The Murdered Children in Killingworth

A woman named Mrs. Higgins is thought to have lived on Firetower Road in the eighteenth century. She was said to have been possessed with a violent temper. On October 14th 1779, after having quarreled with her husband, she grasped a table knife and cut the throats of her three young children. She is reported to have made an attempt on her own life at the time of killing her children, but was prevented by her husband, and in after years always wore a black ribbon about her neck to cover the ugly trace of her savage rage. The victims of this bloody tragedy were buried in the Union District Cemetery.

There was at that time a belief that grass would not grow over the grave of a murdered person; and it is said that for a long time the lot where they laid these children was barren as a desert.

Mrs. Higgins was never prosecuted because she was believed to be insane. She subsequently resided in the Pine Orchard District, near the Episcopal Church. On that edifice there was a clock dial with stationary hands, and she was heard to say “When those pointers come together and stand at twelve, my sins will be pardoned." She also cherished the strange hope that her husband, who was separated from her, would return and that she would again be the mother of three children in place of her dead offspring. She is thought to be buried in the Pine Orchard District Cemetery in an unmarked grave.

The graves of the children were unmarked. In the Union District Cemetery on Roast Meat Hill Road today, there is a row of three graves marked by fieldstone headstones and footstones. The distance between the headstones and footstones is short indicating that these are the graves of children. They are not associated with any family plots so that it is quite possible that these are the graves of the murdered children. Very little grass grows over the graves.