Sarah Maria Cornell (May 3, 1803 – December 20, 1832) was a Fall River, Massachusetts, mill worker whose corpse was found hanging from a stackpole on the farm of John Durfee in nearby Tiverton, Rhode Island on December 21, 1832. Her death was at first thought to be a suicide. After an autopsy, it was discovered she was pregnant. Methodist minister Ephraim K. Avery would be suspected of her pregnancy and tried for her murder, in a trial what would engage local industrialists against the New England Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church. Although Avery would be acquitted for the murder, he was forever scorned in the eyes of the public.
Biography
Sarah Maria Cornell was born on May 3, 1803, likely in Rupert, Vermont to James and Lucretia (Leffingwell) Cornell. Lucretia had been born well-off in an old Puritan family, the daughter of a Connecticut merchant and paper maker. However she had been disowned by her father after she married James Cornell, who had worked in his paper mill, and of whom he did not approve. James abandoned the family when Cornell was a baby, forcing her mother to give up her older sister and brother to relatives as she was financially unable to care for three children. Cornell remained with her mother to age eleven when she moved in with her aunt Joanna, in Norwich, Connecticut. Later in her teens, she apprenticed as a tailor. In 1820 she moved to nearby Bozrahville and worked as a tailor for about two years.
Around 1822 or 1823 she went to work at a cotton mill in Killingly, Connecticut. In the years that followed, she would move often and work at various mills in Rhode Island and Connecticut, including stints in North Providence, Jewett City, Slatersville. During this period, Cornell often got into trouble, including charges of theft and other "inappropriate" acts for a woman of that time.
During her time at Slatersville between 1823 and 1826, Cornell converted to Methodism, and sought to change her ways. However, in February 1826, the mill at Slatersville burned to the ground and she was forced to seek employment elsewhere. She first moved to the nearby village of Branch Factory and later to Mendon Mills (later called Millville, Massachusetts), several miles away.
In early 1827, Cornell moved again to find mill work in Dedham, Massachusetts. However, after only a few weeks there she moved again to Dorchester, Massachusetts, where she was able to reconnect with the Methodists. In May 1828, she moved to the booming mill town of Lowell, Massachusetts where she worked as a weaver until about the end of 1829. It was during this period in Lowell that she met a newly arrived Methodist minister, Ephraim Kingsbury Avery.
In September 1830, she moved to Dover, New Hampshire. Only two months later she moved again to Somersworth, New Hampshire. During the summer of 1831 she left New Hampshire for Waltham, Massachusetts but only stayed there a few weeks. She then moved to Taunton, Massachusetts where she found employment. In May 1832 she left Taunton for Woodstock, Connecticut where she was able to find work again as a tailor in Grindall Rawson's shop. It was at a Methodist Camp Meeting in Thompson, Connecticut at the end of August 1832 that Cornell once again crossed paths with Reverend Avery. By this time, Avery had become the minister in Bristol, Rhode Island. It is alleged that during the Thompson Camp meeting that Avery seduced Sarah Cornell.
In October 1832, she moved to Fall River where she found lodging at the home of Elija Cole. By this time she was showing clear signs of pregnancy, and sought advice from a local doctor in Fall River. By early December 1832, she moved to the Hathaway residence on Spring Street.
Death
On the morning of December 21, 1832, Cornell's body was found by farmer John Durfee quickly identified by the minister. Later discovered among her personal effects at the Hathaway residence was a note written by Cornell and dated the same day as her death: "If I should be missing, enquire of the Rev. Mr. Avery of Bristol, he will know where I am."
Other suspicious and incriminating letters were also discovered, as well as a conversation she had had with a doctor indicating the married Avery was the father of her unborn child. A coroner's jury was convened in Tiverton before any autopsy had been performed. This jury found that Cornell had "committed suicide by hanging herself upon a stake ... and was influenced to commit said crime by the wicked conduct of a married man."