10. The Minister and the Mill Girl

In December 1832, the body of a young, pregnant woman was found hanging at a Tiverton, Rhode Island, farm. She was identified as Sarah Cornell, a worker in a textile factory in nearby Fall River, Massachusetts. Evidence implicated Methodist minister Ephraim Avery, and the community was outraged that a man of the cloth had seduced and murdered an innocent mill girl. But Sarah Cornell was far from innocent, and she had reasons to hate Reverend Avery that had nothing to do with her pregnancy. Could Sarah Cornell have planted evidence against Avery before taking her own life?