‘The Disquieting Death of Emma Gill: Abortion, Death, and Concealment in Victorian New England’
By Marcia Biederman
Chicago Review Press, 256 pages

Women had a lot to conceal in late 19th century America. If a young unmarried woman became pregnant, she risked bringing shame to her family, and also possibly losing that family’s love. Some women had the facts of life concealed from them, so that they knew little about what an abortion entailed. Some newspapers would not even print the word abortion. 

Licensed physicians performed abortions when the life of the mother was at stake. Otherwise, unlicensed practitioners performed the illegal operation, very often in rather sordid and unsanitary conditions.

Most abortionists were men, like Nancy Guilford’s husband, Henry, who practiced without a license. Exactly how she came to share her husband’s work is not entirely clear — precisely because this was an age of concealment.

Emma Gill had every reason to suppose that Nancy Guilford, who came highly recommended, would be able to help her. Exactly what went wrong could be determined only by an autopsy because, again, the circumstances of the procedure had to be concealed.

Nancy had already served one prison term when Emma consulted her. Yet Nancy remained a trusted figure in her community of Bridgeport, Connecticut, and when Emma Gill’s body, sawed into several parts, was discovered by a group of boys under a bridge, many people found it hard to believe that Nancy had been responsible.  

Could a woman have the skill and strength to dismember a body? That was just one of the questions the press asked. Nancy dressed well, was fond of jewelry, and to look at her she seemed hardly the type to commit such a gruesome crime.

To give away too much of the story would be more than spoiling it. It took law enforcement a long time to figure out who ought to be charged with the crime, and though Nancy Guilford eventually became the suspect, she eluded them for quite some time — much to the amazement and even admiration of newspaper readers who followed the case.

It also took Marcia Biederman an extended period to put together how it was that Emma Gill ended up in pieces. This skillful biographer, working in various archives, has assembled a well-wrought narrative, and the result is the creation of a criminal who also became a heroine.

To understand Nancy Guilford, Ms. Biederman carefully situates her in 19th century New England. Nancy pretended, like her husband, to have a medical degree, but at the same time she remained a devoted mother, with her children making every effort to protect her.

As Ms. Biederman shows, Nancy was a much more admirable person than her husband, who tended to prey on helpless women. Nancy stayed with him through many of their legal ordeals, as well as when both were imprisoned. It would seem that she did so in an effort to keep her family together.

What Ms. Biederman cannot tell us is why, even after serving a prison sentence, Nancy Guilford returned to work as an abortionist. It was a lucrative practice, to be sure, but as her daughter Eudora realized, Nancy was putting at risk the very family she wanted to preserve.

What is unsaid but seems apparent from Ms. Biederman’s careful research is that Nancy Guilford, in spite of the Emma Gill case, was good at her work and believed she was helping women — even if that meant she had to lie about what she did.

There never seems to be a dull moment in this book, not only because Ms. Biederman knows how to sustain the momentum of a good story, but because what she knows about Nancy has to be built up detail by fascinating detail.

It is tempting to draw parallels to the abortion debate today, but Ms. Beiderrman refrains from doing so, realizing the power of the story she has uncovered speaks for itself. To editorialize on top of powerful narrative would wreck an impeccable biography.

Sometimes readers of biographies have to do the analysis for themselves, and to work out the relevance of a life like Nancy Guilford’s to the current moment. Conclusions are bound to differ, but what cannot be gainsaid is the consequences of a society in which concealment is itself a form of punishment. 

Mr. Rollyson is the host of a podcast: “A Life in Biography.”