Michael Emerson built a home near the village on the great road close to the house of William White. White was a stalwart of the settlement and one of its most prominent townsmen. While the Emersons were also early settlers of the town they were not considered founders, and certainly not in the same social standing. Emerson must have committed some grave indiscretion because it is evident that White disliked him and his family. As a result of this neighborly feud it was decided by the town that the Emersons should leave the village and “go back in the woods.” Michael was granted a tract of excellent land two miles west with generous acreage to entice their immediate and distant removal.

Elizabeth was the sixth of fifteen Emerson children and one of only nine to survive infancy. Mortality was very high among infants and many parents avoided early bonding as a result. Often times a baby was referred to as “it” rather than he or she until the toddler’s survival was assured. This psychology resulted in child rearing that was sometimes stern and often accompanied by corporal punishment. At age eleven Elizabeth was the victim of abuse from her short-tempered father who struck her with a farm instrument called a flail swingle and kicked her so severely that he was ultimately brought before the court for cruel and excessive beating of his daughter.

Young women were considered naturally weaker than men and a source of temptation in the frontier community. In April 1686 at age 23 Elizabeth gave birth to a daughter Dorothy. Illegitimate childbearing was not considered disreputable if the couple subsequently had a successful marriage. Michael Emerson insisted his neighbor’s son Timothy Swan was the father, perhaps hoping for matrimony. The contentious Robert Swan was so indignant by the claim that he threatened to “carry the case to Boston.” Nothing more was charged and Dorothy came into the world fatherless though rumor had it that one Samuel Ladd, a prominent family man from the village, was the real father.

Five years after the birth of Dorothy, Elizabeth was again the object of scandalous misfortune when she was arrested and charged with the murder of two illegitimate infants. On May 7, 1691 she gave birth to twins boys during the night, in a trundle at the foot of her parents bed. Distraught by her predicament she somehow managed to conceal the infants for three days, before sewing them up in a bag, and then burying them in the backyard of the Emerson homestead.
The following Sunday, while her parents were at church, a group of citizens responding to rumors that Elizabeth was pregnant went to the Emerson house. When they arrived Elizabeth was pale and very weak and submitted to an examination by the women without protest. In the meantime, the men went into the backyard and found the bodies of the two infants buried in a shallow grave.

The shocking revelations lead to an examination of facts by Nathaniel Saltonstall. Testimony implicated Samuel the son of the prominent Daniel Ladd of seduction and fornication for allegedly coercing Elizabeth from her home to a nearby tavern for more than one romantic liaison. The affair was probably carried on for all five years between the births of Dorothy and the twins, which should dispel any allegations of promiscuity. There is also a possibility that the twin boys were born prematurely and did not survive for natural reasons rather than at the hands of a murderous mother.

But Ladd denied all accusations of involvement and nothing more was made the claims. Saltonstall remanded Emerson to the custody of Boston authorities and in spite of her declarations of innocence Elizabeth spent two years in prison before she was hanged at Boston Common for infanticide following her coerced confession to Cotton Mather.

Ironically, four years later Mather would bestow fame and adulation on Elizabeth’s older sister Hannah Emerson Duston for an act that many in society would come to regard as more heinous than any of the sins committed by Elizabeth.