Jeannie's Demise: Abortion on Trial in Victorian Ontario

by Ian Radforth

August 1, 1875, Toronto: The naked body of a young woman is discovered in a pine box, half-buried in a ditch along Bloor Street. So begins Jeannie’s Demise, a real-life Victorian melodrama that played out in the bustling streets and courtrooms of “Toronto the Good,” cast with all the lurid stock characters of the genre. Historian Ian Radforth brings to life an era in which abortion was illegal, criminal proceedings were a spectator sport, and coded advertisements for back-alley procedures ran in the margins of newspapers.


At the centre of the story is the elusive and doomed Jeannie Gilmour, a minister’s daughter whose independent spirit can only be glimpsed through secondhand accounts and courtroom reports. As rumours swirl about her final weeks and her abortionists stand trial for their lives, a riveted public grapples with questions of guilt and justice, innocence and intent. Radforth’s intensive research grounds the tragedy of Jeannie’s demise in sharp historical analysis, presenting over a dozen case studies of similar trials in Victorian-era Canada.



Part gripping procedural, part meticulous autopsy, Jeannie’s Demise opens a rare window into the hidden history of a woman’s right to choose.

258 pages, Paperback

First published October 26, 2020

Reviews

[Becky]

First sentence: Growing impatient, Lovell took an axe and broke open the box. Inside he found some straw, a white chemise, and the naked body of a young woman. A few hours later, Coroner E.C. Fisher held an inquest nearby at Mrs. Mantle’s Robin Hood Hotel on Dundas Street. Two physicians, who had already performed a post-mortem examination of the body, reported that the deceased was an otherwise robust and healthy woman whose death was caused by a violent abortion. The jury at the inquest concluded that there had been a wilful murder of “an unknown woman” by some “person or persons unknown.”

Premise/plot: Jeannie's Demise is an up-close-and-personal, behind-the-scenes glimpse at abortion on trial in Ontario Canada in 1875. In the summer of that year, Jeannie Gilmour got an abortion and died as a result of complications. That fall and winter her two abortionists--husband and wife--went on trial. This news story was covered widely and broadly. (Though for the record, the two were on trial for murdering Jeannie and not for murdering the unborn child.) The book chronicles the case in great depth giving background and context.

My thoughts: I love a good true crime book occasionally. This one fits into that category nicely enough. It is a detailed accounting of three trials: the first trial being that of the two accused abortionists (abortion was illegal in 1875), the second trial being that of the accused seducer, the third being that of a man accused of helping dispose of the body via a coffin in a wagon. Readers get a glimpse of how the police department worked the case, how the prosecution and defense handled the case, the evidence, the testimonies and witnesses. One also definitely got a glimpse of how the media reacted to the case AND influenced the case. One also saw some statistics.

If the book had kept this a book about the past, it perhaps would have set better with me. One could read about the facts of the case--in the past--without trying to moralize, preach, or reveal a modern AGENDA to the case.
It wasn't until the last page or possibly two that the pro-choice cause is championed and glorified. He leaves readers with a warning that there are some in the United States that want to rob women of their oh-so-human right to have access to abortions.

I think both pro-life and pro-choice readers can agree that illegal abortions can be dangerous and risky to women. But to be fair, in 1875 legal or illegal abortion would have been risky. As was childbirth itself it 1875. There was so much about germs and bacteria and care that doctors, midwives, nurses, the general public did not know that lives were put at risk. Medicine has come a long way since the nineteenth century.

[C.J. Johnson]

Jeannie’s Demise by Ian Radforth is a victorian melodrama that has a poor minister’s daughter who died getting an abortion. The horrible medical conditions along with the concept of who a young woman belongs to are enough to make you want to howl.

Jeannie is a minister’s daughter who comes to Toronto for a better life; she joins her family (and she wasn’t happy about being uprooted) and agrees to work on a farm. This was her past life because in those first few pages you meet her, Jeannie is dead and naked in a box. The box was half-buried in a ditch.

The abortionists are quickly caught and they go to trial to defend their actions. But what stands out so starkly is how little medical training they had and how little they cared. They were performing a service and that was all there was to it.

I really wanted the story to be more readable. The author did a ton of research. That’s definitely clear. But it’s presented in the way of a term paper. The author is using the story to provide readability when he should have framed the narrative in a way that makes it less like reading archive papers. It was an interesting book but could have been much more exciting.

[Kristine Morris]

A very thorough and in-depth look at the 1875 trial of an Arthur and Alice Davis, an abortionist couple responsible for the death of Jeannie Gilmour. The section that reviewed all previous deaths from the result of botches abortions is a bit depressing to read, but it provides very good overview of the cases that were known and pursued by law - a minority of cases no doubt.

As a historian, Radforth, presents a very matter-of-fact review of the case. He does not try in anyway to skew what a reader might think of Arthur and Alice David. And it's hard to know what to think. They knew the risks, but chose to provide illegal abortions that women would otherwise try on their own. They helped many young women, but some of their attempts resulted in death. What's not clear is if in the majority of cases the loss of life was due to incompetence (in this case is was probably due to Arthur Davis being drunk), or if abortionist, especially those that were not medical doctors, were a result of the limits of known medical procedure for that time.