You never know what you’re going to find around the house or the office, as the Bristol County Sheriff’s Office recently proved when it shared some of the documents discovered in its office.

Running the House of Correction in Dartmouth is one thing, but the BCSO also operates New Bedford’s historic Ash Street Jail – and is a steward for the 135-plus years of history encompassed within its stone walls.

We recently told you about how Fall River accused ax murderer Lizzie Borden spent time in the matron’s quarters of the Ash Street Jail during her 1893 trial for the murder of her father and stepmother the year before. After a 12-day trial, she was acquitted of all charges.

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Among the historic documents the BCSO shared in a recent Facebook post was the original mittimus for Lizzie Borden. A mittimus – a Latin word meaning “we send” – is the document that charges a sheriff or law enforcement agent to deliver a person named in a warrant to prison.

Bristol County Sheriff's Office via Facebook
Bristol County Sheriff's Office via Facebook
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What’s interesting about the mittimus for Lizzie Borden is that there are two times the word “him” appears in the typed portion of the form, and both times they were written over to read “her.” That shows how uncommon it was for a woman to be arrested for a crime in 1892, that the forms were printed with the assumption that the suspect being taken to prison would be male.

Bristol County Sheriff's Office via Facebook
Bristol County Sheriff's Office via Facebook
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Bristol County Sheriff Paul Heroux mentioned on his own Facebook page that the document was being turned over to the Fall River Historical Society, which has an extensive collection of documents and items related to the Borden case.

Heroux, who has announced a plan to close the Ash Street Jail, also pointed out it wasn’t the first “famous” person’s documents he has dealt with.

“When I was at the Department of Correction, Malcolm X’s files were in my office,” he wrote.

The documents were posted on Friday, March 3, and Heroux updated the post on his page on Tuesday, March 7 with a photo of the Lizzie Borden House in Fall River, where the murders took place.

“What a small world,” he wrote. “I came out of a meeting with the district attorney just now and the house where Lizzie Borden allegedly killed her parents is right outside across the street from the back door of the district attorney’s office in Fall River.”

Wonder if he’s found the bed that Lizzie supposedly slept on that’s tucked away at the Ash Street Jail?

Go Inside Fall River's Lizzie Borden Bed & Breakfast

This infamous Fall River home is open for tours and overnight stays through U.S. Ghost Adventures. Here are all the rooms you can stay in and the haunted happenings that have taken place in them.

Lizzie Borden's Maplecroft in Fall River, Massachusetts

UPDATE: Maplecroft's new owners moved in on July 19, 2022 – Lizzie Borden's 162nd birthday.

While the house where Lizzie Borden's father and stepmother were brutally murdered on August 4, 1892 may have recently been purchased, the home where she moved after being acquitted for those same murders is on the market for anyone looking to own a piece of Fall River history.

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