The Lives of Infamous Children

This article examines children's roles in infanticide cases in late nineteenth and early twentieth century Ontario. Using criminal and coroner case files, it argues for the value of fragmentary evidence to reveal the varied ways girls and boys participated in and reported on suspicious infant deaths. Children could be involved in helping to dispose of infant remains from births in their households and were otherwise witnesses to girls’ and women's reproductive crises. They advocated for their mothers who had been accused of infanticide. The article argues that age is a crucial category for the study of infanticide

Coroner · Dispose pattern · Environmental health · Infant mortality · Poison control · Population · Sociology · Suicide prevention · Canadian Identity and History · Demography · Gender Studies · Historical Studies on Reproduction, Gender, Health, and Societal Changes · History · Homicide, Infanticide, and Child Abuse · Medicine