Episode 88: Took an Axe…

Written By Karl White

The success of the O’Bannon Brother’s traveling carnival carried them far beyond the ports of Europe, to the distant shores and growing cities of the United States. Their show was unlike anything most had ever seen, and crowds came in droves to see a grotesque procession of curiosities, oddities, and horrors gathered from across the globe. But no attraction garnered more attention than the centerpiece, The Living Dead Girl.

Advertisement for the O’Bannon Brother’s Carnival, 1892 - © 2026 Headless Horseman Productions, LLC

By the time the carnival reached America in the spring of 1892, Anne Hyde was barely recognizable as the child she’d once been. Time and decay had hollowed her features, her skin drawn tight and torn in places where it could no longer hold. The O’Bannon’s tried to do all they could to preserve her body, but it was difficult to do at a distance. She was kept heavily chained, her movements erratic and violent, her hunger constant. But to the crowds, she was a ghastly illusion.

That summer, the show arrived in Fall River, Massachusetts, a quiet town of mills, modest homes, and tightly ordered lives. It wasn’t a place accustomed to spectacle, but the promise of something strange drew a curious crowd to the evening street fair.

Lanterns were strung across the square on the hot night. Vendors called out over one another. Children wove through the gathering masses. And at the center of it all, beneath a canvas tent lit by flickering torchlight, the O’Bannon’s prepared their main attraction.

The crowd fanning themselves from the stifling heat, fell silent as Sean O’Bannon took center stage. 

Sean O’Bannon introducing the main attraction - © 2026 Headless Horseman Productions, LLC

SEAN O’BANNON: Step closer, if you dare...and see what the wide world keeps hidden. Brought from distant lands no map dares claim...a thing not meant for Christian eyes. A girl who crossed the ocean...and did not stay dead.

The tension was built with care, each word drawing the crowd further in, until at last he called for a volunteer.

SEAN O’BANNON: Who among you is brave enough to stand before her?

Hands rose hesitantly throughout the audience, but Sean’s gaze settled on a single figure. A reserved woman near the front...Abby Borden.

Reluctant volunteer, Abby Borden - © 2026 Headless Horseman Productions, LLC

Encouraged gently by her husband, Andrew, and watched closely by her stepdaughter, Lizzie, Abby took the stage, uncertain. Sean placed a small piece of raw meat in her hand and instructed her to hold it out for all to see. Behind him, in the shadows, Anne stirred.

The chains rattled softly at first...then more violently as the scent reached the zombie. Hand slick with sweat, Brady held tightly onto the restraints as Anne rose from her seat, knowing a meal was coming. But terrified of the rotting corpse, Abby stumbled, her knees buckled and she fell before the zombie. With a body suddenly presented to her, Anne lunged with more power than usual.

The chain slipped from Brady’s grip -- And in an instant, the performance became something else entirely.

The crowd erupted into panic as Anne attacked. Screams tore through the tent as people scattered in every direction. Sean rushed for the curtain while Brady hauled the chains taut, fighting to regain control. On the stage, Andrew pulled Abby away from danger, dragging her clear as the chaos surged around them.

Abby Borden returned home that night shaken, but outwardly unharmed. She refused a doctor, dismissing the incident, while concealing a bite. What she did want, was to lie down, exhausted from the excitement. So, the family retired for the evening, believing the worst was over.

By morning, Abby was disoriented, unwell, not herself. She moved slowly through the house, her speech uneven, her presence unsettling in a way no one could quite say. Lizzie watched her closely, sensing something, though she couldn’t have known what it truly was.

Hours later the house fell silent. Then came the sound -- a heavy thud from the upper floor. Lizzie found her stepmother in the guest room. Abby stood with her back turned, her posture rigid. When she turned, there was no recognition in her eyes. Only hunger.

The first lunge came without warning. Lizzie stumbled back, barely avoiding Abby’s grasp as she surged forward with the movements of a predator. The woman she knew was gone, replaced by something feral. Lizzie scrambled around the bed, searching desperately for anything she could use to defend herself. That was when she saw it, a small hatchet used for kindling.

Lizzie Borden ready to defend herself - © 2026 Headless Horseman Productions, LLC

She didn’t want to use it. But Abby closed the distance quickly, leaving no room to retreat.

Lizzie swung. The first strike was clumsy. The second landed harder. By the third, she knew whatever stood before her was no longer her stepmother, and wouldn’t stop.

Downstairs, Andrew Borden had already begun to change. He woke not feeling well. The plague passed to him as he slept next to Abby. But after dispatching her step-mother, Lizzie descended the stairs, shaken and breathless. She found her father seated on the couch, his expression fixed and empty. He rose slowly, his movements unnatural, as though something within him was learning to inhabit the body it controlled.

LIZZIE: Father?

Andrew Borden comes after his daughter - © 2026 Headless Horseman Productions, LLC

But there was no answer. And in that silence, she understood.

The second struggle was worse. Andrew was stronger, driven by something far more relentless. Lizzie tried to flee, but he blocked her path. The hatchet trembled in her hands as he closed in. She begged him to stop, but he didn’t. And so she struck. Again and again, each blow motivated by fear and the unbearable weight of what she was being forced to do. When it was over, the house fell into a silence so complete it seemed to consume the sound of her breath.

When authorities arrived, they found a scene that defied reason. Andrew and Abby Borden lay dead within their home, their bodies bearing the marks of extreme violence. Lizzie was found alive but alone, her account fragmented and uncertain.

The official story would be simple. Brutal. A daughter, driven by motive and opportunity, killed her parents with an axe. The number would follow her, repeated in whispers and headlines alike -- forty whacks. A phrase that would echo through history, binding her name to the crime.

But the truth was far darker…

Remnants of an unexplainable tragedy - © 2026 Headless Horseman Productions, LLC

Inside that house, Lizzie Borden had not committed murder. She survived it. She faced something no one would’ve believed, something no court could’ve understood. So she told the only story the world would accept. An intruder. An unseen killer. The case would become one of the most infamous unsolved crimes in American history. 

But the O’Bannons knew better. When news of the murders reached the carnival, they wasted no time. The show packed up quickly and left town before questions could be asked. They’d seen such things before. An accident with a stage-hand in Dublin. A young girl who got too close to Anne in Liverpool. The sickness was easily spread. And the fallout, too costly. 

In the years that followed, the story of Lizzie Borden would continue to echo. The details would be debated, reexamined, and retold, but never truly resolved. Because the truth slipped through the cracks of history. Anne Hyde carried the Black Wind across the ocean, to a quiet American town, and into a single home. And from there, her plague-ridden existence would continue to leave its mark upon the world, spreading death.

TO BE CONTINUED…