned body. They washed

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Speaker 4: her and cleaned her body as much as they could.

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Speaker 4: Then they redressed her and clean, respectable clothing. Once the

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Speaker 4: matrons had finished preparing Rebecca's body, there was a quiet

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Speaker 4: knock at the door. Carrie Nolty says that Thomas arrived

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Speaker 4: to complete another sad task.

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Speaker 3: So one of the things that happened when they laid

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Speaker 3: out the body is that Thomas Junior and a neighbor

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Speaker 3: came in to measure the body for a coffin. Because again,

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Speaker 3: you don't get the luxury of not being involved in

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Speaker 3: everything in the town life in this time, in this place.

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Speaker 4: It would take a few days to build the coffin,

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Speaker 4: so Rebecca's body likely stayed covered up in her locked bedroom.

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Speaker 4: Up until now, there had been quite a few similarities

401
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Speaker 4: between our modern lives and the lives of the colonists.

402
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Speaker 4: Commitment to family, the sad devolving of a once content life,

403
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Speaker 4: then family conflict, and imminent dayti. But things are about

404
00:25:01,960 --> 00:25:04,960
Speaker 4: to start feeling different, and they're about to get more

405
00:25:04,960 --> 00:25:09,199
Speaker 4: complicated because of how religion and the supernatural had begun

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Speaker 4: to merge in colonial America.

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Speaker 3: So one of the women who had laid out the

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Speaker 3: body had heard that the body was purging the day

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Speaker 3: after they laid it out.

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Speaker 4: I asked Carrie what that meant.

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Speaker 3: What I understand from that is that it kind of

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Speaker 3: is like you're getting rid of bad demons or.

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Speaker 1: Whatever it can be.

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Speaker 3: It's based in like a folklore kind of thing, like

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Speaker 3: anything bad that was in you is now leaving, and

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Speaker 3: so the body is being purified by nature.

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Speaker 4: That sounds awful. The women believed that Rebecca's body was

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Speaker 4: forcing out any demons inside it through various bodily fluids,

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Speaker 4: purifying itself. It was a promising sign that her soul

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Speaker 4: would ascend to heaven. But it was upsetting to think

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Speaker 4: that poor Rebecca Cornell had been afflicted by the devil

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Speaker 4: before she died.

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Speaker 3: And so this woman went to go see it, and

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Speaker 3: what she saw was Thomas and the neighbor coming out

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Speaker 3: of the room. She went in, and she saw no

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Speaker 3: purging or what she would assume is purging, but she

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Speaker 3: did seem blood about the nose.

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Speaker 1: Fresh blood. This was right after. This is a two

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Speaker 1: days after.

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Speaker 6: Well, how had fresh blood happened after?

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Speaker 3: So I tried to look it up and I didn't

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Speaker 3: get very far, but it seems like, you know, things

433
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Speaker 3: can just kind of release, and I think that's what Yeah,

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Speaker 3: Paul would know about that.

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Speaker 4: Carrie's talking about Paul Holes, the forensic investigator who is

436
00:26:46,880 --> 00:26:50,280
Speaker 4: my co host on my other podcast, Buried Bones. I

437
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Speaker 4: asked Paul about blood and other bodily fluids appearing the

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Speaker 4: day after a body was prepared. He says that it's

439
00:26:57,080 --> 00:27:01,280
Speaker 4: perfectly normal that fluids can seep out days afterwards. It

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00:27:01,400 --> 00:27:05,080
Speaker 4: wasn't a sign of anything, and Thomas and the neighbor

441
00:27:05,280 --> 00:27:08,280
Speaker 4: were likely just jostling her body as they moved her

442
00:27:08,320 --> 00:27:13,240
Speaker 4: around to measure her. But once the news got out,

443
00:27:13,560 --> 00:27:17,360
Speaker 4: the blood caused a lot of speculation. In sixteen seventy three,

444
00:27:18,200 --> 00:27:21,800
Speaker 4: that's because the folks in Portsmouth had certain beliefs about

445
00:27:21,840 --> 00:27:26,040
Speaker 4: the relationship between a murder victim and his or her killer.

446
00:27:27,440 --> 00:27:34,200
Speaker 3: Why that is significant is because there is something called cruentation,

447
00:27:35,440 --> 00:27:39,320
Speaker 3: and what that is is the belief that the body

448
00:27:39,720 --> 00:27:44,520
Speaker 3: will tell when the murderer is near, so fresh blood

449
00:27:44,600 --> 00:27:47,240
Speaker 3: will show up, the body will begin to bleed when

450
00:27:47,320 --> 00:27:50,560
Speaker 3: the murderer. Sometimes even just approaches the body, but if

451
00:27:50,560 --> 00:27:54,880
Speaker 3: they touch the body, then that is how you would.

452
00:27:54,720 --> 00:27:55,880
Speaker 1: Tell who the murderer is.

453
00:27:56,000 --> 00:28:02,320
Speaker 3: It's sort of this folklore belief superitan thing. This was

454
00:28:02,560 --> 00:28:09,200
Speaker 3: ancient folklore beliefs just carry on despite anything.

455
00:28:09,720 --> 00:28:13,880
Speaker 4: That's pretty incredible. They believed the body would offer clues

456
00:28:13,960 --> 00:28:15,320
Speaker 4: when its killer was close.

457
00:28:16,040 --> 00:28:18,080
Speaker 3: And that's part of the problem that we found in

458
00:28:18,440 --> 00:28:23,239
Speaker 3: Salem and throughout colonial England, because you will find, you know,

459
00:28:23,760 --> 00:28:29,879
Speaker 3: witch bottles in houses from the seventeenth eighteenth century where

460
00:28:29,920 --> 00:28:33,520
Speaker 3: it's supposed to ward off evil spirits, and they really

461
00:28:33,600 --> 00:28:38,760
Speaker 3: did believe in darkness and magic and powers. They just

462
00:28:38,960 --> 00:28:45,120
Speaker 3: cast it as the devil versus God. So this was

463
00:28:45,280 --> 00:28:49,320
Speaker 3: this is a folk magic way of determining who the

464
00:28:49,400 --> 00:28:51,760
Speaker 3: murderer might be. And even up into the nineteenth century,

465
00:28:51,840 --> 00:28:55,000
Speaker 3: people were using this as a method of telling who

466
00:28:55,120 --> 00:28:56,920
Speaker 3: killed someone in a small community.

467
00:28:57,680 --> 00:28:59,960
Speaker 4: Of course, that doesn't happen, and it's sad to think

468
00:29:00,120 --> 00:29:03,880
Speaker 4: that people would have been wrongfully executed based on folklore.

469
00:29:04,400 --> 00:29:08,160
Speaker 4: But anyway, the blood on Rebecca's body caused suspicion in

470
00:29:08,200 --> 00:29:23,520
Speaker 4: the village of Portsmouth. Regardless, funeral plants moved forward, the

471
00:29:23,600 --> 00:29:27,480
Speaker 4: coffin was prepared, though the timing of Rebecca's burial remains

472
00:29:27,600 --> 00:29:31,680
Speaker 4: uncertain even today. Historian Anne Burns doesn't think she was

473
00:29:31,720 --> 00:29:35,640
Speaker 4: buried right away because it was wintertime and the ground.

474
00:29:35,360 --> 00:29:39,920
Speaker 6: Was very hard. It was February. It was too cold

475
00:29:40,160 --> 00:29:40,480
Speaker 6: it was.

476
00:29:40,840 --> 00:29:44,400
Speaker 7: They sized her for a casket, but I don't know

477
00:29:44,400 --> 00:29:45,920
Speaker 7: how true this is, but one story that I had

478
00:29:45,920 --> 00:29:48,760
Speaker 7: heard was that they didn't bury bodies at that time.

479
00:29:48,800 --> 00:29:49,360
Speaker 6: It was too cold.

480
00:29:49,360 --> 00:29:51,520
Speaker 7: They couldn't dig the grave, so she was actually in

481
00:29:51,640 --> 00:29:54,760
Speaker 7: like a body bag and maybe in a casket, but

482
00:29:54,840 --> 00:29:56,560
Speaker 7: she would still she hadn't been buried yet.

483
00:29:56,960 --> 00:30:00,080
Speaker 4: And that's an important note because the speed of decom

484
00:30:00,120 --> 00:30:03,080
Speaker 4: position of a body often depends on the temperature of

485
00:30:03,120 --> 00:30:06,240
Speaker 4: where it is kept. The warmer the temperature, the faster

486
00:30:06,400 --> 00:30:14,880
Speaker 4: the body degrades. Think about the difference between the coldness

487
00:30:14,880 --> 00:30:18,800
Speaker 4: of the snowy outdoors versus the temperatures inside a home

488
00:30:19,000 --> 00:30:23,280
Speaker 4: heated by numerous fireplaces. A body stored inside a house,

489
00:30:23,560 --> 00:30:27,200
Speaker 4: even enclosed in a coffin, would decompose faster than if

490
00:30:27,240 --> 00:30:32,280
Speaker 4: it were underground. In February, soon after his mother's death,

491
00:30:32,480 --> 00:30:35,400
Speaker 4: Thomas returned to his work on the family farm, which

492
00:30:35,480 --> 00:30:38,560
Speaker 4: must have been very difficult. But the land was his

493
00:30:38,720 --> 00:30:42,200
Speaker 4: responsibility now, and I'm sure that his wife was thrilled

494
00:30:42,280 --> 00:30:46,640
Speaker 4: that it was. But even so, Sarah Earle didn't show it.

495
00:30:47,160 --> 00:30:52,400
Speaker 4: She remained subdued and even quiet around investigators until that

496
00:30:52,640 --> 00:31:00,040
Speaker 4: is she revealed something macabre and frankly frightening. On the

497
00:30:59,800 --> 00:31:03,320
Speaker 4: night of Rebecca's death, Sarah had run in behind her

498
00:31:03,440 --> 00:31:06,680
Speaker 4: husband to find out why her stepson Edward was yelling

499
00:31:06,720 --> 00:31:10,040
Speaker 4: for a candle. As they peered in from the doorway,

500
00:31:10,320 --> 00:31:13,920
Speaker 4: Sarah stood back from everyone else for a moment before

501
00:31:14,000 --> 00:31:17,960
Speaker 4: she stepped into the room. Carrie Nolty and Gloria Schmidt say,

502
00:31:18,280 --> 00:31:20,360
Speaker 4: that's something startled Sarah.

503
00:31:20,680 --> 00:31:21,920
Speaker 1: When everyone's rushing in.

504
00:31:22,600 --> 00:31:27,400
Speaker 3: They opened the door and a giant black dog jumps out.

505
00:31:28,240 --> 00:31:33,560
Speaker 3: Now what that means is interestingly it's a reference to

506
00:31:33,880 --> 00:31:37,560
Speaker 3: some folklore in England, one of the things that can

507
00:31:37,600 --> 00:31:41,280
Speaker 3: portend death, but it has also taken on a connotation

508
00:31:41,400 --> 00:31:44,160
Speaker 3: of devil, devilment demons.

509
00:31:44,200 --> 00:31:46,080
Speaker 1: That kind of thing is a big black dog.

510
00:31:46,560 --> 00:31:50,160
Speaker 4: Sarah's vision at the moment the door was opened would

511
00:31:50,240 --> 00:31:52,360
Speaker 4: have been terrifying for colonists.

512
00:31:52,760 --> 00:31:56,920
Speaker 5: So I think what she was saying was something evil

513
00:31:56,960 --> 00:32:00,320
Speaker 5: happened to her. Wasn't us there was something in the

514
00:32:00,360 --> 00:32:03,760
Speaker 5: room with her that was evil, because there really wasn't.

515
00:32:03,800 --> 00:32:06,520
Speaker 5: Nobody had the dog. Nobody there listening to physical dog.

516
00:32:07,680 --> 00:32:11,520
Speaker 4: The black dog seemed convincing, except Sarah seemed to be

517
00:32:11,600 --> 00:32:14,320
Speaker 4: the only one who saw it, And then she began

518
00:32:14,400 --> 00:32:17,959
Speaker 4: bringing up other suspicious points, like how the cotton on

519
00:32:18,000 --> 00:32:22,320
Speaker 4: Rebecca's clothes didn't really burn but the wool did. It's

520
00:32:22,320 --> 00:32:24,680
Speaker 4: strange to think that she would try to draw attention

521
00:32:24,760 --> 00:32:27,760
Speaker 4: to anything about her mother in law's death, but actually

522
00:32:28,240 --> 00:32:30,880
Speaker 4: it sounds like she may have been trying to frame

523
00:32:31,200 --> 00:32:32,760
Speaker 4: Rebecca as a witch.

524
00:32:33,400 --> 00:32:35,680
Speaker 7: She says, a big giant dog came out of the

525
00:32:35,760 --> 00:32:39,240
Speaker 7: room and jumped over my stepson, and the wool was

526
00:32:39,240 --> 00:32:40,640
Speaker 7: burned but the cotton wasn't.

527
00:32:40,840 --> 00:32:41,480
Speaker 6: And people have.

528
00:32:41,480 --> 00:32:45,120
Speaker 7: Said she's trying to connect it to superstitions back in England,

529
00:32:45,480 --> 00:32:48,400
Speaker 7: like a big dog like that was a superstitious thing,

530
00:32:48,440 --> 00:32:50,920
Speaker 7: and that maybe like there was some kind of you know,

531
00:32:51,040 --> 00:32:55,080
Speaker 7: witchcraft involved that Rebecca was involved in because you know,

532
00:32:55,160 --> 00:32:57,280
Speaker 7: her wool burned but her cotton didn't.

533
00:32:57,320 --> 00:32:59,440
Speaker 6: So and she's the only one who mentions the dog.

534
00:33:01,400 --> 00:33:03,400
Speaker 1: Now, no one else said that they saw any dog.

535
00:33:03,520 --> 00:33:06,040
Speaker 3: You would think that there's no mention of them having

536
00:33:06,080 --> 00:33:10,080
Speaker 3: a pet, there's nothing. So it really seems as though

537
00:33:10,120 --> 00:33:13,040
Speaker 3: she's saying that she had some sort of vision that

538
00:33:13,120 --> 00:33:18,840
Speaker 3: she saw you know, this familiar double dog jump out

539
00:33:19,520 --> 00:33:25,800
Speaker 3: leaving having done its mischief and gone away, or maybe you.

540
00:33:25,760 --> 00:33:28,320
Speaker 1: Know it was in cahoots with her witch of a

541
00:33:28,360 --> 00:33:28,920
Speaker 1: mother in law.

542
00:33:29,640 --> 00:33:32,760
Speaker 4: Sarah Earl certainly knew how to spin a story that

543
00:33:32,800 --> 00:33:37,040
Speaker 4: would have alarmed colonists, but was she a reliable witness.

544
00:33:38,120 --> 00:33:40,560
Speaker 5: Sarah was the source of a lot of complaints that

545
00:33:40,760 --> 00:33:44,680
Speaker 5: Rebecca would so you know, her neighbors and everything. I'm

546
00:33:44,720 --> 00:33:48,520
Speaker 5: sure they heard, Oh, my daughter in law doesn't take

547
00:33:48,560 --> 00:33:54,800
Speaker 5: care of me. I don't have enough food.

548
00:34:01,320 --> 00:34:04,520
Speaker 4: In his nearby home, John Briggs had not slept well

549
00:34:04,600 --> 00:34:08,160
Speaker 4: for several nights. He mourned the death of his older sister,

550
00:34:08,520 --> 00:34:11,600
Speaker 4: nine years his senior. There had been some debate about

551
00:34:11,600 --> 00:34:15,040
Speaker 4: whether they were actually blood related, but that really doesn't

552
00:34:15,040 --> 00:34:17,960
Speaker 4: matter in this story. I think they had left England

553
00:34:18,000 --> 00:34:21,239
Speaker 4: together to come to America. They had been persecuted for

554
00:34:21,320 --> 00:34:25,120
Speaker 4: their religion. Together, they both made homes in Portsmouth, both

555
00:34:25,160 --> 00:34:28,560
Speaker 4: are counted as founders of the town, and now with

556
00:34:28,680 --> 00:34:33,280
Speaker 4: Rebecca dead, John Briggs could only take comfort in his wife, Sarah,

557
00:34:33,360 --> 00:34:40,360
Speaker 4: who was Thomas Cornell's senior's sister. On Sunday, February twelve,

558
00:34:40,680 --> 00:34:44,279
Speaker 4: three days after the coroner's verdict, John Briggs lit the

559
00:34:44,320 --> 00:34:47,759
Speaker 4: candles in his bedroom as the sky darkened early, as

560
00:34:47,760 --> 00:34:52,160
Speaker 4: it does during a New England winter. John and his

561
00:34:52,200 --> 00:34:56,760
Speaker 4: wife donned their bedclothes and slipped into bed. Soon John

562
00:34:56,840 --> 00:35:01,240
Speaker 4: began drifting into slumber, but before he he could sleep deeply,

563
00:35:01,800 --> 00:35:03,160
Speaker 4: something strange happened.

564
00:35:05,000 --> 00:35:08,319
Speaker 7: He describes feeling some weight on his blanket. I think,

565
00:35:08,719 --> 00:35:10,480
Speaker 7: like some heaviness, like something there, and.

566
00:35:10,440 --> 00:35:11,000
Speaker 6: It woke him up.

567
00:35:11,040 --> 00:35:13,800
Speaker 7: And when he woke up, he saw what he thought

568
00:35:13,880 --> 00:35:15,440
Speaker 7: was a spectral figure.

569
00:35:15,480 --> 00:35:18,240
Speaker 6: He saw a light, and he said, who's there? What's

570
00:35:18,440 --> 00:35:19,479
Speaker 6: you know? Who's there?

571
00:35:20,440 --> 00:35:23,239
Speaker 1: And he opens his eyes and he sees his sister.

572
00:35:24,440 --> 00:35:27,920
Speaker 3: Kind of bathed in an ethereal light, and she says,

573
00:35:28,000 --> 00:35:29,920
Speaker 3: look how I am burned with fire?

574
00:35:31,719 --> 00:35:35,799
Speaker 7: An actual waking vision. It's interpreted as a ghost. She

575
00:35:35,920 --> 00:35:39,120
Speaker 7: came in spectral form and visited him, and he was

576
00:35:39,120 --> 00:35:41,680
Speaker 7: half between it, half awake and half a sleep. And

577
00:35:42,239 --> 00:35:45,760
Speaker 7: that's when Rebecca Cornell said, it is I your sister,

578
00:35:46,120 --> 00:35:47,200
Speaker 7: See how I'm burned.

579
00:35:47,719 --> 00:35:49,440
Speaker 6: And she repeated that twice.

580
00:35:50,400 --> 00:35:51,160
Speaker 1: But that was it.

581
00:35:51,880 --> 00:35:55,560
Speaker 4: Rebecca's spirits seemed to be stating the obvious, and it

582
00:35:55,719 --> 00:36:00,200
Speaker 4: wasn't accusatory. She wasn't blaming anyone like her son Thomas,

583
00:36:00,239 --> 00:36:01,440
Speaker 4: for setting her on fire.

584
00:36:02,480 --> 00:36:05,880
Speaker 7: She never ever said that she was murdered, but apparently

585
00:36:06,120 --> 00:36:09,640
Speaker 7: it was enough for him to say, hmm, I wonder

586
00:36:09,640 --> 00:36:11,120
Speaker 7: if something happened.

587
00:36:11,440 --> 00:36:15,960
Speaker 5: She's not really accusing the son of anything, but John

588
00:36:16,000 --> 00:36:20,800
Speaker 5: interprets it that way because at that time, the idea

589
00:36:20,840 --> 00:36:25,240
Speaker 5: of the spirit world is very, very common, and everyone

590
00:36:25,280 --> 00:36:29,879
Speaker 5: would think about that as normal. And the idea that

591
00:36:29,920 --> 00:36:33,200
Speaker 5: you would have someone come back from the dead, it

592
00:36:33,320 --> 00:36:36,160
Speaker 5: means that there is something that needs to be cleared up,

593
00:36:36,800 --> 00:36:41,920
Speaker 5: something is not correct, and that spirit wants to write it.

594
00:36:44,800 --> 00:36:48,960
Speaker 9: Whether it was a dream or not, that fit right

595
00:36:49,000 --> 00:36:52,400
Speaker 9: in with the events of the day. They were burning

596
00:36:52,440 --> 00:36:57,040
Speaker 9: witches ninety miles away, and the entire population believed in

597
00:36:57,080 --> 00:37:01,680
Speaker 9: the supernatural. So him having a story like that right

598
00:37:01,719 --> 00:37:05,320
Speaker 9: after his sister had died, I'm sure the local population

599
00:37:06,239 --> 00:37:06,879
Speaker 9: believed that.

600
00:37:08,160 --> 00:37:11,600
Speaker 4: So let's round out all the supernatural evidence that has

601
00:37:11,640 --> 00:37:16,000
Speaker 4: presented itself to the frightened colonists of Rhode Island. So far,

602
00:37:16,719 --> 00:37:20,759
Speaker 4: Rebecca's body might have been purging itself of demons, and

603
00:37:20,840 --> 00:37:23,920
Speaker 4: blood had dripped through her nose. When Thomas was nearby,

604
00:37:24,520 --> 00:37:27,959
Speaker 4: her daughter in law saw an ominous black dog leap

605
00:37:28,040 --> 00:37:31,760
Speaker 4: through the doorway. And now Rebecca's brother had been visited

606
00:37:31,800 --> 00:37:34,960
Speaker 4: by her spirit. It had come to alert him that

607
00:37:35,080 --> 00:37:40,640
Speaker 4: she was murdered, he believed. John Briggs jolted awake, startled

608
00:37:40,680 --> 00:37:45,920
Speaker 4: and understandably upset, and then he rushed out the door

609
00:37:46,600 --> 00:37:47,880
Speaker 4: and straight to the corner.

610
00:37:48,760 --> 00:37:53,680
Speaker 5: Oh boy, John comes and says, look, I had this

611
00:37:53,880 --> 00:37:56,360
Speaker 5: vision and it was my sister.

612
00:38:06,600 --> 00:38:13,440
Speaker 4: On the next episode of Tenfold were wicked on exactly right.

613
00:38:14,000 --> 00:38:17,279
Speaker 3: They had two people come and examine the body when

614
00:38:17,320 --> 00:38:19,960
Speaker 3: Rebecca was first found, and they just assumed that it

615
00:38:20,040 --> 00:38:25,520
Speaker 3: was an unfortunate, unhappy accident. Then John Briggs had his

616
00:38:25,640 --> 00:38:29,280
Speaker 3: dream and they exhamed the body and found a suspicious wound.

617
00:38:30,560 --> 00:38:33,719
Speaker 9: Everybody that has a fireplace has lots of tools around it,

618
00:38:34,239 --> 00:38:37,959
Speaker 9: some of them with sharp edges, So could go either

619
00:38:37,960 --> 00:38:38,759
Speaker 9: way on that one.

620
00:38:39,840 --> 00:38:42,240
Speaker 1: It's suspicious. Why does she have a wound?

621
00:38:42,760 --> 00:38:47,160
Speaker 3: Why is she now burned over the wound. There are

622
00:38:47,200 --> 00:38:49,040
Speaker 3: certain things that are, you know, just more foulble than

623
00:38:49,040 --> 00:38:49,920
Speaker 3: the others.

624
00:38:49,960 --> 00:38:50,960
Speaker 1: Like you sprinkling on.

625
00:38:51,040 --> 00:38:51,600
Speaker 6: A little gas.

626
00:38:51,600 --> 00:38:53,880
Speaker 5: It may not be it right, it may not be

627
00:38:53,960 --> 00:38:57,239
Speaker 5: the right oxygen ratio. You might need more fuel, you

628
00:38:57,320 --> 00:39:01,080
Speaker 5: might need more occident like that's the complicated chemistry. And

629
00:39:01,920 --> 00:39:04,560
Speaker 5: sometimes I think it's just evil Luck.

630
00:39:14,840 --> 00:39:17,719
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631
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Speaker 4: investigated England's most famous haunted house. This has been an

638
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639
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Speaker 4: producer Alexis and Morosi, Consulting producer Kyle Ryan, researcher Nicole Brown,

640
00:39:50,680 --> 00:39:55,520
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641
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Speaker 4: composer Curtis Heath, artwork Nick Toga. Executive produce ducers Georgia Hartstark,

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Speaker 4: Facebook at tenfold More Wicked