Use this search box to find articles that have run in our newspapers over the last several years.
Date: 8/17/2021
Largely untold in most historical texts, Andrew Noone’s book, “Bathsheba Spooner: A Revolutionary Murder Conspiracy,” dives into the tale of a woman who conspired to murder her husband in the early infancy of the United States during the American Revolution.
Noone said Spooner was put on trial after conspiring with an American Continental soldier and two British prisoners of war (POWs) to murder her husband in March 1778.
“Bathsheba Spooner was the daughter of infamous loyalist Timothy Ruggles of Massachusetts and in the winter of 1778, she conspired with a teenage Continental American soldier and two British POWs to kill her husband. During the trial, she claimed she was pregnant, and the state did some tests and decided she was not pregnant, and she was hanged alongside the three men,” he said.
Based on his research, Noone said Spooner is the first woman to be hanged in the history of the United States as a nation, and this case may have also resulted in the first mass hanging of the new nation.
“As far as we know she is the first woman executed in the new nation. The trial notes are the most complete of the 18th century. Not counting the Salem Witch Trials, as a nation in the United States I believe it is the first mass hanging,” he said.
Noone said the story is not well known outside of Worcester, likely because of where it took place and the fact that there were only paper records of the time.
“I think if it had happened in a major metropolitan center, like Boston or New York, more people would know about it. In the 1770s all we have are paper records so that may be part of the reason,” he said.
While there are some articles and another book out there about the trial, Noone said he wanted to give a fuller telling of the case.
“There have always been articles, but nothing had been done until my research, during which another book came out. Mine is the first one to go through the entire court testimony and to place the murder in sequence, it just needed a fuller telling,” he said.
With this book, Noone said he wanted to bring to light Worcester’s history during the American Revolution.
“I wanted to really delve into the original sources, I was also really interested in using this book as a means of telling Worcester’s history during the Revolution, which had really never been told in a book,” he said.
Overall, Noone said the book took four years to research and another four years to write.
Noone said the story relates to Northampton because Levi Lincoln Sr., the defense attorney for the case, began his career as a lawyer in Northampton before moving to Worcester and eventually becoming the attorney general under Thomas Jefferson.
“He was a Hingham native who established his career in Northampton before coming to Worcester in the 1770s to establish his career a little more forcefully. He was also connected to Patriot circles, which helped his career in Worcester, and I think his connection to the Green family, a wealthy family of Patriots, helped him get this case,” he said.
While this is his first book, Noone said he is thinking about working on another book about Worcester’s history.
“I am considering researching more Worcester topics, including the first Black regiment in Massachusetts was not Boston’s 54th, it was actually a regiment in Worcester or Worcester as the home of the nation’s first women’s rights convention,” he said.
Interested readers can purchase a copy of “Bathsheba Spooner: A Revolutionary Murder Conspiracy” on Amazon.