The Hanging of Susanna Cox: The True Story of Pennsylvania’s Most Notorious Infanticide and the Legend That’s Kept It Alive

admin — Wed, 16 Jun 2010 16:01:00 +0000

By Corinne Earnest, Patricia Earnest Suter, Russell Earnest

The story of Susanna Cox, as detailed in Patricia Earnest Suter, Russell Earnest, and Corinne Earnest’s The Hanging of Susanna Cox, nearly perfectly follows the trajectory of the seduction of the mid-to-late eighteenth century: a naive girl is lured from her family, “seduced” (often, in actuality, raped), left by her lover (or rapist), and left to die alone. Seduction novels were simultaneously didactic, propagandistic, prurient, and hugely popular. What differentiates the story of Susanna Cox from the seduction novel is that Cox was a real woman, indentured at the age of fourteen and hung in Pennsylvania for infanticide in 1809 when she was in her early twenties.

The authors tease out the details of Cox’s short life, trial, and execution against the backdrop of the changes to the United States, forensics, the justice system, and the public’s perception of crime. This is all intriguing, albeit concerning, information. The evidence of Cox’s guilt was sparse, her trial exceptionally brief, and the details provided by the authors about her public execution horrific. At Cox’s brief trial, women connected to the case do not testify, nor does the father of Cox’s son, who is not so much as named in public records. Regardless of her guilt or innocence, in many ways Cox’s life was tragic, and the book is particularly sad to read in that her case was likely in no way unique, particularly amongst “invisible” indentured women.

What I found most interesting about the book was the emergence of Cox’s “notorious” status and the visibility that came to her after her death. The authors note, “At the very time Susanna’s life came to an end, her story came alive through the words of printers.” Perhaps because her story was so similar to the type of seduction tale told in countless novels and stories at the time, broadsides and poems about the case were printed simultaneous to her trial and execution, and were widely sold. The story endured. The book opens with the authors’ visit to the Kutztown Folk Festival in 2008—199 years after Cox’s execution—at which one exhibit is the repeated hanging of an effigy of Cox. Although this hanging of Cox’s effigy culminates with a quote from one of the poems about Cox (“Her exit–infamy!”), what is intriguing is that the poems about her are factual, didactic, and moralistic, but also somewhat sympathetic.

Although there are many unanswered questions about the life of Susanna Cox, the authors have assembled an impressive array of facts. As someone who had never heard of Susanna Cox or her execution before reading the book and who has never visited the area in which the story is famous, the book occasionally delved into too much local and geographical detail for me; however, The Hanging of Susanna Cox was still a book that I read with interest and speed, eager to learn more about the story. Beyond just the case of Susanna Cox, which is engaging but frustrating for the impossibility of decisive answers, the book is also a portrayal of a justice system and population in a state of significant change.

Written by: Erin Schowalter, June 16th 2010

Woman Into Wolf: A TrueCrimeTale

admin — Mon, 03 Aug 2009 01:55:00 +0000

By Alysse Aallyn

The Midnight Reader

I haven’t read a true crime story in a long time, and I was really looking forward to it. I was mildly disappointed, then, to learn that Woman Into Wolf “combines the events of several real cases, but other than Digger, who was a real dog, and the Bird Lady, who was a real person, characters must be considered inventions of the author.” It’s not true crime, I don’t think, if it’s been made up, even if the events purportedly did happen. Nevertheless, I put my reservations aside and sat down to chapter one: “The Animal Bridegroom.” Well, this could get interesting, I thought.

And interesting it certainly was. Lucky for me, both Digger and the Bird Lady have prominent roles in this fictional “true crime” novel. Persephone, Persey for short, is a housewife who suffers though a detective’s complaints about a murderer whose victims have never been found because his bosses won’t listen to him and go out looking. The next morning, she hikes off the trail a ways with her dog, Digger, into virtual no man’s land and finds not one, but two bodies. One is a skeleton that has probably been around for a long time; the other is “fresh” and still in the process of decaying. She calls the detective and a whirlwind begins.

The characters seem stock at first, but at least Persey grows into her own, and that’s a relief. I was hoping I wouldn’t have to put this book down as another bodice ripper or “all women are victims” type story, and thankfully, it isn’t (though it threatens to stray into that territory more than once). Persey deals with her husband, Roy, and his mother, Babe, who wants her to have a baby so badly that she is always on the lookout for a “baby-bump.” And though Persey may start out as “just a desperate housewife,” after she takes initiative and searches for the cadavers she finds on her hike that morning, it’s clear that she’s anything but weak or in need of protecting. It’s nice to have strong women characters every once in a while.

I was pleasantly surprised by the caliber of writing in Woman Into Wolf, and would recommend it as beach reading for those who have a thing for true crime. While it still rankles a little that it’s not actually a "true" true crime story, Alysse Aallyn does a great job at braiding the plot together in its various forms to reach a relatively satisfying conclusion. It’s not Shakespeare, but it’s still pretty good for “guilty pleasure” read.

Written by: Viannah Duncan, August 2nd 2009