Tuesday, July 03, 2007

Inspector sews up case.

Brooklyn Eagle, 3 October 1898.

I don't think I'd want a thimble with NAG inscribed on it. But that's just me.
The woman involved is a Dr. Nancy A. Guilford. She had apparently landed in Liverpool the previous week, aboard the steamer Vancouver, under the name Mrs. McAllister, of Chicago. She was wanted in the United States on charges of second degree murder in connection with the murder of an Emma Gill in Bridgeport, Connecticut, an affair known then as the Yellow Mill Pond Tragedy.
There had been considerable difficulty in correctly identifying Miss Gill's body. Several people came forth and "positively identified" her body as that of Nellie Lauckery, Marion Perkins, and Louisa King.
Eventually, it was detemined that the body belonged to Miss Gill, a 24-year-old domestic employed in Southington, Connecticut, who'd come to Dr. Guilford for "a criminal operation" (presumably an abortion--this was 1898) from which she died. Her body was then dismembered in Dr. Guilford's bathtub, with the severed parts disposed of in Yellow Mill Pond. Albert "Harry" Oxley was charged as an accomplice "to the extent of being responsible for the condition of the girl and consenting to a criminal operation." I cannot determine the fate of Mr. Oxley, but Dr. Guilford plead guilty to manslaughter and was sentenced to ten years in prison and fined one dollar.
I don't know how many 2007 dollars equal one 1898 dollar, but it somehow doesn't seem to be enough.

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