Did She Kill Him? A Torrid True Story of Adultery, Arsenic, and Murder in Victorian England by Kate Colquhoun
Summary: In the summer of 1889, young Southern belle
Florence Maybrick stood trial for the alleged arsenic poisoning of her much
older husband, Liverpool cotton merchant James Maybrick. The “Maybrick Mystery”
had all the makings of a sensation: a pretty, flirtatious young girl;
resentful, gossiping servants; rumors of gambling and debt; and tor-rid mutual
infidelity. The case cracked the varnish of Victorian respectability, shocking
and exciting the public in equal measure as they clambered to read the latest
revelations of Florence’s past and glimpse her likeness in Madame Tussaud’s.
Florence’s fate was fiercely debated in the courtroom, on the front pages of
the newspapers and in parlours and backyards across the country. Did she poison
her husband? Was her previous in-fidelity proof of murderous intentions? Was
James’ own habit of self-medicating to blame for his de-mise? Historian Kate Colquhoun
recounts an utterly absorbing tale of addiction, deception and adultery that
keeps you asking to the very last page, “Did she kill him?”
Angie's Comments: Did She Kill
Him? broke my heart. The book is well-written and flows smoothly. Author Kate Colquhoun does a fantastic job of
placing the affair in the context of the time period. It is a glimpse into the
feminism of the 1800s. The first 90 pages concentrate on the lives and marriage
of the Maybricks. The rest of the book focuses on the evidence, the trial of
Florence Maybrick, and the rest of Florence’s life.
Did Florence kill her husband? Or
did she at least try to kill him? I still don’t know, and Colquhoun keeps her
opinion to herself. The events in this book haunt me. No matter who did what,
it wasted people’s lives and destroyed a family. I keep wishing it hadn't happened, or that the people involved acted differently. But those are futile wishes.
If you like true crime stories
that don’t have a good answer, this is the book for you.
|
|
No comments:
Post a Comment