Introduction
Elizabeth “Lizzie” Green lived in Camden in the early 1910s, one could easily say on the fringes of society. Little is known about her other than what can be gathered from newspapers, but what can be inferred is that she was ill-tempered, drank a lot, and jealous. Prematurely gray, possibly as the result of her hard living, she stabbed her erstwhile lover, John Gideon, in or near rooms they both occupied in the 700 block of Baxter Street, to death in July of 1911, and was put on trial for his murder.
Apparently there were no witnesses to the crime, and Green, a white woman, claimed self-defense as her motive for stabbing Gideon. Whether bias on the part of the jury played any role in her acquittal is a matter of speculation. What is not a matter of speculation is that once released from jail, Lizzie Green returned to Camden and the antics that got her in trouble in the first place. She returned to the same neighborhood in Camden and may or may not have taken up with a widower, James Oliver, who had lived on Baxter Street in the 1900s, at 812 Liberty Street prior to the Gideon murder and at 505 Branch Street afterwards. In June of 1912 Lizzie Green was convicted of stealing three dollars from Oliver. She claimed that she had been drinking and was unaware of her actions. At her trial, Prosecutor William T. Boyle referred to her as a menace to society. Judge Howard Carrow sentenced her to six months imprisonment in the Camden County Jail.
Lizzie Green did not appear in the 1910 or 1920 Censuses in Camden, and living as she did, may well have not been counted. She just as easily could have been living outside of the city. No “Lizzie Green” or “Elizabeth Green” is listed in the area she haunted in the late 1900s or early 1910s. As to what happened to her after her release from the county jail, assuming she did not die in jail, is as of this writing unknown.
Woman Admits Killing a Negro
Philadelphia Inquirer —
Elizabeth Green, 33 years old, of Camden, pleaded guilty before Recorder Stackhouse yesterday to being the assailant of John Gideon, a negro, 18 years old, who was stabbed to death in front of 731 Baxter street Tuesday night. She was committed to jail on the charge of murder.
Woman Murders with Table Fork
Trenton True American —
Camden, New Jersey, July 19.—In a quarrel which the police declare was caused by jealousy, early this morning, Lizzie Green, 50 years old, plunged a fork into the heart of John Gains, a negro, 20 years old, killing him instantly. The quarrel occurred in the house in which they lived at 716 Baxter street, and was over a woman. The couple had often quarrelled over this woman, and the Green woman, who is white, told Gains he must stop paying attentions to the other woman.
The couple quarrelled last night, and during the night the quarrel was continued again, with the result that the white woman grabbed a fork from a table and plunged it into the heart of the young negro. The police were summoned to the house by neighbors and they placed the woman under arrest. They say she admitted killing the man and she is now held without bail on a charge of murder.
Note: The Trenton newspaper appears to have gotten the name of the victim and the address where it took place wrong, as there was no house at 716 Baxter Street, and the victim’s name was John Gideon.
Camden News Notes
Philadelphia Inquirer —
Hundreds of the morbidly curious yesterday viewed the body of John Gideon, the young negro who was stabbed to death by Elizabeth Green, a white woman, last Tuesday. The funeral services were held at Gideon’s home, at 731 Baxter street, Camden, near where he met death. Interment was made in Mount Peace Cemetery.
Hatch’s Next Camden Grand Jury Is Puzzler
Philadelphia Inquirer —
As far as the court list is concerned, there are more than three hundred criminal cases to be considered by the grand jury, most of them of a petty character. There is but one murder case, that of Lizzie Green, a white woman, who stabbed to death John Gideon, a negro, last July. There are sixty-four Supreme and forty-four Circuit Court cases listed for trial, besides two in the Common Pleas Court. Circuit Court Judge Lloyd will make an experimental call of cases on October 4 and the actual trials will begin October 25.
Camden News Notes
Philadelphia Inquirer —
Elizabeth Green will be tried before Judge Garrison today for the murder of John Gideon, a negro, who was stabbed to death last July. It will be the first homicide case to be tried in Camden in two years.
Jury Gave Her Liberty
Philadelphia Inquirer —
In less than ten minutes, a jury before Supreme Court Justice Garrison, in Camden, yesterday, freed Elizabeth Green, a white woman, of a charge of murder in connection with the fatal stabbing of John Gideon, a negro, on Baxter street last July. The woman, prematurely gray and looking twenty years beyond her age of 33 years, was the first of her sex to be tried in Camden for a long time.
While the State pressed for a verdict of murder, no degree being specified, the defense entered a plea of self-defense. The jury believed the story of the woman that she had stabbed the negro after he had attacked her.
(news brief — Elizabeth Green sentenced for theft)
Philadelphia Inquirer —
Freed at the last term of court on a charge of murdering John Gideon, her negro paramour, Elizabeth Green, a white woman, was yesterday sentenced by Judge Carrow in Camden to six months in the county jail on a charge of stealing $3 from James Oliver, also colored. After the woman had declared that she had been drinking heavily and that she had no knowledge of taking the money, Prosecutor Boyle, classing her as a menace to society, asked that she be sent away for a long term. The court, however, refused to send her to State Prison.
Freed at the last term of court on a charge of murdering John Gideon, her negro paramour, Elizabeth Green, a white woman, was yesterday sentenced by Judge Carrow in Camden to six months in the county jail on a charge of stealing $3 from James Oliver, also colored. After the woman had declared that she had been drinking heavily and that she had no knowledge of taking the money, Prosecutor Boyle, classing her as a menace to society, asked that she be sent away for a long term. The court, however, refused to send her to State Prison.