Elizabeth Woodley was born in July 1799 in Bennington, Vermont. Her early life was marked by hardship; both of her parents died when she was around 8 years old. After their death, she was sent to live in Cambridge, New York. She received little to no formal education and was not raised with any strong religious background, something that may have influenced the choices she made later in life.

At the age of 20, Elizabeth married for the first time. She and her husband moved to Pennsylvania and started a family, having four children. After living there for six years, they relocated to an area near Johnstown, New York. Elizabeth lived in that region for the next 18 years, raising her children and managing the household.

In 1834, a year after her first husband’s death, Elizabeth remarried. Her second husband was John Van Valkenburgh, and together they had two more children. But this marriage, like the first, was deeply troubled. Elizabeth later confessed that John was a habitual drunk and that he physically and emotionally abused her and their children. She described frequent arguments, especially when he was intoxicated, and said he failed to provide for the family during his long drinking binges.

Elizabeth’s adult son from her first marriage had offered to buy her and the younger children a home in the western United States, a plan John strongly opposed. Tensions at home continued to rise. She recalled that John had been “on a frolic” for several weeks, never returning home sober or supporting his family. In desperation, Elizabeth bought arsenic and poisoned his tea, but he survived the initial dose. Weeks later, she made another attempt—this time mixing the poison into his brandy. This dose proved fatal. His death was slow, gruesome, and left Elizabeth deeply remorseful. In her written confession, she admitted, “If the deed could have been recalled, I would have done it with all my heart.”

After the murder, Elizabeth fled, hiding in a barn where she broke her leg after falling from a hayloft. Authorities quickly captured her. She was brought to trial, convicted in 1845, and sentenced to death. Public opinion was mixed—ten of the jurors and many citizens signed a petition for clemency, appealing to Governor Silas Wright. Despite her gender, her obesity, and the public sympathy over her poverty, the governor found no legal grounds to overturn the sentence.

Elizabeth Van Valkenburgh was executed on January 24, 1846.