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Saturday, August 31, 2024

The Abortion Ad Trump Should Make: Life of the Mother

Please feel free to lift from this script to do your own version of the Life of the Mother ad Trump should be making. This message needs to get out. Just please, provide a linkback.

Best if you have Trump's voice in your head when you read this.

The Democrats, they love abortion. They love abortion. Look at what they were doing outside their convention. They brought in a bus to give away abortions. Like party favors. Free abortions. And they were dressed up like abortion pills, dancing around. They love abortion. But most Americans, they don't love abortion. Even the ones who think it should be legal and available, they don't love it. They don't think it's something to be celebrating.

And a lot of why people think abortion needs to be legal and available, it's because the Democrats have been lying to them. Lying. And it's very tragic, these lies. Very tragic. And we'll take just one example: They lie and say that you need abortions to save women's lives.

And their lies are clever. Very clever. Because there's a small piece of truth in the lie. A piece of truth. The woman has a health problem, and the pregnancy is a threat to her health, a threat to her life. And it's true that the doctor needs to end that pregnancy to save that woman's life. Very tragic, but true. But here's where the big lie comes in. Termination of pregnancy.

You know how the Democrats do that. "Termination of pregnancy," they say. Abortion is terminating the pregnancy. But that's not the point of the abortion. Pregnancies, they terminate all on their own usually, at about nine months. They terminate on their own. But what the Democrats want to terminate isn't the pregnancy: it's the baby. Because doctors, long before abortion was legalized, and in states where abortions are restricted, they save mothers lives all the time. They save them by inducing labor or by doing an emergency C-section. Right? All of you probably know somebody whose doctor said, "We need to induce," or "we need to do an emergency C-section."  And a lot of the time, a lot of the time it's later in the pregnancy. That baby might need some help. The baby might have to spend some time in the NICU. A very scary time for the family, very scary. But they get to take their baby home. The pregnancy was ended to save the mother, but the doctor didn't kill the baby. He saved the baby.

Sometimes, it's tragic, sometimes the baby is too young to survive outside the womb. Very sad. Rick Santorum's family, that happened, their son Gabriel. Mrs. Santorum's life was in danger, and the doctors had to end that pregnancy to save her life. So they delivered that baby. They delivered little Gabriel, and he spent his last moments on earth being held and cuddled and loved by his family. The one bright spot in that tragic, tragic situation is that little Gabriel, the only thing he ever knew was love. Just love. Just being held and loved. And that's what Americans want for these babies. 

But the Democrats, they want to delay ending those life threatening pregnancies. Delay them. Why? Because they want to be able to justify abortion, so they want to take advantage of these situations, very sad situations, for politics. For politics. They don't tell the woman about options to save her baby. And the way these abortions are done, I'm not gonna describe it. It's too horrible. And my heart breaks for those families whose doctors lied, whose doctors said that the way to end those pregnancies was with an abortion, not inducing labor, not a C-section. Those doctors told those families that they needed to do what they call a "termination of pregnancy," but it's really a termination of the baby. Taking extra time, endangering that mother's life even more, to do extra procedures to terminate that baby.

And those very late abortions? Those very late ones? That they say they have to do to save the mother's life? You know where they do those? They don't have the woman in a hospital. That woman, her life is in danger, her health is in danger. And they don't want to check her into a hospital where they can do transfusions, or do surgery, or anything else they might need to do to save that mother's life, protect her life. They want that woman to be in a motel. Don't take my word for it. Look on these abortion clinics' websites. They describe how those abortions are done. The woman stays in a motel. Not a hospital, a motel. She goes into the clinic every day to have the different steps of the abortion done. It takes two days, three days, sometimes even four days if the pregnancy is very far along. With the woman staying in a hotel. Not a hospital. With her family or friends, not with doctors and nurses. And they want us to believe that they're doing this to save the woman's life, that her life is in danger. And they want us to believe that she needs to be in a hotel, not a hospital.

So when the Dobbs decision came down -- I put those justices on the Supreme Court, the justices that said Roe vs Wade was a bad decision. Very bad. The Dobbs decision said that the states could decide. Voters in every state could decide. And by doing that, this means that there needs to be public discussion, public debate. People will have a chance to learn about what abortions are, how they're done, and they can decide. They can learn the difference between inducing labor or doing a C-section, and taking extra time, doing extra stuff, extra procedures, to end that baby's life before you end the pregnancy. They can still choose to love abortion like the Democrats do. And that's sad, very sad, that the Democrats love abortion more than they love women. We don't. We love women. And we want them to be having the discussions about what abortion really is, what it really does, and what women really need. And maybe, maybe those states will have so many Democrats that they will choose to protect abortion, like it's something beautiful. But other states, those voters have the chance to say no thank you. We don't love abortion. We love women and we love babies, and when a pregnant woman's life is in danger, we're not going to let some doctor check her into a motel. We're gonna say he needs to check her into a hospital and provide her with the very best obstetric care. 

Abortion -- it's not great. No matter how much the Democrats love it. And we're going to encourage people to get out and learn about how the abortion lobby has captured the Democrat party. Totally captured it. Putting politics ahead of women, ahead of babies, ahead of families. We urge Americans to learn more about abortion. Learn about it. Debate it. Vote on it. And we trust that eventually, the abortion lobby's stranglehold on Democrat politics will come to an end, and we can build a country where we help women welcome their babies. And that's gonna be through discussion, debate, and the democratic process. Not the Democrat process, which is just to pack the woman off to an abortion clinic, or pull up with a bus and hand out abortion pills like Halloween candy. But the democratic process, where voters hash things out and decide what's really important to them.

Tuesday, August 27, 2024

August 27, 1887: The First Known Death Attributed to Dr. Hagenow

Dr. Louisa "Lucy" Hagenow
Louise Derchow
, age 23, is the first known victim of notorious criminal abortionist Dr. Louisa "Lucy" Hagenow


Louise had been born in a village near Hamburg, Germany. Some time in the mid 1880s she moved to San Francisco and took work as a domestic servant in the home of Mrs. Steinhart at 1090 Post Street. She was courted by another German immigrant, a barkeep named Henry Peckelhoff. Those who knew the couple anticipated that they'd marry soon.

In early August of 1887, Louise moved in with Henry and began using his surname. 

On August 9, 1887 Louise told Peckelhoff that she was pregnant, and he told her to go to Dr. Hagenow's “maternity hospital” at 19 Twelfth Street in San Francisco to be examined. She was admitted, and Peckelhoff later said that she seemed well when he visited her there until but something went wrong. Louise died at about 1 a.m. on Monday, August 21.

Peckelhoff went to an undertaker named Suhr at about 2 a.m., saying that he needed a burial for his wife. The undertaker's assistant removed Louise's body from Hagenow's establishment at about 3 a.m., then went to get a death certificate from Hagenow. The Assistant Secretary of the Health Department refused to issue a burial permit with a death certificate signed by Hagenow because she was on a list of "illegal practitioners." The clerk said that Dr. S. S. Kahn was authorized to examine the body and issue a death certificate if no qualified doctor could sign one. Mr. Suhr said that he could get a new certificate signed by a properly qualified physician.

The undertaker's assistant and Hagenow went looking for Dr. F. F. DeDerky, who had also attended Louise. They couldn't find him, so Hagenow's cook forged DeDerky's signature on a death certificate identifying the woman as Louise I. Peckelshoff  in order to get the health department to accept the death certificate and issue the burial permit, which was finally released at 3 p.m. 

The funeral was held an hour later. 

Because of the suspicious circumstances surrounding Louise's death, the City Physician disinterred Louise's remains and performed an autopsy at the Odd Fellow's Cemetery on September 1. He found what was termed “conclusive evidence” of an abortion, with inflammation caused by an instrument. 


Hagenow insisted that Louise had shown up at her door already seriously ill and bleeding heavily. Prior to her death, Hagenow admitted, Louise was delivered of a four-month fetus. She also admitted that the young woman had died of peritonitis.

Abbia Richards
All told, Hagenow was tried three times in Louise's death, and acquitted in the third trial, just around the time she was being investigated in the abortion deaths of Annie Dorris and Abbia Richards, as well as for the suspicious death of Emma Dep shortly after discharge from Hagenow's maternity home. The third acquittal was largely attributed to the death of the state's star witness, a journalist who had originally broken the story. 

One of Peckelhoff's friends helped him to go through the young woman's possessions and found the necessary addresses to write to her friends back home in Germany about her death.

A smiling young white woman with 1920s style clothes, hair, and makeup standing in front of some shrubbery
Nina Pierce
Hagenow relocated to Chicago and began piling up dead bodies there as well, including Minnie DeeringSophia Kuhn , Emily AndersonHannah CarlsonMarie HechtMay PutnamLola MadisonAnnie HorvatichLottie LowyNina PierceJean CohenBridget Masterson
Elizabeth Welter and Mary Moorehead.

Sources:

August 27, 1970: Undetermined Abortionist in Cleveland

Victoria Seronka, a 17-year-old homemaker, died on August 27, 1970 in transit by ambulance to Southwest General Hospital in Cleveland, Ohio.  

Doctors said that she was 3 months pregnant, and an autopsy revealed signs of an attempted abortion.  

Original sources lost with loss of original Cemetery of Choice wiki. Additional information from Ohio death record.

August 27, 1909: Doctor Indicted in Chicago

On August 27, 1909, homemaker Anna Dennin, age 23, died in her Chicago home on Hamilton Avenue from an abortion. 

Dr. Emma Maycke of Belmont Avenue was held by the coroner's jury and indicted for felony murder. Dr. Maycke said that she had only been treating Anna after somebody else had perpetrated abortion. The source documents don't indicate that the case went to trial.  

Sources: 

Monday, August 26, 2024

August 26, 1922: Mercury, Abortion, or Both?

On August 26, 1922, Catherine Wainwright died at Nassau Hospital, Long Island, New York. 

Monday, August 21

At the inquest, Dr. Joseph B. Musante testified that on the morning of  Monday, August 21, he was called to Catherine's house by her friend and attorney, John C. Wait. Dr. Musante believed that Catherine was suffering from  "a gastro-intestinal infection." She had told him that she'd been suffering from violent bouts of vomiting since the previous Saturday, when she had gone into New York City for lunch with Wait, and she believed she was suffering from food poisoning. Dr. Musante testified that he provided two prescriptions for Catherine.

He returned that evening. Catherine's mother, Catherine Cusack, said that she had given her daughter one of the prescriptions but hadn't filled the rhubarb and soda prescription because it had been lost. However, Dr. Musante testified, he encountered Wait at the house shortly thereafter. Wait had said that he was a chemist and that he had read the prescription and destroyed it because "he had better soda in the house." However Musante said, Wait also indicated that he hadn't given Catherine the superior soda either.

Tuesday, August 22

Dr. Musante was again at Catherine's home on August 22. Catherine was refusing to go to the hospital. Dr. Musante testified that while he was at the house he got the impression that Wait was either a family member or a very close friend. That evening, Dr. Musante said, Wait stopped at his office and asked questions about Catherine's condition. When Dr. Musante had asked why he was so interested and whether he was related to Catherine, Wait ended the conversation and left.

Wednesday, August 23

Catherine was declining instead of improving, so Dr. Musante called in another doctor, Gustave Fensterer, who was a surgeon at Nassau Hospital. Dr. Fensterer didn't take no for an answer from Catherine. He admitted her to the hospital. Because of an unusual odor to Catherine's breath, Dr. Fensterer suspected that she had ingested poison. 

For reasons not clear in the news coverage, Dr. Fensterer suspected that the specific poison was mercury. Also, again for reasons not clear in the news, he performed an operation on Catherine and found evidence that she had undergone a criminal abortion three or four days previously. However, he could not determine if the abortion had been done with drugs or instruments.  

Catherine herself was no help in clearing up the mystery. She denied having ingested any mercury recently but said that she had used bichloride of mercury occasionally in the past.

Thursday, August 24

Wait came to the hospital and spoke to Dr. Fensterer and a resident, Dr. Santos Lucent, who had assisted Dr. Fensterer in the surgery. The doctors told Wait that Catherine was fatally ill and asked who he was. He said that he was the one that was going to pay Catherine's bills. Wait then told the doctors that he was going to reach out to Catherine's husband.

Catherine and her husband, Robert C. Wainwright, had originally lived in Springfield, Illinois. They had been married about four years when they moved to New York City along with their young daughter the April prior to Catherine's death.

So Where Was Catherine's Husband?

Probate records reveal the likely reason Catherine decided to abort her unborn baby. They indicate that "in the early part of the year 1922 he went to South America as a prospector and civil engineer to prospect, locate and develop hydro-electric powers,..." and that he was working and living "somewhere in the Cordilera Mountains between the Central and Easter Cordilera in the headwaters of the Magdalena River, with headquarters in and about La Mesa; that he makes occasional trips to Bogota; that said District is a wild mountainous country with poor transportation and communication, which makes communicatoin with said Robert C. Wainwright uncertain and infrequent,; that to secure waivers of citation from said Robert C. Wainwright would require at least three to four months and possibly much longer, as the executaition of such papers would require [Robert] to go to some large city where there is a consul of the United States of America; that [Robert] in a communication... expressed his belief that he could not return from South America for a period of eighteen months to two years."

According to probate records, Catherine's survivors included her husband, parents, daughter, sister, two nephews, and an aunt. Her estate was valued at $18,000 dollars, which is just over $337,000 adjusted for inflation. 

Sources:




August 26, 1917: Scanty Information from Chicago

On August 26, 1917, 28-year-old Mrs. Valdislaw Zapanc (I have been unable to determine her first name) died at Chicago's Englewood Hospital from a criminal abortion performed by some unknown perpetrator.

Source: Homicide in Chicago Interactive Database

Sunday, August 25, 2024

August 25, 1871: The Trunk Mystery

Who was the young woman whose decomposing body had been discovered in a trunk at a railroad depot? The police wanted to know -- and the friends and family of Alice Augusta Bowlsby wanted to know where she was. The two mysteries came tragically together that late summer of 1871. 

A Mysterious Woman

Alexander "Paddy" Potts, age 12, made money at the Hudson River Railroad Depot in New York City by selling candy and papers and by helping people with their packages. At around 1:00 on the afternoon of August 26, 1871, one-horse cab pulled up near where Paddy was waiting outside the ladies' entrance. Paddy ran up to the cab and opened the door. A shabbily-dressed woman who seemed to be around 18 or 19 years old handed the cab driver a $1 bill then turned to the boy. "Sonny, can you tell me where the ticket office is?" she asked.

Paddy went with her to the ticket office. She bought a ticket to Chicago, paying with two $20 bills and getting $18 in change. After chatting for a moment with the clerk, the young woman told Paddy that she'd changed her mind about going to Chicago herself and wanted to just check her baggage on the train. Paddy told her that she couldn't just put her baggage on the train; it had to be with a ticketed passenger. 

Paddy went with her to the baggage drop-off area and waited. The young woman recognized the wagon and beckoned the driver. The trunk was small -- less than three feet long -- but very heavy. Paddy and the driver each grabbed a handle put it on a baggage cart. The woman fussed about how the trunk was handled, stressing that it contained glass and other fragile items. Paddy went to the counter and told Frank Dunning, the baggage clerk, that the lady wanted her trunk checked to Chicago. 

The woman fretted that the lock was flimsy and said that she would like to have an extra strap around the trunk. Frank charged her a dollar for the strap, which he nailed into place. He had his doubts as to whether the trunk was sturdy enough to get to Chicago in one piece. The woman gave Frank $1 and her ticket. Frank punched the ticket and handed it back to the woman with a baggage check. 

With hours to go before the train was due to depart, the young woman asked Paddy where she could go to get something to eat. The boy walked her to Keenan's saloon, assuring the young woman that she had plenty of time to return in time to get a good seat on the train. Instead of going into the eatery, the woman told Paddy that she didn't have much money to buy something to eat, so she was going to meet some friends and would pay him more on her return. She then walked off and vanished into the crowd.

The Grisly Discovery

Hours later, when it came time to board the Chicago train, the flimsy trunk was hauled to the platform from the baggage room. The lid was jarred, and an overpowering stench filled the balmy summer air. The station master was called over. He had no trouble opening the cheap lock. He pried open the lid to find bloodstained quilts and rags covering the nude body of a young woman. She was frail and slight, doubled up and crammed into the small space. Her pale hair spilled over her body. Her blue eyes stared sightlessly at the horrified spectators.

A summoned police officer had the trunk and its grisly contents brought to the morgue. Dr. Cushman removed the body from the trunk, along with an army blanket, a quilt, a bed-tick, a chemise, and two white muslin rags. Nothing in the trunk provided a clue as to the young woman's identity.

The body had no external marks of trauma, though there was substantial decomposition. 

The Autopsy

Dr. Cushman began the autopsy. All of the organs of the chest were found to be normal. Inside the pelvic area he found an enlarged uterus with a dilated cervix and remnants of a placenta, evidence of peritonitis, and uterine lacerations caused by a pointed instrument. 

Dr. Cushman concluded that the young woman had died from infection due to an abortion. 

Public Display

The newspapers dubbed the mystery "The Trunk Case", and filled their pages with lurid descriptions of the crime and poetic descriptions of the victim. She was, the New York Times said, a "young girl ... [with] a face of singular loveliness... but her chief beauty was her great profusion of golden hair... that lay in heavy masses upon her breast." 

An appeal went out to the public to identify the dead girl. Crowds braved the smell to catch a glimpse of the young woman's body, which was kept on ice to try to slow decomposition. Despite some false leads, the woman's identity remained a mystery.

Searching for the Wagoneer

The police enlisted the help of young Paddy Potts. The boy remembered seeing the name "Tripp" on the wagon in question, leading the police in search of carters named Tripp, then Trapp, and dragging an innocent man into the police station and assuming that by denying being the carter in question, he was likely an accomplice in the murder. None of the men turned out to be the carter in question.

Paddy was taken all around the city by the police in search of the wagon in question, to no avail.

Finally a man named William Pickett came forward. From reading the papers he'd realized that he was the carter the police were looking for. Paddy and Pickett recognized each other.

The Carter's Story

Pickett said that the young woman from the depot, who had given her name as Julia Sidney, had quibbled over the $1 fee but had paid it when Pickett went into a store and broke a $5 for her. She instructed him to go to the house at 687 Second Avenue and ring the basement bell. The trunk, she said, would be brought to him. 

Pickett had gone to the address and rung the bell as instructed. A man opened the door and let him in. Several women were present in the basement room. The man helped Pickett to carry the trunk to the cart, but didn't speak to him. Pickett described the man to the police, who knew that Dr. Jacob Rosenzweig, who matched the description the cart man had given, lived at the address in question.

Dr. Rosenzweig Identified

Dr. Jacob Rosenzweig
The police then went to 687 Second Avenue and arrested Rosenzweig. That he was probably the "butcher" who had killed the young woman in the trunk came as no surprise to reporters and police detectives. He had, in fact, been one of the city's abortionists featured in a New York Times article, "The Evil of the Age," just a week earlier. 

Rosenzweig, a native of Poland, had reportedly begun as a saloon owner, but qualified himself as a doctor and branched out into abortion on the basis of a $40 diploma he'd bought from a diploma mill in Philadelphia. Since at that time all a person had to do to legally practice medicine in New York was pay a $10 "physician revenue tax," this diploma might well have raised his status.

After the arrest, Pickett identified Rosenzweig as the man who had handed the trunk off to him.

Though the police still had to complete their investigation, they were certain that they had identified the abortionist. They still had to identify the victim.

A Worried Mother

Meanwhile in Patterson, New Jersey, Caroline Bowlsby worried about her daughter, 25-year-old Alice. The young woman and her mother had been in Newark, helping to attend to her ailing uncle. Alice had left her aunt's home on the 23rd  to go to New York for the day. Clad in a white lawn dress with a blue sash and ribbons, she'd headed into the Big Apple to see a matinee and do some shopping. She hadn't been seen or heard from since. 

Mrs. Bowlsby asked the family dentist, Dr. Joseph T. Parker, what she should do. Parker, though worried that evil had befallen the young woman, tried to reassure the frantic mother that perhaps Alice had taken ill and was resting up somewhere before returning home.

Caroline had already suffered much. Her abusive, alcoholic husband had abandoned her to care for their three daughters. The four of them lived together, working as dressmakers. Alice also taught Sunday school. She had her share of attention from men, but had formed a relationship with 25-year-old Walter F. Conklin. Walter was the son of Newark alderman Lewis Conklin and worked as a bookkeeper at a silk factory. He had met Alice at the dressmaker's shop where she worked. 

Alas for Alice, Walter was a bit of a rake. More on that later.

Sad Suspicions Confirmed

The family doctor, Theodore F. Kinney, had also heard of Alice's disappearance, and had read about the gruesome discovery in the papers. He consulted with Parker, who practiced in the same building, about whether or not the woman in the trunk could be the missing Alice. On Tuesday, August 29, Kinney went to the Bellevue Hospital morgue to view the body and learn if the dead girl was his patient.

He found the body in a state of such decomposition that he couldn't just identify her on first sight. However, upon closer examination, Kinney was able to tentatively identify her as Alice by her scars -- particularly an unusually-placed vaccination scar, and by a scar on her face. 

Kinney returned to New Jersey, and together with Dr. Parker went to Mrs. Bowlsby and voiced his suspicions. He returned to Bellevue with Parker, who was able to identify Alice positively by her facial scar and a mole, as well as by the dental work he had done on her. Both men concurred on the identification. The dead woman was indeed Alice Augusta Bowlsby.

When Dr. Kinney and Dr. Parker went to the police to report on the identity of the dead woman, they were brought to Rosenzweig's home to see if they could identify anything there as belonging to Alice. They identified a hemstitched cambric handkerchief, marked "A. A. Bowlsby", and a blue sash that the men could not say for sure was Alice's, though they believed it to be. This strengthened the identification of Rosenzweig as the abortionist.

Even More Scandals Revealed

The news that the Trunk Mystery woman was Alice Bowlsby reached most of Patterson, New Jersey, through the newspapers. Gossip was running rampant in the silk mill where Walter Conklin worked. Some conjectured that Walter's diamond pin, which he'd not been wearing recently, had been used to pay for the fatal abortion. While most of the 250 workers were on lunch break, Walter opened large fireproof room off the bookkeeper's office, went inside, and shot himself in the head. In his pocket was a note written on a piece of the business letterhead:

 "I have long had a morbid idea of the worthlessness of life, and now to be obliged to testify in this affair and cause unpleasantness to my family is more than life is worth."

After his death, rumors arose that Walter Conklin had two wives -- one in New Jersey and one in Russia, where he had traveled on business -- while being involved with Alice and possibly other young women. His suicide cemented his identity as Alice's "seducer."

Another young man, Frank Tripp, believed to have been somehow involved in Alice's sad end, absconded from the area and was believed to be in Canada.

The Coroner's Jury

On September 1, 1871, a Coroner's Jury was convened. Alice's mother was in no state to view her daughter's body or to participate in the inquest. The men of the Coroner's Jury, after being sworn in, were first brought to the morgue, where Alice's body lay under a sheet. Dr. Kinney and Dr. Parker showed the jury the marks by which they had identified the dead woman as Alice. The jury then returned to the hearing room, where they cast angry and disgusted looks at Rosenzweig, who turned away and looked out the window.

An ad from the New York Herald, read, "A. -- Ladies in trouble guaranteed immediate relief, sure and safe; no fees required until perfectly satisfied; elegant rooms and nursing provided. Dr. Ascher. Amity-place. $c." Dr. Ascher, it turns out, was an alias being used by Rosenzweig. Rosenzweig denied any duplicity in also being the "Dr. Ascher" who ran thinly veiled abortion ads in the paper. He asserted that he just used Ascher's name for pure convenience because his predecessor had left the sign up. 

Rosenzweig reportedly attempted to hang himself in his prison cell on the morning of September 2. He insisted that he was a victim of a conspiracy and was placed on suicide watch.

Under Boss Tweed, abortion, though illegal, had been tolerated. But the gruesome discovery of the blonde-haired, blue-eyed girl crammed rudely into a trunk excited too much outcry for any politician to step in and intervene. Rosenzweig would be brought to trial. As the evidence against him mounted, nobody doubted that he would be convicted.


James F. Boyle, an undertaker, testified that on the morning of Saturday, August 26, a man came to his establishment, saying that a servant girl of his had died. She'd only had about $10. He wanted to know how much it would cost to bury her. Boyle had asked where the girl was to be buried, and the man had said he wasn't particular; the cheapest place would suffice. He also wanted to know how quickly the preparations could be finished. Boyle had told him about an hour and a half. He asked where the dead girl was, to which the would only reply that she wasn't far away. Boyle had asked about the doctor who had tended the girl, and was told he was downtown. Boyle said that he would need a medical certificate. The man had left, saying he would return later with the medical certificate, but he never did. Boyle testified that he's seen him later, standing outside the house on Second Avenue. He said he identified him later, at the police station, as Dr. Rosenzweig.
Jane Johnson, Rosenzweig's servant, testified that she had seen a woman dressed in white, with a white bonnet, admitted to the home on August 23. The woman went upstairs. She never saw the woman again. She identified a piece of a diaper and a towel, taken from the trunk, as belonging to the Rosenzweig household.

A woman named Marian Arthur testified that she had let professional rooms to a man she had always known as Dr. Ascher, who she identified by pointing to Dr. Rosenzweig. She said that Ascher/Rosenzweig "has a considerable practice, but more gentlemen than ladies."
Rosenzweig answered few questions for the Coroner's Jury, only indicating that he was a Polish-born physician, 39 years of age. His attorney argued that "a great deal of the testimony admitted is illegal," and the suspect denied "any participation in the atrocities charged".
The Jury quickly returned their verdict, that Alice Bowlsby had died from a criminal abortion performed some time between August 23 and August 26, and that Jacob Rosenzweig was the perpetrator.
News coverage of the inquest concluded by saying that the District Attorney, when interviewed, "said there was no possible chance of escape for the abortionist, and that he is certain of seven years' retirement from professional life at Sing Sing."
The Trial Begins
The trial was a sensation, drawing huge crowds to the brownstone courthouse. The first motion in open court was by Rosenzweig's co-counsel, Mr. Hummell, who pleaded unsuccessfully for an adjournment to allow main counsel, William Howe, to recover from an illness. A jury was empaneled: a cigar maker, a tailor, a builder, a plasterer, a speculator, two brokers, a hatter, a grocer, an agent, a dry goods merchant, and a tobacconist.
The Second Day
On this, the first day of testimony, the infamous trunk was brought into the courtroom and entered into evidence.
Alice's mother, distraught, agitated, and dressed in mourning, took the stand. She testified about the last time she'd seen her daughter alive, and about Alice's possessions, found at Dr. Rosenzweig's home. She also briefly testified about Alice's relationship with Walter Conklin. Next, Alice's sister Carrie testified. She spoke of the last time she'd seen her sister alive, and corroborated her mother's testimony about Alice's possessions.
Jane Johnson, a servant working at Rosenzweig's house, testified that she had been living under his roof for three months prior to Alice's death. She left Rosenzweig's employ on the 29th of August, when the trouble had erupted over the discovery of Alice Bowlsby's body.
Rosenzweig lived with his wife, four children, and a boarder named Abraham Sigel. A woman named Netta was a frequent visitor, up until about noon on the 23rd or 24th of August (which Jane recalled as the Wednesday or Thursday prior to the discovery of Alice's body). On that day, Jane saw Rosenzweig come into the house through the basement and admit a woman, clad in a white dress with ruffles and tucks, through the main entrance. This woman immediately went upstairs.
On Friday morning, the 25th, Mrs. Rosenzweig sent Jane on an errand that kept her out of the house all morning. Jane reported seeing Nettie at the house that day.
Early in the morning of the 26th, Jane was sent to take Rosenzweig's children to Central Park. She didn't return until late afternoon. She could not positively identify the trunk, but there had been one like it in Rosenzweig's house. She believed, from what she'd heard from Rosenzweig's daughter Rosie, that it belonged to Netta. Jane did positively identify a baby blanket found in the trunk as belonging to the Rosenzweig family.
On cross-examination, Jane indicated that she'd not heard or noticed any particular excitement or stir about the house on the days in question, other than that naturally involved with the birth of the Rosenzweigs' new baby.
Pickett the cabman gave the same testimony he'd given to the Coroner's Jury. Extenisve cross-examination didn't shake him in his story. He identified the trunk, as did several other witnesses, including the baggage boy, police officer, baggage master, and morgue attendant, all of whom reiterated testimony given at the Coroner's Jury. Alice's dentist and family doctor testified about how they'd identified her body. Boyd the undertaker reiterated his testimony from the Coroner's Jury. The police who searched Rosenzweig's house testified about the evidence they'd found there.
A woman named Nellie Willis was called to the stand to identify Rosenzweig as the man who had performed an abortion on her, about two and a half years earlier, that had left her hospitalized for weeks, and had nearly killed her. Rosenzweig had been practicing then as Dr. Ascher.
Dr. Cushman testified in great detail about the autopsy he'd performed. Alice's uterus had been enlarged, the cervix dilated, and various lacerations, giving evidence of an abortion which had caused fatal infection. The trial was adjourned for the day during cross-examination.
Day Three
This day began the the defense completing the cross-examination of Dr. Cushman. A Dr. Finnell was sworn in, and corraborated Cushman's testimony. The prosecution rested its case.
The defense, while conceding that the crime against Alice was "frightful, replsive, horrible", and conceding that there was a strong circumstantial case, held that it had not been proved that Rosenzweig had actually killed Alice.
Howe called two doctors to the stand, Garrish and Parker, who gave some medical testimony that made so little impression on reporters that I've been able to find no record of it.
The defense called Cornelia Bowlsby of Brooklyn, who was not related to the dead woman. Mrs. Bowlsby of Brooklyn claimed that the handkerchief identified as Alice's actually belonged to her daughter, Anna. She said that she and her daughters had visited the Rosenzweig home in August, and that Anna had spilled some wine and wiped it up with the handkerchief, and had left it behind. She said Anna had seen articles about Alice's death in the newspapers, with great attention focused on the handkerchief, and had brought it to her mother's attention. Mrs. Bowlsby then felt compelled, she said, to step forward to identify it. On cross-examination, she indicated that she'd not given any thought to the handkerchief until Mrs. Rosenzweig had come to her house to talk to her about it three weeks before the trial, and she wavered a bit on her description of the handkerchief. She also admitted that her husband had been expelled from the same college of physicians that Rosenzweig had gotten a phony diploma from.
The defense also produced as witnesses the Cohen brothers, Jacob and Lewis, who placed Rosenzweig at their home on the 26th, providing medical care to Jacob. Lewis testified that Rosenzweig had arrived at 10 a.m. and had stayed until 2 p.m.; Jacob testified that Rosenzweig he had arrived at aout 12:30 and stayed two or three hours. But on cross-examination, both brothers became less clear about what day Rosenzweig had actually been at the house, with Jacob saying that it was two or three days before Rosenzweig was arrested, and Lewis only being able to say it was a Saturday in the later part of August.
Mr. M. Samuels took the stand, saying he'd known Rosenzweig for at least six years, during which he'd treated his brother at their father's house. He said that Rosenzweig had visited at his house on the day he was arrested -- Monday -- and had been there the previous Saturday as well at about 3 p.m.
The defense also brought forward eight character witnesses, but most of them could only verify that they knew Rosenzweig as a physician. Only three of the eight testified that they personally knew that he was "a man of good character."
The vanished Netta, also identified as Yetty Fox, was produced as a defense witness. She said she had secretly gone to Rosenzweig's house on the Thursday prior to the 26th, due to illness, and had been dressed in white. She said she had come forward after reading accounts that placed importance on the entrance to Rosenzweig's home of a woman dressed in white.
The Defendant Takes the Stand
When Rosenzweig took the stand in his own defense, according to the New York Times, "his testimony was singularly incoherent, and he totally failed in his endeavor to remove the effect of the case made by the prosecution."
Rosenzweig testified that he knew Cornelia Bowlsby, and her daughters, who lived in Brooklyn, but never knew any Bowlsbys that lived in Patterson, New Jersey. He said he knew of nobody named Conklin from Patterson, New Jersey, and that nobody had arranged for Alice Bowlsby to board at his home. He denied having ever performed an abortion on anybody. He denied that any woman had died in his house during the time period in question, saying, "if she did I would know it."
He said any evidence of a pregnancy at his home was due to the fact that five weeks prior to his arrest his wife had given birth in the family home. He said he'd brought Netta to his house to see the baby, and had come in through the basement because he'd forgotten his key. Netta, he said, was the white-clad woman the servant had seen. He insisted that no other woman dressed in white had come to his house at all during the period in question.
Rosenzweig also testified that he had never seen the carman, William Peckett, until after his arrest. He also insisted that he'd never seen the handkerchief until after his arrest. He denied ever having seen the trunk. He admitted to having visited Boyle, the undertaker, but said he'd been sent by a Jewish society to get prices for funerals for the poor.
Under cross-examination, Rosenzweig admitted to practicing under the name of "Dr. Asher," but that he only did so because he'd taken over the previous doctor's practice and had simply left the name on the door. He denied having any knowledge of some other physicians who were evidently part of an abortion ring.
Day Four - The Defense Rests
The court was crowded, with Rosenzweig's wife and 14-year-old daughter arriving early. Alice's family did not attend, but the Mrs. Bowlsby of Brooklyn was there with her daughter as well.
Defense attorney Howe launched into a challenge for the court to prove that Alice Bowlsby had been alive on August 24, and that if an abortion had been performed it had not been necessary to try to preserve her life. His motions were denied.
In his closing argument, Howe proved a less than stellar spokesman for his client. He attacked Alice's mother for not having gone to the morgue personally to identify her daughter's body, instead having "deputed a hired dentist and a hireling physician". He then insisted that the identification was insufficient to prove that the dead woman was in fact Alice Bowlsby. How, he said, could Rosenzweig be convicted of killing Alice Bowlsby when it hadn't been sufficently been proven that Alice Bowlsby was in fact dead? Then he pointed out that the last people to see Alice Bowlsby alive had seen her in New Jersey, and no witnesses had seen her alive in New York. Sure, he conceded, Alice's things were in New York, but had Alice brought them to New York alive and died there? Then he theorized that Conklin, "who betrayed the girl, procured her death to conceal his guilt, and subsequently sent the body to the house of a so-called New-York abortionist" -- thus admitting that Alice's body had indeed been at his client's house and that his client was known as an abortionist, assertions that his client had denied during the trial.
He then argued that had Rosenzweig actually killed Alice, he'd hardly have kept her sash, dress pads, and handkerchief around the house to be discovered. Then he used the lack of larger, more easily identifiable items of Alice's dress at Rosenzweig's home as proof that Alice hadn't been there.
Howe pleaded Rosenzweig's reputation, his family, his home, and his charities, while Mrs. Rosenzweig and their daughter wept openly.
Day Four - The Prosecution Rests
The prosecutor began by focusing on the horrible nature of the crime. According to the New York Times, the District attorney, addressing the court, "observed that he never rose to open a case of this description without feelings constituting the most lively emotions within the heart. The surroundings of a case of this character were such that wherever we look, to whatever point of the compass they direct their attention, death, blood and murder stared them in the face. If the prisoner was guilty of the crime with which he stood charged, he was guilty of one of the highest crimes known to the law. And yet for some unaccountable reason ... our legislators and governers have seen fit to construct the law so that a man who takes the life of the unborn child, and also of the mother, by no jury of his country or by no Judge can he be consigned to the gallows."
He described the plight of a girl like Alice, desperate to save her reputation and not to shame her mother and family, abandoned by her lover to face her shame alone.
He reiterated the evidence identifying the dead woman as Alice Bowlsby. He reiterated that only Alice and her killer knew exactly what had been done to her, and Alice had taken the secret to her grave. He reviewed the evidence that Alice had been at Rosenzweig's home, that her body, crammed into a trunk, had been removed from that home.
He contrasted the respectable Dr. Rosenzweig's practice with that of the disreputable Dr. Ascher -- one and the same man.
He ended with a plea for justice not just for Alice, but for her unborn baby, and held that any man who loved his wife and children would have to convict.
Day Four - The Jury
A man identified as "Recorder Hackett" read the applicable laws to the jury, then reviewed all the evidence, including inconsistencies in the defense's case. He closed by saying, "The crime of which the prisoner is accused has been practised from the formation of the world, and will continue to be practised as long as human nature remains as it is. It can only be restrained by potent legislative penalties and the vindications of the law. The poor girl's story is shortly told. Trusting, betrayed, she and her seducer sleep the sleep that knows no waking. Your duty is to calmly weigh the tesimony, and render a verdict according to your oaths."
The jury deliberated just under two hours before finding Rosenzweig guilty of manslaughter. He was sentenced to seven years of hard labor. The New York Times noted, "The testimony presented so clear a case against Rosenzweig that he himself seemed to have abandoned all hope of escape. He expressed no astonishment at the verdict, though he showed that he thoroughly realized the horror of his situation."
Upon the judge dismissing the court, Mrs. Rosenzweig wept and went to embrace her husband one last time before he was taken away. His daughter threw herself on the floor shrieking, crying out curses on everybody who had spoken against her father: "Oh, may my God curse every one who has went against you, father; may their flesh rot from their bones; may their lives wither up; may they die rotten. Oh, father, if I die for it, I'll have all their lives!" She then threw herself onto her father and clung to him. Through all of this, Rosenzweig remained stoic. He was led outside, past a jeering crowd, and taken to prison.
The Aftermath
Alice was buried in the Potter's Field. The feminist newspaper, Woodhull & Claflin's Weekly, published a scathing piece about the death of Alice and her lover, placing the blame on a society that winked at unchaste men but condemned women who showed evidence of unchastity themselves:
We bring the dead bodies of the father, mother and the unborn child and lay them on society's doorstep, saying, "Behold your handiwork." This is no time to be scrupulous in our language. We cannot stand to pick words which hundreds are running the risks which Miss Bowlsby ran to satisfy the laws of society. We say that society itself is the patron of abortionists, that society's present laws make their occupation excusable, nay, a necessity; that the very men who are so loud in their denunciations of Rosenzweig and his class have, nine out of every ten of them, paid for his assistance, and, among women, nine out of ten would act as Alice Bowlsby did, if placed in the same position.
....
You screech at Rosenzweig today; you employed him yesterday, and will produce patients for his successor tomorrow, and go to church next Sunday and look as devout as a Chadband. And yet, as society exists, he has been your friend. How many of your daughters owe the shelter of your roofs to him? Ah! were that question fairly solved, it would ignite a torch whose lurid glare would inflame this city from end to end, and every one would proclaim how dreadfully bad his neighbor was, and point out the skeleton in his neighbor's closet.
....
The Rosenzweigs step in and say, practically, "I will spare you nine deaths out of the ten (for only one in a hundred dies under my hands). I will send fifty more out of the hundred victims home, still virtuous according to your rules, because no one knows of the so-called transgression, and the remainder shall have their error known only to their parents or relatives, and the outside world and future husbands shall remain in happy and blissful ignorance of the truth. All this I will do for one hundred dollars each." You find the money, you have the private interview with Rosenzweig (not that you are interested; oh, no, it is all out of pure friendship; you didn't do it; it was some other man.) You cheat society's rules of its victims, until another victim dies. Then you howl at their depravity and Rosenzweig's villainy.
Alice's mortification at her predicament must have been great. She was a Sunday school teacher and an active member of her church. Whether it was fear of censure alone that drove her to sacrifice her baby and risk her own life at the hands of Rosenzweig is a secret she took to her grave.
A public outcry against abortionists led to laws nationwide calling for stiffer penalties for abortionists. Ironically, Rosenzweig's attorney was able to leverage the new law into an appeal that freed his client on a technicality after he had served only one year of his sentence.

Additional sources:

August 25, 1893: Widower Gets Teen Housekeeper Pregnant

In April of 1893, 17-year-old Ada Hawk was living with her parents, Eliza J. and Samuel M. Hawk  in Walnut Grove, Missouri. John O. Edmonson, a bank vice-president and middle-aged widower, hired her to serve as a live-in housekeeper for the home he shared with his mother in Greene County, about a mile from her family.

When summer came, Edmonson began trying to cajole several men into marrying Ada so that her impending baby would have a legitimate father. This was a plan she reportedly resented. Unwilling to marry Ada himself and unable to recruit another husband for her, Edmonson began asking around for the best way to "get rid of it." Ada seemed willing to go along with this plan. She and Edmonson first tried inserting a rubber catheter, to no effect. Edmonson consulted with a druggist who said he didn't know how to cause an abortion. Edmonson asked if whiskey and "Indian  turnip," more commonly known as Jack-in-the-pulpit, would do the job. King indicated that there was a place near Walnut Grove where Indian turnip could be found.
Having had no success with the catheter -- or, if they tried it, "Indian turnip" -- Edmonson took Ada to Springfield on July 10, where a doctor had supposedly agreed to perform an abortion for $50 (over $1,400 in 2020 dollars). Ada then checked in to the Commercial boarding house in Springfield with Edmonson on August 28. The elderly Mrs. Donaldson, who was keeping the boarding house, insisted that while Ada had told her of the pregnancy and requested help getting rid of it, she'd refused to do anything to abort the pregnancy. Evidently, at some point in the journey, some sort of concoction was also given to Ada.
Ada's mother reported that Ada had come home on August 1 and had taken sick on the 5th, reporting pain in the stomach and bowels. Edmonson coached Ada on how to hide the abortion from her mother and was very attentive of her during her illness. Some two or three weeks passed during which Ada kept her secret and continued to take some greenish medicine Edmonson had provided. The medicine seemed to make Ada more ill. She bled heavily and passed a clot, which led her mother to wonder if her daughter had been pregnant and had aborted.
Both Ada's parents said that they insisted on sending for a doctor, wanting Dr. Hardin, the family physician. Ada, however would only consent to the doctor Edmonson chose, Dr. Perry. 
"That excited my suspicions that my daughter had not done right," Mr. Hawk testified. "I asked her about it but she made no reply. She never made any confidential statement to me after or during her sickness."
Dr. J. K. Perry testified that Edmonson had come to his office on August 21, asking him to tend to Ada for her headache and bowel pain. Perry arrived to find her with a fever of 103, and was told that she'd been delirious. He diagnosed her as having typhoid malarial fever and denied that she was pregnant when he treated her.

Perry came nine times to care for Ada, Mr. Hawk said, and always insisted that everybody leave the room while he attended to her.
As her health deteriorated, Ada realized that she was dying and said to her mother, "Ma, how I love you. You will keep our secret, won't you?"

Mrs. Hawk promised that she would.

"Well, Ma, I did miscarry the Saturday after I came home [August 5]." Ada had gone into the woods to deliver the baby, then returned to the house and acted as if nothing had happened.
The dying girl turned to Edmonson and said, "John, you know that it was yours, for you forced me, and you know you forced me. You know you did and you can be punished for it yet. Are you going to do what you said you would? You said you would take care of me, and if you don't I will commit suicide."

Edmonson told Ada to be quiet and stop making herself so upset.
Ada died on August 25. Mrs. Hawk further testified that after her daughter died, "Mr. Edmonson told me that if I would get my husband quiet he would do what was right by us. "

Ada's father testified that, "Mr. Edmonson did not ask me to keep my mouth shut in regard to my daughter's death, but he said he would pay for the hauling of the coffin and of the corpse. He said he would not go to my house so much only to keep suspicion down."

After Ada's death, Edmonson asked a Mr. Brown to help him dig a grave, telling Brown that "he wanted her buried quick" and that "the family wanted a shallow grave." Word got to the authorities about the suspicious circumstances. Edmonson was arrested then released on $500 bond (over $14,000 in 2020 dollars). The coroner arrived in town and had Ada's body exhumed, but it was too decomposed for him to be able to perform a satisfactory autopsy. Instead he held the inquest that brought the story out. 


Edmonson, for his part, had conveniently hopped into a buggy and stayed out of town for the entire time the coroner was there investigating Ada's death. This did little to help him, as the coroner swore out a new warrant and bond was set at $2,000 (over $57,000 in 2020 dollars).

When the time came for his trial, Edmonson managed to get a change of venue from Greene County to Taney County, which did nothing to help him. Edmonson was convicted of manslaughter in the second degree. Though he appealed his case the conviction was upheld. 
Edmonson, who had relocated to Springfield, married and become a father since Ada's death, was sentenced to three years in the state penitentiary. In an interview he told a reporter that he was innocent and appreciated the support he was getting from his many friends. He planned to petition the governor for clemency. 
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Saturday, August 24, 2024

August 24, 1888: No Investigation into Dead Hagenow Patient

Dr. Louisa "Lucy" Hagenow

On August 24, 1888, Mrs. Emma Dep, who had recently been discharged from a maternity home run by known abortionist Dr. Louisa Hagenow, died at 537 Second Street in San Francisco. The San Francisco Bulletin indicated that a Dr.  Erenberg signed the death certificate attributing the death to peritonitis from a self-induced abortion.

I find it a bit odd that there was no evidence of a real investigation of the death. There is simply no explanation that makes any sense other than that Emma had gone to known Hagenow, had an abortion at the maternity home, thought she was recovering, went home, and died. Considering that there had recently been three Hagenow patients dying from botched abortions -- Louise DerchowAnnie Dories and Abbie Richards --  one would think that they'd dig deeper into the circumstances surrounding Emma's death. Furthermore, a man named Franz Krone had died on August 13 at Hagenow's maternity home, leaving behind jewelry and money that was never accounted for. 

Hagenow promptly relocated to Chicago, began using the name Lucy rather than Louise or Louisa, and began piling up dead bodies there as well. She was implicated in numerous abortion deaths, including 
Minnie DeeringSophia Kuhn , Emily AndersonHannah CarlsonMarie HechtMay PutnamLola MadisonAnnie HorvatichLottie LowyNina H. PierceJean CohenBridget MastersonElizabeth Welter and Mary Moorehead.

Watch Why No Investigation? on YouTube.

Source: "Body Exhumed," San Francisco Bulletin, August 29, 1888