Robert Treat Paine Papers, Volume 4
Hampshire Ss At the Supreme Judicial Court begun and holden at Northampton within and for the County of Hampshire on the last Tuesday of April in the year of our Lord Seventeen hundred and Eighty Two
The Jurors for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts upon their Oath present that Priscilla Woodworth of Blanford in the County of Hampshire Widow late Wife of Nathaniel Woodworth late of the same Blanford husbandman deceased, not having the fear of GOD before her Eyes, but of her malice aforethought contriving and intending him the said Nathaniel Woodworth her late husband aforsaid to deprive of his life, and him feloniously and traiterously to kill and murther, on the thirtieth day of September in the year of our Lord seventeen hundred and Eighty one at Blanford aforsaid in the said County of Hampshire with force and Arms, feloniously, traiterously wilfully and of her malice aforethought did mix and mingle a great quantity of white Arsenick being a deadly poison in a certain quantity of Brimstone the said Priscilla Woodworth then and there well knowing the said white Arsenick to be a deadly poison and that the said Priscilla there afterwards vizt. on the same day the poison aforsaid so mixed and mingled as aforsaid with force and arms feloniously traiterously wilfully and of her malice aforethought did offer and give to the said Nathaniel Woodworth her said then Husband to take eat and swallow down and that the said Nathaniel Woodworth not knowing the poison aforsaid to have been mixed & mingled with the Brimstone as aforsaid, by the procurement and instigation of the said Priscilla Woodworth did take eat and swallow down the Poison so mixed and mingled as aforsaid with the Brimstone aforsaid and thereupon the said Nathaniel Woodworth by the Poison aforsaid so as aforsaid taken eaten & swallowed down then & there became sick and distempered in his body, and that the said Nathaniel Woodworth of the poison aforsaid and of the sickness and distemper thereby occasioned, did languish & languishing did live from the said thirtieth day of September to the first day of October then next ensuing on which same first day of October at Blanford aforsaid the said Nathaniel Woodworth died of the poison aforsaid and of the sickness & distemper occasioned thereby as aforsaid. And so the Jurors aforsaid upon 201 their oath aforsaid do say, that the said Priscilla Woodworth the aforsaid Nathaniel Woodworth her said late husband in manner and form aforsaid feloniously, traiterously, wilfully, and of her malice aforethought did poison kill and murder against the peace of the Commonwealth aforsaid and Dignity of the same.
Hampshire Ss. April 1782 Priscilla Woodworth is set to the Bar & arraigned upon this Indictment and being demanded how she will acquit herself thereof, she says that therof she is not guilty and therof for trial puts herself upon God and the Country.
Comnwlth vs. Priscilla Woodworth for Petit Treason1
Dr. Robt. KingSunday evening. Pris out milking called me in sd. husband sick; small pulse, griping, bloody Stool. next morning:—pulse, very faint. I went for medicines wn. I returned speechless, lived 10 minutes: not long after he took the brimstone he became sick & dyed—he was opned on Wednesday AM: his Stomach appeared mortified
he had lived 6 or 7 [11 or 12
interlined] yr. in Blanford—I live 150 R
Sunday morning Pris. said she never saw him so merry in her life as he was on Thursday night he braged he wd. get her Estate into his hands & go away, poor Soul he is going but not the way he intended
Stephen Ballard She told me she did not like the disposition of her hus.she sd. her
Father sd. he had rather see her go to the Grave than have her married to this man, I have known them 4 yrs. had children Decd. buried on Wednesday 202 or Thursday.Dr. King desired me to go to the house & talk abt. the giving the Brimstone. I went she was washing his Cloaths.
she sd. I have a Jobb & an half of it. she sd.
if she had a mind to poisonhim she did not know wt. to get for she never saw any nor ever had any. I asked wt. she wd. say if any body would swear that she was seen with Ratsbane in her hand a day or two before,
she paused & her Countenance changed. she sd. Brock & she had talk abt. getting Ratsbane
to poison Rats, but never had seen any & that Mr. Brock had said he did not: Thursday she was in Constable Crook at his house she said she got the Ratsbane of Dr. Mather to colour Red
what became of theRatsbane the 6th she sd. it was at home in her Pocket or Chest or had lost it by the way. I & 3 or 4 more went with her house she look’d in Chest Pocket, bed room, basketts, chips before Door.
Erskine BrockI had lived in the house 3 or 4 months Decd. worked on Sunday morning well She got some Brimstone to take her self, he wanted some she sd. there is none pounded she said if you haven’t you must pound it. she put it into the Skillet broken brimstone, she got some milk for him to take it in. She went into the closet & brought a Tea Cup of milk. I heard a grating in the Closet like cutting maple sugar—in ½ hour he went out of Doors & came in said he had been a vomiting—sickened all day
Friday before a differance she sd. Brimstone in Hell for him, she went to Westfield, he gave her money, she returned with a gold necklace—in the Summer she said she wanted some Ratsbane to Colour with the Brimstone remains in Paper had chalk & alumn in it
Rosewel Woodworthwhen I got up he began to grow sick—she sd.
Father sd. itwas the
Brimstone made himSick & she was afraid he would not take any more—she said she mixed some for her self & there was not enough pounded, she gave him some to pound, he pounded—that she told him to
take it down quick for it was not good; yes it is sd. he
Sunday morning she asked him if he thought he shd. get well he sd. he did not know, he was low, weak, full of pain she asked him where the notes were, he sd. they were safe, then he told her they were at a neighbour, she sd. the other day you brag’d of getting her Estate & going away, but now you are going another way:
She burn’t the skillet red hot & said she wanted to pound some to annoint her Self
Dr. Mather,I went up on Tuesday after his Death Stomach mortified as big as Palm of hand abraded, thinner, vessells adjoining, inflamed & tumified, Intestines inflamed, not mortified
the Friday before she applied to me for Ratsbane to dye linnen thread, scarlet,—a peice as big as an Indian Corn. I thought it not sufficient to answer her purpose, & let her have 2. Drams: 1 gr. suff. to take away life—I did not tell any body that I had sold Ratsbane to any woman; when I spoke to her, her hankercef wold be up, but she talked to others with it down. I knew the Gown
she sd. before—that she gave other Brimstone to her husband
Dr. Pynchonthe Symptom comport with the account of Poison
Dr. Shephardthey use white arsenick in dying.
Wm. Pomeroy,2 oz to 20 yds.—not set the Colour of Red
Mary AshleyPris came to our house Friday she asked for Dr. he was not at home she askd for Ratsbane, she said it would
set red Colours. She asked
if we had any Sleeping Droops. She had met with a great deal of trouble & could not sleep would it to macke her Sleep I asked her if she met with extra Trouble She said she would go to Dr. Mather She said she had heard that people took Drops & never slept again
John Ches. Williams2 the attempt to poison the scholars at Yale.3 reaching to vomit
Majr. Seth WalesArsenick is used in green & blue, I think Scarlet, a small peice will answer
Joseph Lymanit was at first thought to be poison (the affair at New Haven) but of the Lower kinds
no Council allowed &c
. John Frederick Helleman4 I found the mortification in the Stomach, secretion stopt vessel stuffed: I have opened those dead of cholera morbus. Stomach not mortified I have seen a person opned who died of arsenick those dying of drinking Cold Water stomach not mortified
Dr. HarveyI saw Decd. next day after he died.
Mary Brown
This case was heard in Northampton before Chief Justice William Cushing and associate justices Nathaniel Peaslee Sargeant and David Sewall:
And now here cometh the said Priscilla Woodworth in her own proper person under the Custody of the Sheriff of the County of Hampshire and is set to the Bar & arraigned upon this Indictment and being demanded how she will acquit herself thereof, she says for Plea that thereof she is not guilty and thereof for trial puts herself upon God & the Country. The Prisoner is asked if she desire Counsel & upon her signifying her Desire therefor & that Theodore Sedgwick & Caleb Strong Esqrs. may be appointed, the Court thereupon assign those Gentlemen accordingly—whereupon a Jury is impannelled & sworn to try the Issue vizt. Abner Barnard Foreman & fellows namely John King, Elijah Lyman, Eldad Bordwell, Stephen Wright, Zaccheus Crocker, Thomas Hastings, Jonathan White, Lucius Doolittle, Zadok Martindale, Jacob Willson & Samuel Cunnabel who after hearing all Matters & Things concerning the same, return their Verdict & upon their Oaths do say that the sd. Priscilla Woodworth is not guilty. It is therefore considered by the Court that the sd. Priscilla Woodworth is not guilty & on motion it is ordered that she go without Day. (Supreme Judicial Court Minute Books, Hampshire County, Apr. 1782. Massachusetts Judicial Archives, Boston, Mass.)
RTP succinctly noted in his diary on May 3, 1782: “Priscilla Woodworth tryed for Poisoning her husband & acquitted.” Judge Nathaniel Peaslee Sargeant’s notes on this case are at the Phillips Library, Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, Mass.
While this case was being heard, there was a disruption of the court when “a considerable number of people collected (from some of the back towns as it was said) to impede the regular administration of justice.” The immediate cause was the arrest of Samuel Ely, “a fomenter of disturbances in the counties of Berkshire and Hampshire” (Massachusetts Spy, May 16, 1782). RTP noted in his diary on May 6 that at daybreak, an alarm was raised by the ringing of bells and firing of guns warning that “a Number of insurgents to the amount of 2 or 300 Armed came within 7 miles of the Court House” planning to release Ely, “a Person indicted for Seditious Words & Actions.” The militia turned out to establish order, and in the event Ely pleaded guilty and the “Court went on peaceably.”
John Chester Williams (1746/7–1819), a 1765 graduate of Yale, was a lawyer in Hadley, Mass., who also worked as a merchant and served as selectman (1773, 1776, 1780) (Sylvester Judd, History of Hadley [Springfield, Mass., 1905], 160–161, 385, 450).
The poisonings at Yale dated back to Apr. 14, 1764, when eighty-two students, two tutors, and one cook “were seized with violent Vomitings, great Thirst, Weakness in the Extremities and some with Spasms, and other Symptoms of Poison. By the Use of Emetics, Oleaginous and mucilaginous Draughts they are recovered, saving that some are yet weak in their joynts and affected in their Eyes. The Physicians conjecture it to be Arsenic, mixed with the Cake, on which they all Breakfasted.” Although some French Acadian exiles in the colony were at first suspected, Pres. Ezra Clap investigated the matter and decided that the cause was “either some accident or some strong Physic put into the Victuals with a Design to bring a Slur upon the Provisions made in the Hall” (Dexter, Biographical Sketches of Yale Graduates, 3:57–58). Judith Ann Schiff, Chief Research Archivist, Manuscripts and Archives Division, Yale University Library, kindly provided this reference.
Dr. John F. Heileman (d. 1816) had served as a surgeon in Gen. Friedrich Adolph Riedesel’s German Brigade under Gen. John Burgoyne and was one of the many Germans to remain after the Revolution. He at this time was a physician at Granville, Mass., and at the time of his death was a post surgeon with the U.S. Army (Charles K. Gardner, A Dictionary of All Officers Who Have Been Commissioned by the Army of the United States [New York, 1853], 223).