 Good evening. This is crime classics. I am Thomas Highland listen The man in non-descript uniform dropping stones into that well is a mercenary soldier More recently a deserted He's testing the depth of the well the only way he knows since the length of rope is not immediately available and More complicated machines are as yet undiscovered This is the year 1778 and the deserter is named James Buchanan Next to him is his friend another deserter whose name is William Brooks These men are in the employ of Mrs. Basci baspooner of Brookfield, Massachusetts whose well it is Mrs. Spooner will pay these men immediately. They deposit the body of her murdered husband right down there and Tonight my report to you on the crime of Basci baspooner the first woman to be tried for murder in the United States Crime classics a new series of true crime stories Taken from the records and newspapers of every land from every time Your host each week. Mr. Thomas Highland connoisseur of crime student of violence and Teller of murders Now once again Thomas Highland the place is Brookfield, Massachusetts the year 1778 seen The home of Joshua and Basci baspooner a large and respectable dwelling two stories in height Situated on the north side of the road from Brookfield to Worcester In the front of it and nearly opposite on the south side of the road are stately elms and a well And in the living room, there's this What manner of woman are you bascuba? There's no content in you and no happiness and what happiness have you given me a life that dies quickly Cooking and sewing and from you drunk and sleep and you've not answered me You would like to see me dead. Would you not listen to me, Joshua? Well, when you returned this morning from Worcester, my heart sank in me I'd hoped you wouldn't come back that I would have an accident that in some way I would be killed yes that you would be free then yes to walk the town newly widowed with a wandering eye and you listen true I am your husband and I'm your lover and that's the way things are Ezra Ezra I've been waiting Bathsheba wait no more waiting Bathsheba The time I was away from you with your husband in Worcester the thinking about you and they'll be more waiting Until it's done until you kill him. I tried but I could not he asked me a question my husband did What manner of woman are you he asked now? I wonder what manner of woman am I to love such as you or you a Boy who pretends to manhood you without the courage to the poison you gave me there was no opportunity Bathsheba And a boy who lies opportunity When it becomes nighttime my husband becomes a drunkard you know that To empty the poison in the cup when you were with him a simple thing like that you couldn't do I swear it to you Bathsheba He'll die when Go to him now to the tavern where he is empty the poison. I I through the poison away With no courage Bathsheba speak my name and bedevil yourself with it. Just kiss me back No kisses no secret with springs none of that no more Until my husband is dead Laugh then you'll see I mean it Ah There's a wench bad sheba at the other end of town and she watches me when I walk by then go to her all right Wait Don't leave me You almost let me go boy boy You bat sheba Kill him kill my husband later and That was Bathsheba Spooner You've come to know her pretty well. You've seen her hating you've seen her loving There's more you should know She was the sixth child of an illustrious man general rugles The general was a man of great wealth and lived in the style of unusual luxury for that day He kept 30 horses and had a park of 20 acres for deer and a pack of hounds for the amusement of numerous visitors He was a man intensely loyal to the British crown and never hid his loyalties And so at the outbreak of the Revolutionary War, he was forced to give up his estate and to leave the country His married life was also pretty bad and he and his wife did not set a good example to his children in their conjugal relations Bathsheba sprang from that kind of a household Her loyalist background in time of war and the very fact of the name she had Bathsheba Were sufficient cause for the town in which she lived to view her with alarm But keep this in mind Bathsheba Spooner is going to murder her husband How? Well, let's see how time and motive and circumstance Conspire to get a man violently dead the man Joshua Spooner Let's pick him up and see what he's doing It's the same evening and since it's after dark. He's drinking and in Brookfield There's only one public house in which to drink Cooley's tavern and that's where he is Oh, no, no, no doctor Then what would you do the trap general be going very simple hand me your tanker dr. King now and here This spoon the line of March of begot And your tanker than mine two sections of the troops of general what in there? No, that's how we take care of general burglar Yeah Joshua Spooner talks of strategies and drinks his ale but mark this Near the bar another table two men men in nondescript uniforms Deserters from the army of general Burgoy their names James Buchanan and William Brooks They've made known the fact that they've deserted the enemy so their drinks are on the house and the appreciative customers They're having a fine time drink to drink your ale will Make me a toast and I'll drink with you and it's okay. You shall get Burgoyne is a scurvy louder will load or else we'll pay for our own ale. Aye That toast your toast to that scurvy plump bellied burgoy may you rot in the wilderness? That is if he don't drown coming across this in london Gentlemen and the merry evening to you Joshua Spooner is my name That would do me proud if you would commit me. He'll is what we're drinking sir for the Patriot and Patriots we are indeed a goodness. Oh, yes, we joined general Washington, sir and his colonials. You should know that From here we go to Worcester where a column of Washington's heart is a Oh Are you? True. Yes, sir. And thanks to you my place Willy but your tanket is dry and so is my if you will permit me gentlemen It would be my pleasure my pleasure indeed It would be mr. Spooner's pleasure indeed to buy the lads more ale as was the custom True it was 28 but the etiquette was the same nothing too good for our boys and The deserters in Cooley's bar were off to join our boys as a matter of fact It was mr. Spooner's pleasure to direct James Buchanan and William Brooks to Worcester to become soldiers in Washington's army It just happened that one of the landmarks that mr. Spooner gave the lads went something like this Mark you a pile of elms and a well and across the road from it my house When you pass there you will be leaving Brookfield, and you will know you're on your way We'll have another ale before you leave. You're a gentleman if I ever met one Oh, it's true one James my lad a real jet So They touched tankers the deserters and Joshua Spooner and they made tearful farewell and The deserters left and walked the road toward where the elms were and the house and a well Let's go on ahead of them. Let's get back to the lady That she does home that she does fixing her hair and the youth as well He's tying into it night ribbons a lover's Their gesture their talk, however is shocking perhaps you're right Perhaps the best way is not to poison him. I say shoot him perhaps in such a way to make it appear as an accident Will you shoot him as well? But tightly with the ribbon dear Ezra I Have not the courage for it, but you know of guns and shooting you were in the army for a year I marched I shot no one. I marched upon an ambush and was wounded myself. I never pulled a trigger If not you to kill him Ezra then someone Yes Turn from your mirror baths. She won't look at me Do you hear yes drunkards Someone go to the window Rockets two of them by the moon British deserters. I've seen them in town A lady wants to talk to you let them in Ezra He baths she was Booner who greeted the deserters must have been quite a sight tall long hair and blue ribbons There must have been a fire in the fireplace and in all probabilities. She was standing in front of it Her manner was gracious and she was smiling Ezra served the liquor all in all it was the nicest thing that could possibly have happened to two fellows who had deserted general Burgoy And now gentlemen a question we bow bow James mad Say oh my lady How would you gentlemen like five hundred pounds to see you on your long journey? Mirhan old would warm the cockles. Wouldn't it will toward does that answer you my lady? And what would you do for it? There is nothing that will and I have not done and for less handsome payment from less handsome women Kill my husband this lad the one you call as Come here lad the next to skinny ones don't take long for twistin Not him not Ezra not him They know My husband will return from his drinking Will you wait for him kill him when he returns meet him outside at the door and Greet him Will you not only for the money dear lady? But with the pleasure of your presence to two tired soldiers Right Jane. It's the truth You'll be the master of this house Yeah And you are the tool that we'd be Oh This one was a struggle. He will get the woman and the one she calls Ezra. Hi And a tiny job if I say so myself Mrs. Pooner and now he's dead What will you do with him? There's a well across the road. I Give a sign James and you Walk with you. It's a deep well poor little man and That's how Joshua Spooner died and That's how Bashiba Spooner killed him. You are listening to crime classics and your host Thomas Highland And now once again Thomas Highland and the second act of crime classics and his report to you on the crime of Bathsheba Spooner listen to this It's awful and dread this tale that I tell Joshua Spooner lies dead in a well in Brookfield town in 78 from six doubt wax across the page Small poem by an anonymous contributor to the Worcester spy the local newspaper of the day a Change of scene now across the road from a cold well into a warm living room tableau for people Mr. Spooner was such an elegant man What will become of these clothes in his closet and his horse? You may have them Come away from the window batship Here to me close The stars are dancing You're shivering you cold Will is very weary widow Spooner will not go on to Worcester tonight Then wait till morning you can make a place for yourselves in the barn But the money we'll have now and the clothes and the oars Yes, all of it as Rob. Yes in the morning. You will go to Cooley's tavern Inquire of Joshua tell them he's not been home Tell them I'm frantic for his welfare Yes Good night gentlemen a Very good night I've been sent to inquire of Joshua Spooner Who sent you the wife of in Bathsheba? Did she not why last night? He did not return home and Mrs. Spooner is frantic for his welfare not home. Well, he's not here last night He sat right there my lad and discussed military strategies with the doctor then to the best of my knowledge Dr. King dr. Dr. Wake wake up Please dr. Wake up. It's important What is it what where is Joshua Spooner where is he mr. Cooley says he sat with you last night As he did it and left me he's not home Mrs. Spooner sent me to fetch him. She's trouble that he's not returned But where else could he have gone if not to his wife? We must find him doctor. Yes. Yes. Well mean Ezra did that very well with the precise shading of alarm in his voice the concern a man on an errand for a troubled lady Everybody was impressed mr. Cooley closed his bar Dr. King appealed to the neighborliness of the other customers and everybody went looking for Joshua Spooner Immediately they called on Mrs. Spooner whom they found in the greatest apparent distress Upon an examination of the premises in the neighborhood of the doorstep They observed the tracks of several persons on the snow and on further search. They found mr. Spooner You know where in the well So far only horror and suspicions But now let's pick up Willie and James They haven't left Brookfield Stupid of them, isn't it? But then you've got to examine it from their point of view Why become soldiers in Washington's army? Especially in the winter and suffer the privations of the military when they could be warm and rich as a civilian So imagine it To tattered a million deserters suddenly elegant in mr. Spooner's clothes, which were somewhat tight fitting But elegance and tight fitting are somehow akin Now they lived in Brookfield a certain wench whose name is lost in history This much is known about her. She had an eye for tight elegance This much is known about her too that she went riding with Willie and James on their newly acquired horse James How is it we are riding mr. Spooner's horse? Why dearie we don't know a mr. Spooner Mr. Spooner's silver buckle These are our clothes dearie come. Let's ride some more. It brings the pink to your pretty cheeks The cat was out of the bag the girl told her mother and her mother her father And it so happened that her father was at that moment on his way to look for the murderers of Joshua Spooner So the father told some neighbors and they located James and Willie brought them all together The two deserters Ezra and Basheba and this is what happened government and people of Massachusetts Bay in New England On their oath present that William Brooks and James Buchanan and Ezra Ross in the county of Essex Not having God before their eyes and assault did make upon Joshua Spooner Poloniously willfully and of their manners of forethought on the first day of March last past With force and arms also by striking beating and kicking a force at Joshua Spooner So as to inflict several mortal bruises of which Joshua Spooner died and that Bathsheba Spooner widow And late wife of Joshua Spooner being seduced by the instigation of the devil did in sight move a vet Counsel and procure the murder of a force at Joshua Spooner How do you plead not guilty not guilty not guilty What statement have you but she was Boona I Am the wife of a deceased if what you accuse me of be true What end could the death of my husband serve whether any reasons persuading hopes Inviting or advantages arising from the death of my husband Depriving myself of husband. I would subject myself to the burdens of a widow If I hated my husband as such has been said could I not have separated from him gone to my father or to my brothers What foolishness is this to say? I've loved Ezra Ross when one of my station might have any gallant I please Gentlemen if I be guilty I was not of sound mind Essex greetings We command you that on Thursday the fourth day of June next between the hours of 12 and 4 of the clock in the afternoon You've caused William Brooks James Buchanan Ezra Ross and Bathsheba Spooner to be conveyed from our jail where they are now in your custody to the usual place of Execution and rare to be hanged by the neck until their bodies be dead The motive the crime and the sentence Justice was simple and quickly too quickly for the four prisoners the fourth day of June This is a copy of the Worcester spy dated that day that I have here. I'd like to read from it It was about half past two of the clock in the afternoon When the four criminals were brought out of prison and conducted to the place of execution under a guard of 100 men The three men went on foot Mrs. Spooner was carried in a shades being then as she had been for several days exceedingly feeble The procession was regular in solemn Just before they reached the place of execution one of the most terrific thunderstorms that had incurred within the memory of the oldest Inhabitant darkened the heavens They're followed an awful time The loud shouts of the officers amidst the crowd of five thousand people The horses pressing upon those in front the shrieks of the women in the tumult and confusion Slowly advancing to the fatal three preceded by the dismal The fierce forestations of the lightning afford the darkened horizon quickly followed by loud peals of thunder Inspired together and produced a dreadful scene of horror It seemed as if the author of nature had added such terrors to the punishment of the criminals as Might soften the stoutest heart of the most obdurate and abandoned At length the place of execution having been reached Ross Buchanan and Brooks ascended the ladder to the stage Ross made an audible prayer The other two were engaged in silent devotions until they faced the noose Mrs. Spooner as she approached the tree was seen to bow gracefully to many of the spectators with whom she had been acquainted Then she crept up the ladder on her hands and knees When the eyes of the malefactors were covered and all was ready Mrs. Spooner took the sheriff by the hand and for the first time Vashiba Spooner accepted the verdict of justice My dear sir, I am ready the little time I expect to be in bliss and But a few years must elapse when I hope I shall see you and my other Friends again. That's the way the newspaper recorded it This has been my report of the crime of Vashiba Spooner the first woman tried and executed for murder in the United States