POISONING BY ACONITIA OR ACONITINE. THE WIMBLEDON POISONING CASE—DR.
LAMSON.
UNDER this head of poisons, there is only one trial to report in
full, that of Dr. Lamson for the murder of his brother-in-law, Percy
Malcolm John, at Wimbledon, on Saturday, the 3rd of December, 1881,
for which he was tried before Mr. Justice Hawkins, at the Central
Criminal Court, on the 8th of March, 1882, and the five following days.
The especial difficulties in the way of detecting this preparation of
aconite, invested the case with more than usual interest to both the
medical and legal profession. The subsequent attempt by the convict’s
friends to induce the Home Secretary to delay his execution, in order
that his mental condition might be inquired into, backed as it was by
the American Government, kept alive the public interest to an unusual
extent, and bid fair to revive another such controversy as that which
followed, but with a different result, on the conviction of Smethurst.
By the kindness of Mr. W. A. Mills, Dr. Lamson’s solicitor, I have had
the advantage of reading the whole of the very numerous affidavits
tendered in support of this application, of which I have given a
summary at the close of the trial.[197]
Though the trial now reported is the only one in which aconitia was
employed, other forms of aconite have been used in previous cases. In
that of Dr. Pritchard it was administered in the form of tincture of
aconite, and as far back as 1841, in the case of _Reg._ v. _McConkey_,
it was administered as powdered aconite root. In this case the reputed
poisoner was tried at the Lent Assizes, Monaghan, and the medico-legal
investigation was conducted by the late Dr. Geoghegan, of Dublin. As
in Pritchard’s and Lamson’s cases, the medical evidence was beset with
difficulties, for no trace of the poison could be discovered in the
body, and it was only by a close analysis of symptoms and appearances
that the charge was brought home to the prisoner. The deceased had
eaten at his dinner some greens dressed for him by the prisoner: he
complained of their having a sharp taste, and this was perceived also
by another person present who tasted them. It was ascertained that
the deceased, soon after the meal, had vomited a greenish matter,
and suffered from purging, restlessness, incoherence, lockjaw, and
clenching of the hands. He died in about three hours after having eaten
the greens, but was not seen by a medical man while living. The chief
appearance met with was in the stomach, where the mucous membrane was
of a light reddish-brown colour. Traces of vegetable matter were found
in the intestines, but no poison could be detected, either botanically
or chemically. The symptoms suffered by a friend of the deceased,
who had accidentally tasted the greens, were very characteristic of
poisoning by aconite. In _two_ minutes he felt a burning heat in the
mouth, throat, gullet, and stomach; then a sensation of swelling in
the face, with a general feeling of numbness and creeping of the
skin. Restlessness, dimness of sight, and stupor almost amounting to
insensibility, followed; and in about an hour after the meal he was
found speechless—frothing at the nose and mouth, the hands and jaws
clenched, appearing occasionally as if dead, and then again reviving.
Vomiting, purging, tenderness at the pit of the stomach, cramps,
tingling of the flesh, and a burning taste in the mouth, followed. This
man did not entirely recover until after the lapse of five weeks. The
prisoner was convicted, and confessed before his execution that the
powdered root of Monkshood (aconite) had been mixed with pepper and
sprinkled over the greens.[198]
THE WIMBLEDON POISONING CASE.
_Before_ THE HON. MR. JUSTICE HAWKINS, _at the_ CENTRAL CRIMINAL
COURT, _March 9, and five following days, 1882_.
* * * * *
_For the Prosecution_: The Solicitor-General (Sir F. Herschel), Mr.
Poland, _and_ Mr. A. L. Smith.
_For the Defence_: Mr. Montagu Williams, Mr. C. Matthews, Mr. E.
Gladstone, _and_ Mr. W. S. Robson.
_George Henry Lamson_, surgeon, aged 29, was indicted for the murder of
his brother-in-law, Percy Malcolm John, at Blenheim House, Wimbledon,
on December 3rd, 1881.
HISTORY OF THE CASE.
In the winter of 1881, among the pupils at the school of Mr. Bedbrook,
of Blenheim House, Wimbledon, was Percy Malcolm John, the youngest of
the five children of a Manchester merchant, a lad of about nineteen
years of age, a sad sufferer from paralysis of the lower limbs produced
by curvature of the spine, but otherwise in a fair state of health.
Since the death of their mother in 1869, the children had been orphan
wards in Chancery, and previously to 1881, one brother and one sister
had died, under age, another sister had married a Mr. Chapman, and the
third the prisoner, a medical practitioner at Bournemouth, who was now
indicted for the murder of his brother-in-law. By the wills of their
parents, the children, as they came of age or married, were entitled
to the family property in equal shares, those of such as died under
age passing to the survivors. Hence, at the time of his death, Percy
John had property in expectance to the amount of £3,000, which, in the
event of his death as a minor, would be equally divided between his
two married sisters, and by the settlement made by Mrs. Lamson on her
marriage, her share would come into the hands of the prisoner.[199]
Though such a sad sufferer from paralysis as to be unable to move
about readily except in a wheel-chair, and only able to drag himself
backwards up a few stairs,[200] there were no symptoms of serious
bodily illness in the lad: his temper was good, and his intelligence
fair.
In his brother-in-law’s health Lamson appeared to take great interest,
visiting him at the school, having him to stay at his own house, and
sending to his master from America some medicines which he stated had
been found useful in that country in similar cases. On the 1st of
December, the prisoner wrote to the boy that he would come to see him
the next evening, before he left for Paris—a promise which he failed
to keep.[201] On the 3rd, however, about seven in the evening, he came,
bringing with him some sweets, a cake, and a box containing gelatine
capsules, which he told the master he had brought for him from America,
as convenient for enabling him to administer nauseous medicines to his
pupils. At this interview with his brother-in-law, he persuaded Mr.
Bedbrook, who was present, to take one of these capsules to try how
easily they were swallowed. Whilst doing so, the master noticed that
the prisoner was filling another with some powdered sugar, which he
had asked for, on the plea of destroying the alcohol in some wine of
which he was partaking. When he had put in the sugar, the prisoner,
turning to the lad, shook up the capsule, saying, “It has to be shaken
in order that the medicine may go to the bottom. You are good at
taking medicine; take this.” The boy swallowed the capsule, and within
a few minutes after, the prisoner, saying that he wanted to catch the
tidal-train for Paris, left the school-house. In about twenty minutes
afterwards Percy complained of heartburn, gradually became worse, was
carried up to bed, and vomited largely in the closet.[202] “He felt,”
he said, “as he had done in the previous August when the prisoner gave
him a pill in the Isle of Wight.” He was in great pain, violently
restless, and with difficulty kept down by those who were holding him.
After more simple remedies had failed to relieve him, the doctors
who had been called in injected morphia under the skin, which had a
temporary effect. This was subsequently repeated, but with no apparent
result, and shortly afterwards he died, within four hours of swallowing
the capsule. The _post-mortem_ examination revealed no signs of such
a natural form of disease as would account for his sudden death—the
only sign of disease being the long-standing curvature of the spine,
distressing, but at that time innocuous. A chemical analysis of the
stomach and other parts of the body was had, and, so far as the present
state of scientific knowledge could decide, it was the firm opinion of
the experienced analysts Drs. Stevenson and Dupré, that death was due
to an irritant vegetable poison, and that that poison was aconitia,
a most highly poisonous vegetable alkaloid, containing the active
principle of aconite, the product of the root of monkshood.
Suspicion naturally fell on the prisoner, and was greatly increased
when it was discovered that a few days before his last visit to the
boy he had purchased aconitia in London, and that previously to the
illness of the deceased in the Isle of Wight, the prisoner had also
purchased of a druggist at Shanklin some of this deadly poison. In the
meantime the prisoner had gone to Paris, whence on the 8th of December
he unexpectedly returned, presented himself to the police at Scotland
Yard, in consequence, as he said, of the reports he had seen in the
papers, and, apparently to his surprise, was taken into custody.
Other incidents in the prisoner’s career and conduct gradually came
to light. Whilst in practice as a surgeon at Bournemouth he had been
in great pecuniary difficulties, though he had received his share of
the property of that one of the children who had died a minor; an
execution had been put into his house, and at the time of the murder he
was admittedly in straitened circumstances. Again, in the boy’s boxes
at school, in addition to some genuine quinine powders purchased of a
chemist in the Isle of Wight, and proved to be free from poison, which
had been sent to the boy by the prisoner, were three heavily charged
with aconitia, and two pills containing this deadly drug. Again, he had
written to the boy on the 1st of December that he would call on him on
his way to Paris the next day. He went to Wimbledon, however, on the
evening of the 2nd, with his friend, a Mr. Tulloch, whom he left at the
station, whilst he professed to have gone to the school, and to whom he
said that “he had seen his brother-in-law, who was much worse, and that
he did not expect he would live long, and that he would not go on to
Paris that night, as Mr. Bedbrook, who was a director of a continental
line, had told him that there was a bad boat on.” All this was untrue.
He had never been to the school, and Mr. Bedbrook had nothing to do
with any continental line. He had invented the whole story.
In the trial that followed, the interest centred on the impossibility
of detecting vegetable poisons by any chemical tests, and on the
necessity, as in Dr. Pritchard’s case, with aconite, of relying on
the test of tasting the extract from the various parts of the body.
On this test, supported by the effects observed on injecting drops of
the extract under the skins of mice, which successively died of the
operation, and exhibited the same symptoms before death as resulted
from similar injections of pure aconitia, depended the proof that
the death resulted from this poison. I proceed therefore to give the
medical and analytical evidence in detail.
EVIDENCE OF MEDICAL ATTENDANTS.
_Dr. Berry_, of Wimbledon, the regular medical attendant at the school,
who had known the deceased for a year and a half, and only had occasion
to attend him twice during that time, once for vaccination, and another
time for an eruption on the skin, his state of health being otherwise
good, gave the following account of the symptoms:—
“On Saturday, Dec. 3, I arrived at the school about five minutes to
nine p.m., and was taken by Mr. Bedbrook to Percy John’s room.[203] He
was in bed, and partly undressed, and in great pain in the stomach. He
also complained of the skin of his face being drawn, and that there
was a sense of constriction in the throat, in consequence of which he
was unable to swallow. He was retching and vomiting; the vomit was a
small quantity of dark-coloured fluid. I asked him shortly after the
cause of his illness (Mr. Bedbrook had previously made a communication
to me), and said to Percy, ‘Did your brother-in-law ever give you
quinine pills before?’ He said, ‘Yes, at Shanklin.’ I said, ‘Did it
make you like this before?’ ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘but not so bad.’ There
is nothing in ordinary quinine pills to produce such symptoms. I
did not form an opinion at that time to what the symptoms were due.
During an interval of the vomiting I had some white of egg beaten
up in water given to him, which he was able to swallow, and had hot
linseed poultices placed on his stomach. He was very restless on the
bed—violently so, throwing himself backwards and forwards and from
side to side. Several people held him to prevent him from injuring
himself. He did not improve at all under this treatment. Hearing that
Dr. Little, a medical man of Wimbledon, was in the house, I had him
sent for, and in about twenty or twenty-five minutes after I had been
in the room he came. I consulted him, and we determined to inject
some morphia. I left the house to get the morphia and an instrument,
being away five to ten minutes. When I returned the deceased was
not better, and I injected a quarter of a grain of morphia under
the skin, over the region of the stomach. This was done about ten
o’clock. The symptoms abated somewhat about half-past ten, but not
very much. They were still all present, but in a modified degree, and
then they returned again a little before eleven as severely as before
the injection of the morphia. A little before eleven the deceased
asked to have the morphia injected again. He complained then of pain
in his body, but not in any particular part. I then about eleven
injected one-sixth of a grain of morphia in the same place as before,
but it had no apparent effect. In about ten minutes he became a little
unconscious and wandering. That was the first time I noticed it. His
breathing became slower and sighing, and the heart’s action weaker and
weaker, and he died about twenty minutes after eleven.”
In his account of the symptoms and the progress of the case until the
deceased’s death, Dr. Berry was fully confirmed by Dr. Little, who
added that at that time they were of opinion that the death was due to
an irritant poison. _Dr. Berry_ then gave the results of
THE _POST-MORTEM_ EXAMINATION.
“After his death Dr. Little and I collected some of the vomit which
had been caught in a basin in the bedroom. (He had previously vomited
in the closet.) I also collected some from the floor of the bedroom
and the closet, and the whole was put into a cup together, and thence
into a clean bottle, which was sealed with my own seal, and given to
Mr. Bond on the day of the _post-mortem_ examination.
“On Tuesday, Dec. 6th, Mr. Bond, Dr. Little, and myself, made a
_post-mortem_ examination. I made some notes at the time which I have
here. With the exception of the paralysis of the lower limbs, he was
a particularly well-developed, muscular lad. The brain was slightly
congested superficially, as well as the substance of the brain itself.
By superficially, I mean the membranes. There was no fluid in the
ventricles of the brain, nor under the membranes. The pupils of the
eyes were dilated; the lips pale and the tongue bleached; in the
right lung were some old adhesions at the apex, between the lung and
the chest wall, the result of inflammation at some previous time.
Both lungs were healthy, but considerably congested in the lower
part. The heart was healthy muscularly, the valves also healthy; _it
was almost entirely empty and flaccid_. There was a small quantity
of fluid in the _pericardium_. The liver was normal in size, but
intensely congested. The kidneys were also normal in size, but much
congested, and the spleen was also congested but normal in size.
The stomach had the mucous membrane congested throughout. Under the
surface, near the large end of the stomach, were six or eight small
yellowish-grey patches, slightly raised, about the size of a small
bean. Towards the smaller end of the stomach were two or three similar
smaller spots. I believe that they were the result of inflammation,
caused recently before death. The stomach contained three or four
ounces of dark fluid, which was carefully preserved, and of which
Mr. Bond took charge. I examined the _duodenum_, the first part of
which was greatly congested, and there were patches of congestion on
other parts of the small intestines. Portions of the intestines were
taken care of by Mr. Bond, who also took possession of the stomach
itself and portions of the liver, with the gall bladder, both of the
kidneys and the spleen. The bladder contained three or four ounces of
urine, which was drawn off and taken possession of by Mr. Bond. There
were no traces of inflammation in the _peritoneum_. The membranes of
the spinal cord were greatly congested. Except the appearance of the
lungs and the curvature of the spine, these were all the appearances
I noted in the _post-mortem_ examination. There was nothing in the
_post-mortem_ examination to account for death from natural causes.
I should say that he died from the effect of some irritant poison,
the administration of which would, I believe, account for all the
appearances. Aconitia is a vegetable alkaloid poison, and the
appearances would be consistent with a fatal dose of that poison, but
I have no special knowledge on the subject.”
On _cross-examination_, the witness repeated, in several forms, that
he had no special knowledge of aconitia, but some of aconite as used
internally for cancer, erysipelas, and other complaints, and was unable
to say whether a grain of aconitia blended into 20 pills would be good
for curvature of the spine, and that the remedies he applied were for
the violent irritation of the stomach from which up to the time of his
death he believed the deceased was suffering.
“At the _post-mortem_ I examined the spinal cord and the spinal
curvature. The cord was healthy, but congested. The existence of
paralysis is consistent with a healthy spinal cord, but not with
healthy bone and healthy intervertebral cartilages. I did not examine
the condition of the arteries in the neighbourhood of the curvature.”
_Mr. Williams._—“Are you not aware that there are many cases on
record of death having resulted from the effects of pressure on the
arteries in the regions of these curvatures?”
_Witness._—“No; but I am not prepared to say that there are not such
cases.”
_Mr. Williams._—“Will you undertake to say that death did not result
from such a cause as that?”
_Witness._—“I cannot undertake to say. I did not examine to see the
effect of the spinal curvature on the position of the lungs.”
_Mr. Williams._—“Nor what its effect was on the heart?”
_Witness._—“No.”
_Mr. Williams._—“Do you not know that the lungs are very much
displaced in some cases of spinal curvature?”
_Witness._—“Yes, they are.”
_Mr. Williams._—“Is not the heart very much displaced?”
_Witness._—“Yes.”
_Mr. Williams._—“You say this irritation of the stomach was
consistent with poisoning with vegetable alkaloids, and yet you have
never seen a case of such poisoning?”
_Witness._—“I have not; I did not take means to ascertain whether the
appearances were _post-mortem_. I know—only from Taylor’s ‘Medical
Jurisprudence’—that vegetable alkaloids have produced these symptoms.”
On _re-examination_, the witness said that “he could not think that the
death was caused by anything he saw in the curvature of the spine; that
if death had been caused by pressure on the arteries, he should not
have expected to find the symptoms of irritation in the stomach which
existed after death; that displacement of the lungs and heart had not
been, in this case, produced by the curvature of the spine, and, if
there had been much displacement of either, he could not have failed
to observe it.” Dr. Little was equally inexperienced with Dr. Berry in
cases of poisoning, but agreed with him that the curvature of the spine
in the lumbar region had not displaced either the lungs, the stomach,
or the heart, and that the patches on the surface of the stomach were
of recent date—“might have existed for days, but not for weeks, but
not without the patient suffering.”
_Mr. Bond_, the Lecturer on Forensic Medicine at the Westminster
Hospital, detailed the various portions of the body which he put aside
for chemical analysis and delivered to Dr. Dupré; the receipt of two
pills given to him by Dr. Berry, one of which was taken out of one of
the capsule boxes after the boy’s death, and the other brought to Dr.
Berry whilst he was in attendance on the deceased, and two packets
of sweets, and part of a cake. He further confirmed the evidence of
Dr. Berry as to the results of the _post-mortem_ examination, with
the exception, that Dr. Berry had omitted to state that “the whole
of the lungs were somewhat congested, and the anterior part of them
exceedingly so, and that the body was not decomposed.” In his opinion
there was nothing to account for death from natural causes, and
he attributed it to poisoning by some vegetable alkaloid, such as
aconitia, a fatal dose of which could be given in one of the capsules.
The appearances on the _post-mortem_ examination were, he considered,
such as he should expect to find in death by aconitia. He agreed also
with the other medical men that the grey patches on the stomach were
recent, due to intense irritation, and would cause the deceased great
pain, and induce vomiting. On the question of the probable effect
of the curvature of the spine, he gave the following most material
evidence:—
“The principal curvature was in the lower part of the body; in the
upper part of the spine there was slight anti-posterior or forward
curvature, but it was not enough to affect the position of the heart
or lungs relatively to each other. The cavities of the chest appeared
to me to be deeper from before backward than usual. The heart was in
its right position, except perhaps that it was higher up in the body
than is normal. In the lower region there was a good deal of lateral
curvature. I examined the spinal cord down to the end of the dorsal
vertebræ, and I found the membranes very much congested, but otherwise
it was quite healthy, to all appearance. I did not examine it with a
microscope. In the lower lumbar region I did not open the canal, for
it was very twisted, and I had difficulty in getting it open. No
disease there could have caused sudden death. The curvature appeared
to be of long standing; the bones were very hard, and there was no
active disease there. I think it impossible that death could have been
caused by pressure produced by the curvature on one of the arteries.”
The _cross-examination_ of Mr. Bond by Mr. Williams was directed,
_first_, to whether the time at which after taking the dose the
symptoms might be expected to show, depended on its amount. Of this the
witness had no knowledge, but considered that that would be determined
by the fulness or emptiness of the stomach; and _secondly_, whether he
would expect to find in the stomach the amount of poison that would
cause death. On this last point the following questions and answers
must be reported:—
_Mr. Williams._—“Would you, supposing death had been occasioned by
aconitia, expect to find the amount of poison that had caused death,
or would it have disappeared?”
_Mr. Bond._—“I believe it would be possible to use so small a dose
that it could not be found in the stomach.”
_Mr. Williams._—“Supposing death caused by aconitia, would you expect
to find the actual amount that caused death?”
_Mr. Bond._—“That would depend on the amount. My opinion is that if
death was caused by an ordinary amount, traces would be found.”
_Mr. Williams._—“Of the amount that caused death?”
_Mr. Bond._—“Not of all.”
_Mr. Williams._—“And you say aconitia enough to cause death might
leave no trace in the stomach?”
_Mr. Bond._—“Not of aconitia in the stomach.”
_Mr. Williams._—“Do you agree with this: ‘that the poison found on
analysis would be over and above that used up in causing death?’”
_Mr. Bond._—“No; I should not agree to that, unless it means that so
small a quantity had been absorbed, causing death, leaving a larger
amount which did not cause death. What I mean is, that the poison
which may have caused death has been removed from the stomach to other
organs, and it is quite possible that a larger amount may be left
behind in the stomach than the portion which has been removed, and
caused death.”
_Mr. Williams._—“Do you mean that it would be decomposed in causing
death?”
_Mr. Bond._—“I do not know whether it would or not. I think not. I
will not give a decided answer one way or the other. I have no idea.”
_Mr. Williams._—“‘Guy and Ferrier on Forensic Medicine’ is one of the
first authorities, is it not?”
_Mr. Bond._—“Yes, I think so.”
_Mr. Williams._—“Do you agree with this, in regard to aconitia, ‘that
the commencement of the symptoms may be in a few minutes or in one or
two hours’?”
_Mr. Bond._—“I do not know anything about poisoning by the alkaloid
aconitia, so I cannot say one way or other.”
_Mr. Williams._—“I understood you to say, that the ventricles of the
heart were both empty?”
_Mr. Bond._—“The ventricles and auricles were both empty.”
_Mr. Williams._—“Can you produce any case on record where such a
symptom as that has appeared in poisoning by aconitia?”
_Mr. Bond._—“No, I cannot produce any case on record of poisoning by
aconitia.”
On _re-examination_, the witness declined to speak more positively on
this point, on the ground that he was a surgeon, and therefore had not
had experience in the pathology of such cases. His only experience in
poisoning by alkaloids had been in a case of strychnia. In reply to
the Judge, he admitted “that other vegetable poisons, even a strong
solution of oil of mustard, would produce the same congestion of the
stomach, and the same yellow marks as had been found; that a vegetable
alkaloid would pass within a minute from the stomach into the blood,
and that it would be more likely to be found in the liver, kidneys, and
urine, than in the heart; he did not know whether strychnia had been
found in the heart when not discoverable in the blood and the urine.”
ANALYTICAL EVIDENCE.
_Dr. Thomas Stevenson_, Lecturer on Medical Jurisprudence and Chemistry
at Guy’s Hospital, and Examiner in Forensic Medicine at the London
University, after enumerating the various matters handed to him and
Dr. Dupré by Mr. Bond for analysis,[204] and stating that the methods
of it were arranged with his colleague, the manual operations carried
out by both of them, and the results of those performed by Dr. Dupré
examined by himself, gave the following evidence, which must be
reported in full.
“The bottle marked ‘A’ contained portions of the liver, spleen, and
kidney. To that was applied Stas’s process. I obtained an alkaloidal
extract which contained a trace of morphia, and which, placed on the
tongue, gave a faint sensation like that produced by aconitia. I
reserved that for experiments. To the bottle ‘2,’ which contained
part of the bowels, large and small, I applied the same process. I
obtained an extract which I have done nothing further with—that
is to say, I have not tested the extract. No. 3 contained a fluid,
the contents of the stomach, 3½ ozs. This was treated in a somewhat
similar way. The fluid contained a raisin and a piece of fruit like
the top of a carrot or an apple. From that fluid I obtained, by Stas’s
process, an alkaloidal extract, which was distinctive, and produced
a very faint sensation, like that of aconitia. When placed on the
tongue, burning of the lips was produced, though the extract did not
touch the lips. Burning, tingling—a kind of numbness peculiar but
difficult to define; a salivation creating a desire to expectorate,
a sensation at the back of the throat of swelling up, and this was
followed by a peculiar seared sensation of the tongue, as if a hot
iron had been drawn over it, or some strong caustic placed on it. I
reserved that alkaloidal extract also for physiological experiments.
No. 4 D contained a human stomach, and 7 ozs. of spirits added to
preserve the stomach. I observed that the stomach was reddened, I
think from congestion, in the region of the greater curvature, and
posteriorly. At one part there was a little pit as if a blister or
inflammatory effusion of lymph had broken. From the stomach and liquid
in the bottle I made an extract by Stas’s process, and obtained an
alkaloidal extract. That I reserved; but I tasted it, and it had no
particular taste that I could recognize. Next was No. 5 E, containing
the urine, 6 ozs. I opened it in Dr. Dupré’s presence. He found that
4 ozs. of urine had had 2 ozs. of spirit added to preserve it. I made
an extract from a portion of that liquid—three-fourths. I obtained an
alkaloidal extract which contained a trace of morphia. By a further
process I obtained more morphia, but the first alkaloid I referred to
was more than could be accounted for by the morphia I obtained. Some
of this extract was placed upon my tongue. It produced the effects of
aconitia, which I have already described, in a marked degree, and a
peculiar burning sensation extending downwards towards the stomach.”
_By the Judge._—“I have 50 or 80 alkaloids in my possession, and I
have tasted most of them.”
_The Solicitor-General._—“How long did the effects last?”
_Witness._—“About four hours—not all the effects, but the burning on
the tongue did. I made an experiment on about one-third of the urine.
I injected it beneath the skin of a mouse. The animal was obviously
affected in two minutes. From that time it exhibited symptoms of
poisoning, and died in 30 minutes. I made some experiments on mice
from Morson’s aconitia, which I procured for the purpose. I injected
some of that, after dissolving it, under the skins of several mice.
It operated on the mice in a manner which was undistinguishable from
the effect of the urine. The effects of the two I might say were
ridiculously alike. Tartaric acid was previously used on a mouse in
the same quantities and was found inoperative. I retained portions
of the extract made from the liver, spleen, and kidneys, from the
stomach, and from the contents of the stomach. All contained an
alkaloid; two giving a slight taste of aconitia, and the third no
taste. I then mixed together the alkaloidal extracts, Nos. 1, 3, and
4, and I injected it under the skin of a mouse, in the same manner,
and it produced effects on the mouse, in nine minutes from that time,
of severe symptoms of poisoning, and the animal died in 22 minutes.
These symptoms were precisely similar to those produced by Morson’s
aconitia. No. 6, the vomit, contained nearly ten ounces, or half a
pint, of thick, pasty fluid stuff, with which also were spirits of
wine. Dr. Dupré pointed out marks showing that to 5oz. of vomit 5oz.
of spirit had been added. There was a good deal of solid matter in
the vomit, which must have been of a solid character. I examined the
solid portion and found it consisted of pieces of fat, a very small
portion of the muscular fibre of some animal, pieces of onion, a
little starch, probably that of wheat, a slice of candied peel like
that put on the top of cake, a piece of apple pulp, raisins, and some
pineapple, with just the odour of pineapple drops. I subsequently
examined with the microscope the vomit again, the solid portions, to
see if I could find anything corresponding to the root of aconite or
the root of horseradish. I found neither. I made an extract from the
vomit, and obtained an alkaloidal extract. The extract had no trace of
morphia or of quinine. I applied it to the tongue with a very powerful
result, such as that of aconitia. The severe forms of attack lasted
for 6½ hours; it lasted for that time, though the effects did not then
cease. I took 1-24th part for experiment on a mouse. I injected it
into the back of a mouse. It was severely affected in 2½ minutes, the
symptoms continuing till the time of its death, 15½ minutes after.
Those symptoms were parallel with those of aconitia. In my judgment
the vomit submitted to me contained a considerable quantity of
aconitia.”
_Question._—“Can you fix what quantity?”
_Answer._—“Approximately it was not less than one-seventh, and not
more than one-fourth of a grain.”
_Question._—“What would be a fatal dose of aconitia to a human being?”
_Answer._—“There is only one fatal case I know of, and in that
death was caused by about one-sixteenth of a grain. What is known to
have caused death was not less than one-twenty-first of a grain, and
not more than one-thirteenth. Each of the boxes produced contained
capsules. There were only two pills in them. They were gelatine-coated
pills, like those in the bottle. I examined those pills, or rather I
saw Dr. Dupré do so. They were simply five-grain quinine pills.”
_Question._—“The packet of sweetmeats, No. 8. Did they contain any
traces of poison?”
_Answer._—“No.”
_Question._—“No. 9, the cake?”
_Answer._—“That contained no traces of poison of any kind.”
_Question._—“No. 10, the capsules, did you examine them?”
_Answer._—“They are simply gelatine capsules.”
_Question._—“You have told us there were some pills loose?”
_Answer._—“Yes; there were four, and they were similar to those I
have just referred to, quinine, gelatine-coated pills. There was some
sugar in a paper. Some of the powders were in larger papers than
others; six were in large. They contained 1½ grains of disulphate
of quinine. There were 14 smaller papers containing powders. They
were tied together in a bundle numbering from 7 to 20. They varied
considerably in weight, the lowest weighed 6-10ths of a grain, the
highest 1⅛ grains. Three of the powders differed in appearance. The
average weight of those which were quinine were 9-10ths of a grain. I
examined those powders, and I found they consisted, eleven of them,
7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 18, and 20, of disulphate of quinine
simply, the ordinary quinine powders, but varying considerably in
weight, from 3-10ths of a grain up to 1¼ grains. Of the other three,
my attention was drawn to No. 16 by Dr. Dupré; it was a different
colour, as also were Nos. 17 and 19. No. 16 was an obvious mixture;
there were two substances clearly to a chemist, who would have noticed
the mixture at once. It was a very pale fawn, the mixture; the other
was a pure white. No. 16 weighed 1-8/10 grs. or 1·79 grs. No. 17
weighed ·88 of a grain; No. 19 weighed 1·26, or about 1¼ grs. In the
No. 16, which appeared to be a mixture, it looked as if the quinine
had been damaged. I tasted it, and in about three minutes a startling
sensation came on. The sensation was severe for three hours, and then
gradually went away after dinner.”
_Question._—“Did you make a special examination of the pills?”
_Answer._—“Yes.”
_Question._—“What amount of aconitia was in the pills?”
_Answer._—“Decimal 83. In the quinine pills there was ·96. I tested
the action of this quinine on a mouse. In three and a half minutes
after I had administered it the effect was the same as before. In
No. 17 there was aconitia, and in 19 there was aconitia; I cannot
tell you how much. In 17 and 19 I noticed the difference in colouring
between the ordinary quinine powders. The proportion of aconitia was
considerably less in 16 as compared with 19.”
_Question._—“Is it usual to wrap pills in tinfoil?”
_Answer._—“No.”
_Question._—“Or to put them in boxes of this description?”
_Answer._—“Oh, no.”
_Question._—“Were these two pills examined by yourself and Dr. Dupré?”
_Answer._—“Yes; one weighed 3 grs. and another 2¾. There was nothing
particular in the appearance. There was a little bitterness at first
with the 2¾ grain pill. I cut out a small piece with a penknife.
We all took a little piece, I only took the 22nd part of a grain.
Part of it was used for the microscope. It caused intense burning.
The bitterness of quinine was followed by intense burning, and the
same symptoms I have already described, but of a more severe kind. I
injected some of that into the back of a mouse. It exhibited symptoms
of poisoning, was very ill in two minutes, and it died in 4½ minutes.
I came to the conclusion that there was ·45 of a grain of aconitia
in that pill, or nearly half a grain. No. 12 was the sherry. I found
no trace of poison in that, nor in the wafers. I have said the urine
contained aconitia, showing that the poison had been absorbed into
the blood, had passed through the tissues of the body, and had become
excreted. I have said I found in the extracts traces of morphia. I
have heard of the injection of morphia by Dr. Little and Dr. Berry
during the last hour of the boy’s illness. The traces I found were
such as I should have expected to find from that, both in the urine
and probably in the liver too.”
_Question._—“Could a fatal dose of aconitia be administered in such a
capsule as this?”
_Answer._—“Oh, yes. Many times a fatal dose. I have put into one a
grain of aconitia, and into another a half-grain.”
[Capsules produced by Witness, and shown to Judge and Jury, to show
how little space in the capsule was occupied even by the grain of
aconitia.]
Witness continued.—“The symptoms lasted after tasting the pill 7½
hours, notwithstanding having taken a meal.”
_Question._—“Supposing aconitia taken in a capsule of this
description, would it prevent a taste on the tongue?”
_Answer._—“Oh, yes.”
_Question._—“I believe there is no test of aconitia?”
_Answer._—“No specific or characteristic chemical test.”
_Question._—“What are the tests?”
_Answer._—“We can tell chemically that it is an alkaloid. Then
there is the physiological test, the effect on the tongue and the
neighbouring parts, and its general effect on the system if taken in
any quantity. Then the other physiological test is that it will kill,
after a definite course of symptoms, as shown in my experiments with
the mice.”
_Question._—“Have you any doubt that you did find aconitia in the
portions of the body you examined and in the vomit?”
_Answer._—“Not the least. I have heard the description of the
deceased boy. He had symptoms such as would arise from poisoning by
aconite. His symptoms approached more nearly to those caused by that
than any other poison. Judging from the symptoms discovered at the
_post-mortem_ examination, I should say that he died from poisoning by
aconitia.”
_Question._—“Is aconitia a medicine commonly used for spinal diseases
in this country?”
_Answer._—“No.”
_Question._—“I do not know if you are aware of its use here by
medical men?”
_Answer._—“No; the British Pharmacopœia orders it for external use,
but makes no mention of any dose for internal use. It was formerly
tried a quarter of a century ago, or thirty years ago, but it was
given up because it was too dangerous.”
On _cross-examination_ by _Mr. Williams_, after he had stated that he
had never seen an acknowledged death from aconitia, but founded his
opinion not only from tasting, testing, and the experiments on mice,
but from his reading, and that he knew that it was used in France
and Germany, but not that it was sold at the French chemist’s in the
Haymarket as a patent medicine, the examination proceeded as follows:—
_Question._—“Do you know Guibert’s French book on chemistry?”
_Answer._—“Yes; I know the book. I have it in my possession.”
_Question._—“Would you look at that book—is that it?”
_Answer._—“Yes; that is the book.”
_Question._—“Do you there find a formula for pills with aconitia in
them?”
_Answer._—“Yes.”
_Question._—“And drops?”
_Answer._—“Yes.”
_Question._—“For internal use?”
_Answer._—“No. The drops are for dropping in the ear; the pills are
for internal use.”
_Question._—“Also for ointment?”
_Answer._—“Yes.”
_Question._—“And in the British Pharmacopœia you will find ‘Unguentum
Aconitiæ,’ 8 grains of aconitia to 1 ounce of lard?”
_Answer._—“Yes.”
_Question._—“Is Sidney Ringer an acknowledged authority on
therapeutics?”
_Answer._—“Yes.”
_Question._—“Do you know his books?”
_Answer._—“Yes.”
_Question._—“Do you agree with this:—‘Aconite is used externally in
the form of liniment or ointment to relieve pain?”
_Answer._—“Yes.”
_Question._—“The ‘Unguentum Aconitiæ’ alludes to aconitia, does it
not?”
_Answer._—“Yes, the ointment does.”
_Question._—“Is that applied in neuralgic cases?”
_Answer._—“Yes, it is used in neuralgia and rheumatism.”
_Question._—“Do you agree with the statement, ‘That a piece of
ointment the size of a bean or nut should be applied with friction,
which enhances its efficacy?’”
_Answer._—“Yes, to the skin.”
_Question._—“A piece the size of a bean would contain half a grain of
aconitia, would it not?”
_Answer._—“Yes.”
_Question._—“Do you agree that the application in such a case will
cut short pain?”
_Answer._—“Yes.”
_Question._—“And prevent sickness?”
_Answer._—“I do not know about that. Sickness is not a usual symptom
in neuralgia and rheumatism.”
_Question._—“Do you agree with this, that ‘Aconite diminishes
sensibility, and it has been used internally in various painful
diseases?’”
_Answer._—“Yes, aconite.”
_Question._—“Have you heard of the use of aconitia in typhoid fever?”
_Answer._—“No; I have heard of its use in fevers generally, but not
in typhoid.”
_Question._—“In the _Journal of Medicine_, No. 27, March, 1882, by
Dr. Phipson—--“[205]
The _Solicitor-General_ objected that that was something written
within a few days.
_Mr. M. Williams._—“Then I will put this question generally. Have you
heard of its use internally in severe cases of fever?”
_Answer._—“Yes, I have heard of its use in fever, but not in typhoid.”
_Question._—“Have you heard of its use in pleuro-pneumonia?”
_Answer._—“Yes, in very minute doses; it is recommended in a journal
of medicine which is edited by a man who is not a medical man.”
_Question._—“Your collaborateur, Dr. Dupré, is not a medical man, is
he?”
_Answer._—“No.”
_Question._—“With regard to the symptoms—the dilated pupils—are
they not invariably dilated three days after death?”
_Answer._—“After a natural death. The surface of the tongue being
rough is no sure sign of aconitia poisoning. Congestion of the brain
has been observed in aconite poisoning, but is no sure sign.”
_Question._—“Has bloody fluid in the bag of the heart been met with
in aconitia poisoning?”
_Answer._—“Yes.”
_Question._—“Would you expect to find the ventricles and auricles
empty?”
_Answer._—“It has been observed in poisoning by preparations of
aconitia; but in the only case of aconitia poisoning I know of
the state of the heart is not mentioned. You will find it in the
_Philadelphia Journal of Medicine_ of November last.”[206]
_Question._—“Is congested liver a sign of aconitia poisoning?”
_Answer._—“The congestion of the internal viscera is an important
sign of poisoning by aconitia. The congestion could be caused by
various means. The kidneys being congested was consistent with
aconite poisoning, but not dependent on it. The same could be said
of congestion of the spleen. I am prepared to admit that cases may
have occurred in which congestion has been caused without poison. The
patches in the stomach may have existed days before death, but not
without causing pain. I commenced the analysis of the contents of the
stomach on the 10th of December. I commenced the analysis of the vomit
the same day. I commenced to examine the urine the same day.”
_Question._—“You say the bottle C, No. 3, contained matter from which
you extracted an alkaloidal extract. Would you expect to find an
alkaloid from morphia in the contents of the stomach?”
_Answer._—“No; but I should expect to find it in the urine, and I
found in that more alkaloid than was consistent with morphia. That
requires the most delicate test. By a further extraction I got a
little more morphia.”
_Question._—“The precise process I ask you for in testing the
alkaloidal extract.”
_Answer._—“I took half the contents of the stomach. I mixed it with
such a quantity of rectified spirit as, with the spirit previously
added by Dr. Dupré, made the proportion of spirit two volumes of
spirit to one volume of matter. The liquid I took was acid in
reaction. The liquid stood over from Sunday to Monday. It was then
filtered. The insoluble part was well washed with rectified spirit.
The clear liquid was then evaporated at a temperature below that
of the human body, till it was almost solid. The portion I had not
dissolved in spirit was then treated with an additional quantity of
spirit, to which a little quantity of tartaric acid was added. The
mixture was then warmed to 140 deg. Fahr. It was then cooled. The
insoluble part was well washed with spirit, and the clear liquid
evaporated at a temperature below that of the human body. A fairly
solid residue was obtained. I now obtained two alcoholic extracts,
each of which was treated in a precisely similar manner, but
separately, by digesting them with warm absolute alcohol, or rather
tepid, till the alcohol would take up and dissolve nothing more. The
solutions in absolute alcohol were filtered and evaporated nearly
to dryness. They were then treated with a little water. They were
found to be acid in reaction, and the two solutions—that is to say,
that from the plain spirit, and the other from the tartaric acid
spirit—were mixed. Care was taken that they remained just faintly
acid, and the solution was then agitated with washed ether. The ether
was allowed to separate; it was drawn off, and replaced by fresh
ether. This operation was carried out five times. The ether was set
apart, and allowed to evaporate at a temperature below boiling point;
that was reserved as not containing any alkaloid. The residue was oily
and partially dissoluble with water; it was of a brownish colour. It
was not weighed, but was a very appreciable quantity.”
_Question._—“Were these tests conducted for aconitia only?”
_Answer._—“Oh, no; I tested for other poisons. The aqueous liquid
which separated from the ether was made alkaline by carbonate of
soda, and it was then agitated with a mixture of washed ether and
washed chloroform. The ether-chloroform solution was then allowed to
separate, drawn off, replaced by washed ether, the ether again drawn
off, and again replaced by ether, which was again drawn off. These
chloroform-ether mixtures were mixed and evaporated, and finally dried
in vacuo over oil of vitriol. Before it was placed in the vacuum, I
examined it to see if there were any volatile alkaloids, which would
be distinguished by their peculiar odour. There were none. I then
weighed it, after drying, and found its weight ·108 of a grain, or
rather more than 1-10th of a grain. It was slightly crystalline in
appearance. I tasted it, putting a little on my tongue. That was one
of my taste tests.”
_Question._—“That was afterwards dissolved, and part of it was
applied to the mouse?”
_Answer._—“Yes, but I had previously tested it for an alkaloid. I
went through the same operation with the vomit and the urine, with
only minor differences of details here and there as occasion required.”
_Question._—“You say that the effect on the tongue was characteristic
of aconitia. Was it characteristic of nothing else?”
_Answer._—“Nothing else that I know of.”
_Question._—“Not of veratria?”
_Answer._—“No; I have tried that on the tongue, and its effect is
different. I do not recollect that delphinia is like aconitia. Morphia
has no marked bitterness. I know that the taste is very different from
other substances. Pepperine has an immediate burning effect.”
_Question._—“Is not phosphoric acid a test for aconitia?”
_Answer._—“No; it is given as a test, except by those who have
studied it recently. I have made experiments with pure aconitia with
no results. The book produced is written by an authority. Fluckijer,
in his work on the subject, gives the reaction of aconitia, but it
is German aconitia he refers to; it is very different to English
aconitia. I see no reference to English aconitia in Fluckijer.”
The book was handed back to counsel, and Mr. Montagu Williams said the
date was 1879.
_Witness, cross-examined further._—“The solution injected into the
mouse was measured on each occasion. About three minims of liquid
altogether was injected. With the exception of the urine and one of
the vomits, the injections were unmixed. He believed, of course, that
too much reliance must not be placed on experiments on animals.”
_Question._—“Is it not a recognised fact that alkaloids are found in
the human body after death, irrespective of poisons?”
_Answer._—“It is a question still _sub judice_. It has been asserted
that such is the case where the stomach or other viscera has been much
decomposed.”
_Question._—“What are called cadaveric alkaloids, utterly
irrespective of the administration of poison?”
_Answer._—“It is so asserted.”
_Question._—“Is not Stas’s test a mode of extracting cadaveric
alkaloids?”
_Answer._—“Cadaveric as well as natural alkaloids.”
_Question._—“Would these cadaveric alkaloids produce the same effects
as the natural alkaloids?”
_Answer._—“They have been described as producing the same effects;
but I have seen no description of one producing the effects of
aconitia. There is a test distinguishing these cadaveric alkaloids
from all natural alkaloids, except morphia and veratria, and certainly
from aconitia. That test was applied to these extracts when no morphia
was present,—the reduction of the ferricyanide to the ferro-cyanide
of potassium. There is an authority for the method of obtaining and
distinguishing these cadaveric alkaloids. I was one of the first to
point out that alkaloidal extracts from the stomachs of the dead
would kill frogs if injected under the skin. I have read most of the
foreign writers on this subject. I have not read Peschi, and cannot
say whether they produce pricking of the tongue. I do not remember any
of them describing sensations produced on the tongue from cadaveric
alkaloids, similar to those from aconitia. Many things would produce
prickings on the tongue.”
_Question._—“Have you found the ordinary residue of the stomach from
the dead poison the lower animals?”
_Answer._—“I have never known it to do so. I will not say it is not
so.”
_Question._—“How long after the administration of aconitia would you
expect the symptoms to appear?”
_Answer._—“From a few minutes to an hour and a half.”
_Question._—“Would the time of action depend upon the dose?”
_Answer._—“The probabilities are that a large dose would soonest
produce effect. The smallest dose that has produced death has been
between 1-21 gr. and 1-13 gr., or about 1-16 gr.”
On _re-examination_ by the _Solicitor-General_, the _Witness_ explained
that it was when corpses were putrefying that the cadaveric alkaloids
were produced. He had procured alkaloidal extracts from the urine,
viscera and stomach, and ascertained the effects of them upon mice:
had made twenty-two experiments this year: there were two cases of
heart disease, and four of the liver, kidneys, spleen, vomit, and six
from the urine. He had also, in six instances, taken from the urine
of living persons, and in three from that of healthy dead persons.
Those extracts had no effect on his tongue. He had had many years’
experience, and certainly never tasted anything like aconitia, and he
had tried these alkaloidal extracts on the same number of mice without
the animals suffering except from the puncture. One of these mice,
he added, he had killed with the _three-thousandths_ of a grain, and
_two-thousandths_ of a grain was always fatal to a mouse. To a question
by the judge, he said “it would make a great difference in the time
when the severe symptoms appeared, whether the poison was swallowed
directly and whether it came into direct contact with the tongue.” Dr.
Dupré confirmed in every detail the statements of his colleague. “In
his case the effects of tasting the alkaloid from the urine continued
over four hours, and that from the vomit over six hours, though he took
lunch and dinner during that time. In the vomit he did not find any
trace of quinine which he should have expected had aconitia been given
in conjunction with quinine.”
THE PREVIOUS ACTS OF THE PRISONER.
Soon after his marriage in 1879, the prisoner set up in practice at
Bournemouth, whence in April, 1880, he went for a six months’ trip to
America. Early in 1881, he was in great pecuniary difficulties, and
had to part with his furniture to pay an execution out of his house,
and again went to America on the 30th of August. Three days before he
sailed, whilst staying with his mother at Ventnor, he visited Percy
John at Shanklin, where the boy was staying with the Chapmans, and
promised to return on the Monday, the 29th, before he left England. It
was supposed that he did so, and it was then, according to the boy’s
statement before reported, that he gave him a pill, after which he was
taken ill in much the same way as at Blenheim House in the December
following.[207] From America he returned on the 17th of October, and
after a visit to Ventnor, where he got a cheque, which was subsequently
dishonoured, cashed by a tradesman (Price Owen), he was in London on
the 1st of December, staying at the Nelson Hotel, Portland-road. His
actions are now taken up by the following witness, to whom, and to
whose brother, the prisoner had from time to time advanced money, in
the case of the brother pawning his surgical instruments and watch, on
the 24th of November, in order to lend him five pounds.[208]
_John Law Tulloch_, a student of medicine living in Alma Square, St.
John’s Wood, said:—
“I have known the prisoner for some time. I did not see him till
December of last year from the previous April. I saw him on the 1st
of last December, a Thursday night, at my house. He said he was
staying at Nelson’s Hotel, and was going to Paris the next night.
He had dinner at my house. I went with him to Nelson’s Hotel, and
assisted in packing his luggage. I went with him from the hotel to
Waterloo Station. We had with us a leather case, a handbag, and
a rug. He said he thought he would go first of all to see his
brother-in-law at Wimbledon. We went to Wimbledon together at about
six in the evening.[209] He said he was going up to the school, at
Mr. Bedbrook’s. I waited for him in the public-house opposite. He
came back to me in about twenty minutes. He said that he had seen his
brother-in-law, who was very much worse. He added that he did not
expect him to live long. He said he had seen Mr. Bedbrook, who was a
director of one of the Continental lines, and that gentleman had told
him that it was as well that he should not go that night, as there was
a bad boat on the service. We returned to town, and went together to
the Comedy Theatre in Panton-street. After that we went to Stone’s, a
public-house opposite the theatre, and while we were there he wrote
the cheque produced, on the Wilts and Dorset Bank, dated December 2,
1881, for 12_l._ 10_s._, payable to J. L. Tulloch. He asked me to
try and obtain the cash for it. We went first to the Adelphi Hotel
in Adam-street, but could not get it cashed there. We then drove to
the Eyre Arms, St. John’s-wood, which is close to where I reside. Mr.
Perrot, the landlord, cashed the cheque, and I gave the money to the
prisoner. I then parted from him, and arranged to meet him on the
following day at the Adelphi Hotel. I saw him there about three or
four in the afternoon. I was to meet him at half-past one, to see him
off by a train at 2.50, but I do not know from what station. He said
that he was too late for the mid-day train, and could not go until
night. I went with him to the Horseshoe to have some refreshment.
When there we found that one of the bags received from the Eyre Arms
contained coppers. We returned to the house and obtained a 5_l._ note
in exchange. He left me there about six. I did not hear of him again
till he was in custody. The cheque was dishonoured. On the 13th of
December he wrote saying the amount would be in my hands very soon,
and he was surprised at my attitude towards, or, rather against
him.”[210]
On _cross-examination_, the _witness_ said:—
“I have said to-day the prisoner said on December 2, ‘the boy is very
much worse, and I don’t think he will last long.’ I do not think he
said anything about his having passed his examination that day. I was
quite sober. I do not owe him money.”
At five minutes to seven, on the evening of the 3rd of December,
he was at Blenheim House telling Mr. Bedbrook he wished to see his
brother-in-law. The boy was brought into the dining-room, some wine
got for the prisoner, and some powdered white sugar to cure, as he
said, the alcohol in it. He then had with him a leather bag from which
he took some Dundee cakes and sweets, of which the boy and the master
partook.
_Mr. Bedbrook_ deposed:—
“About a quarter past 7 the prisoner said to me, ‘Oh, by the way,
when I was in America, I thought of you and your boys, and I thought
what excellent things these capsules would be for the boys to take
nauseous medicine in.’ He produced two boxes of capsules from his bag,
and said, ‘I should like you to try one to see how easily they can be
swallowed.’ I examined them, and put one in my mouth.”
_The Judge._—“Was the box wrapped in paper, or was it handed to you
open?”
_The Witness._—“It was handed to me open.”
The remainder of the capsules were here produced.
_Mr. Montagu Williams._—“I do not think they are all of one size.”
_Mr. Poland._—“These are the original capsules.”
_Witness_ continuing, said—“I swallowed an empty capsule, and it was
very easy to swallow.”
_The Witness_ continuing, said—“The prisoner took the lids off
both of the boxes. While I was examining a capsule the prisoner was
filling another with sugar, with a little spade spoon. He then, having
apparently filled it with sugar, said, ‘If you shake it the medicine
will come down to one end.’ He then handed the capsule to the boy
Percy John, who was sitting on his right, about a yard from him. In
doing so he said, ‘Here, Percy; you are a swell pill taker; take this,
and show Mr. Bedbrook how easy it is to swallow.’ Percy John then put
the capsule in his mouth as far back as he could, and at one gulp it
was gone. I remarked to him, ‘That is soon gone, my boy.’ The prisoner
then said, ‘I must be going now,’ and I then looked at the time-table
to see the next train for London. It was then 7.20 or thereabouts,
and I told him the next train left at 7.21, and advised him to go at
once or he would miss his train. Previous to this I had asked him to
remain a little longer, until the 7.50 train. He said, ‘I cannot, as
I have to catch a train at eight o’clock at London Bridge, _en route_
to the Continent.’ He said he was going to Florence, _viâ_ Paris.
Passing through the drawing-room I remarked to him that I thought the
curvature of the spine of the deceased was getting worse. He observed
on that occasion that he did not think the boy would last long. I did
not make any reply to that. He then left the house at about 21 or 22
minutes past seven o’clock. He left behind the two boxes of capsules.
I placed them on the dining-room waggon.”
_Question._—“From the time Percy John had swallowed the capsule how
many minutes elapsed before the prisoner said, ‘I must be going now’?”
_Answer._—“He said it within five minutes. After the prisoner left
the house I returned to the dining-room, where Percy John was. When I
got back deceased said, ‘I feel as if I had an attack of heartburn.’
I think after that I returned to my guests. He was reading the
newspapers.”
_Mr. Montagu Williams_ objected to the statements of the deceased being
put in evidence.
_The Judge_ said that evidence as to symptoms could be received when
made by the deceased.
_Examination continued._—“I returned to him in five minutes. He said,
‘I feel as I felt when my brother-in-law had given me a quinine pill
at Shanklin.’ He said he would like to go to bed. I gave orders that
he should go to bed. Mr. Bell carried him upstairs.”
_The Judge._—“At what time was this?”
_Answer._—“Between eight and nine.”
The fatal attack now came on as previously described. In the box with
the capsules were some little pills, and in the boy’s own box in his
bedroom a small box of quinine powders, and another with two pills
wrapped in tinfoil.[211] In the previous year, when the prisoner was
in America, Mr. Bedbrook had received from him a box of pills, with a
letter, saying that “he had met some one in America suffering from the
same complaint as the boy, who had derived great benefit from taking
medicine similar to that now sent, and requesting Mr. Bedbrook to see
the boy take the medicine.” “I afterwards,” said the witness, “gave
the boy one of the pills, and next morning he complained of being very
unwell. At that time the box was in his bedroom, and Percy John said,
‘I will take no more of them.’ I thereupon took the pills downstairs,
and until the box produced was found, was under the impression that I
had thrown it away.”[212]
PURCHASE OF ACONITIA BY THE PRISONER.
_Mr. Charles Albert Smith_, a chemist at Ventnor, proved that on
the 28th of August, 1881, the prisoner purchased of him 3 grains
of sulphate of atropine, and 2 grains of aconitia, and that he had
labelled the latter “Aconitine, poison.” As he had previously made
up prescriptions for the prisoner, and knew him as a medical man, he
sold the poison to him without hesitation. Aconitia, he believed, was
commonly used for neuralgia and cancer, to relieve the palpitations in
heart disease, and as a diuretic in dropsy.
On the 24th of November, 1881, the prisoner asked for 2 grains of
aconitia at Messrs. Allen & Hanbury’s, of Plough-court, Lombard-street;
and as the assistant, on reference to the Medical Directory, found the
prisoner’s name as a medical man practising at Bournemouth, he sold
them to him without further precaution than labelling it “Poison.”
On the evidence of this witness, Mr. Dodd, a difficulty arose, from
his having at first entertained the impression that it was “atropia”
which he had sold. The price of this drug to a medical man would have
been only threepence a grain, whilst that of aconitia would be 1_s._
3_d._[213] In the petty-cash book of the day, among entries of sales
marked “C”—the sign that they were sold to a medical man—was one of
2_s._ 6_d._, but none of 3_d._; and Mr. Dodd, after consulting with the
other assistant who was present at the sale, became convinced that it
was “aconitia,” and not “atropia,” which he had sold to the prisoner.
“There is also,” he said, “a difference in colour, atropia being white,
and aconitia yellowish-white.”
A previous attempt to purchase aconitia was proved by Mr.
Stilling,[214] an assistant of Messrs. Bell & Co., Oxford-street,
on the 20th of November. Twice before that day the prisoner had had
prescriptions made up there, which he wrote in the shop, and marked as
for his own use. These contained morphia and atropia, but at the bottom
of the second of these prescriptions he had written, “Digitaline, pure,
5 grains.”
_By the Judge._—“He told me he practised at Bournemouth.”
_By Mr. Poland._—“He led us to infer that he was accustomed to
prescribe this digitaline for internal use. It is the active principle
of foxglove, and is a poison. While he was in the shop I looked at
our stock of digitaline, and found it more coloured than I expected.
I told him that, and said I would provide him some fresh from the
manufacturer in a few days. I did that because he had laid stress on
its being pure. He did not say when he would call again, but in a
few days. Dr. Lamson himself then struck out the lower part of the
prescription as to the digitaline. All the rest was made up—morphia
and the sulphate of atropia. He waited in the shop while it was made
up, and paid 2_s._ 9_d._ for it. In a few days he called again; it was
after the 20th of November. He then asked for one grain of aconitia
for internal use. I knew it was poison, and I recommended him to
procure it where he was better known. Nothing more was said, and he
left the shop. I believe he wrote an order for one grain of aconitia
in the shop, and I believe he tore it up himself. Except seeing him on
the 11th and the 16th I knew nothing of him before.”
_By Mr. Williams._—“He told me on the 11th that he was staying at
Nelson’s Hotel, in Portland Street. I cannot swear that there was a
written order for the aconitia. I believed that when I went from the
shop for my fellow-assistant, Dr. Lamson wrote the order; and then
when we returned he tore it up. I have not said anything about that
order before to-day, because I was not asked. Only the atropia and
morphia were bought on both occasions.”
_Re-examined._—“When he asked me for the aconitia, knowing it was a
potent poison, I went to consult a fellow-assistant, and then he wrote
the order, as I believe.”
It may be noted here that the larger quinine powders in the box which
were found to be pure were proved to have been purchased of Mr.
Littlefield, a chemist at Ventnor, on the 13th of October, 1880; that
he knew nothing of the smaller ones, which were proved by Dr. Stevenson
to contain aconitia, and that he never kept that drug in his shop. In
this he was confirmed by his assistant, Mr. Bright, who identified his
own handwriting on the box in which they had been sold. The smaller
quinine powders were not traced.
THE SURRENDER OF THE PRISONER.
On the 7th of December, the prisoner called at Scotland Yard and saw
Inspector Butcher, who gave the following account of the interview:—
“When the prisoner came there and saw me, he said, ‘Mr. Butcher?’
and I replied, ‘Yes.’ He said, ‘My name is Lamson. I am Dr. Lamson,
whose name has been mentioned in connection with the death at
Wimbledon.’ I asked him to be seated, and he continued, ‘I have
called to see what is to be done about it. I considered it best to
do so. I read the account in the public papers in Paris, and came
over this morning. I have only just now arrived in London. I am very
unwell, and much upset about this matter, and not in a fit state at
all to have undertaken this journey.’ I then communicated with Chief
Superintendent Williamson, who said to the prisoner, ‘You will have
to remain a time.’ I remained with him. His wife was present. He
conversed on various subjects for some time, and then he said, ‘Where
is the delay? I thought I would come here and leave my address. I am
going into the country to Chichester, so that you will know where to
find me, and I will attend the inquest. I have travelled from Paris
_viâ_ Havre and Southampton. I went over _viâ_ Dover and Calais.’
After this I again saw Chief Superintendent Williamson, who called the
prisoner into another room. I said, ‘Dr. Lamson, this case has been
fully considered, and it has been decided to charge you with causing
the death of Percy John. I therefore take you into custody, and
charge you with causing the death of Percy Malcolm John, at Blenheim
House, Wimbledon, on the 3rd of December instant.’ He said, ‘Very
well; do you think bail will be accepted? I hope the matter will be
kept as quiet as possible, for the sake of my relations.’ I told him
he would now be taken to Wandsworth police-court, and the question
of bail would rest with the magistrate. I conveyed him in a cab to
the Wandsworth police-station. On the way he said, ‘You will have my
father here in a day or two. I hope it will be stated that I came to
Scotland Yard voluntarily. I came from Paris on purpose.’ I said,
‘Certainly.’”
On searching the box which he had left at Euston Station among various
articles, chiefly of plate, a medical memorandum book was found, from
which the Solicitor-General read an extract on the “effects of acrid
vegetable poisons,” and then closed the case for the prosecution.
_Mr. Montagu Williams_, having previously had the letter read from the
Home Office, refusing to allow an independent analysis of the contents
of the body on the part of the prisoner, then commenced.
THE DEFENCE.
Of the speech for the defence, which lasted the greater part of two
days, and dealt with the case with extreme minuteness, it will be
sufficient to give a summary, especially as its leading points were
remarked upon so fully in the charge of the learned Judge.
On the question whether the death of the boy was from poison, _Mr.
Montagu Williams_, necessarily laid great stress on the admitted
inability of the scientific witnesses to rely on any other test than
that of taste. “Scientifically,” he said, “it was a leap in the dark,
and they had to traverse a region of science up to the present moment
unexplored. Who knows about aconite? and echo answers who? What was
it? The root of monkshood. Aconite was one form, and aconitia was the
active principle of that form: and up to the present moment, with the
exception of one reported case, there was not a single authority on the
subject.” Pursuing this subject, he said:—
“The first medical witness called was Dr. Berry, who on the night of
December 3rd was visiting at Blenheim House, where he saw the poor
boy until his death, and observed all the symptoms under which the
unfortunate lad suffered. What were they? The lad told him that he
was suffering from heartburn, and where was the symptom of heartburn
in the administration of aconite in the evidence of the experts that
had been brought before them? What medical gentleman had said that
heartburn was a sign of aconitia poisoning? The poor lad was found
vomiting, and Dr. Berry and another medical man, Dr. Little, treated
him for irritation of the stomach. Neither of them treated him for,
or thought of, poisoning. The boy was taken from the bath-room, where
he was found, to the bed from which he never rose, and from first to
last all the symptoms were those of irritation of the stomach. From
nine o’clock to past eleven no attempt was made to use the stomach
pump; and if the medical gentlemen thought poison had been taken, they
never used anything to relieve him, or what might have saved him. If
poison was in the minds of these medical men, why did they not treat
him for such? It was clear, therefore, there was no thought of poison;
and Dr. Berry admitted in evidence that it never occurred to him that
it was so until the _post-mortem_ examination. He said he then thought
the death was from alkaloid poisoning. It was the duty of him (Mr.
Williams) to cross-examine him on vegetable alkaloids. What was his
knowledge? His knowledge was a blank, and he admitted he knew nothing
of vegetable alkaloids. Therefore, the first expert witness called for
the prosecution—who had, moreover, the benefit of seeing the symptoms
in life—broke down altogether. It was his case that the theories of
the prosecution were of the most speculative character. Dr. Little
differed somewhat, and said, ‘We came to the conclusion that the boy
was dying from a vegetable poison an hour before his death,’ while Dr.
Berry said it was not until the _post-mortem_ examination that they
thought anything of the sort. Dr. Little says he read about vegetable
alkaloids in his student days. Both those gentlemen, who give the
opinion that death resulted from vegetable alkaloids, knew nothing
whatever about the subject. Then they had Mr. Bond, a gentleman of
great scientific attainments, well known in these courts, who gave
the results of the _post-mortem_ examination, and he (the learned
counsel) thought it would not be straining the imagination too much
to say that that gentleman gave the first idea of poisoning in the
matter. Mr. Bond said he came to the conclusion that death resulted
from a vegetable alkaloid, and again the same line of questions and
answers followed. Mr. Bond admitted he had never known a case of
such poisoning. And so the jury were asked to form a verdict on the
evidence of two persons who had seen the symptoms of the deceased in
life, and were entirely ignorant of the signs of vegetable alkaloid
poisoning, and of Mr. Bond, who was not present, and who admitted he
was also ignorant upon the subject. They were asked to give a verdict
on which an existence hung, and to say they had no doubt whatever that
aconitia was in the body. He could only say up to that time there
was not one single piece of evidence that the boy died by aconitia
poisoning.”
Passing thence to the evidence of Doctors Stevenson and Dupré, whose
tests, the former said, “rested on his taste, on the effects of the
solutions on the mice and his reading,” he called the attention of
the jury to Dr. Stevenson’s admission that the results of most of
these tests were consistent with other causes, though consistent
with aconitia, and ridiculed the effects on the mice as confirmatory
tests, quoting the remarks of Lord Coleridge that tests upon animals
were always found to be most unreliable, and of Professor Tidy, “that
although useful at arriving at results, they sometimes failed, and
were not reliable.” “If they used their common sense they must see
that that must be so. So delicate was the constitution of a mouse that
one of those experimented on had died because the injecting needle had
been stuck in a quarter of an inch too far. Mice would sometimes die
from fright, and also from the injection of water, and yet because
these mice spoken of died in five minutes they were asked to say
that they died of aconitia poisoning.” As to the test of taste, Dr.
Stevenson had admitted “that it was like some other alkaloids, and not
like others.” The question of the production of cadaveric alkaloids
was still _sub judice_. He was prevented, by the refusal of the Home
Office, to allow experts on the prisoner’s behalf to be present at the
analytical examination, from calling scientific witnesses to rebut—“an
act that was trifling with life—a beautiful bit of red-tapeism; and,
if it was contrary to all practice, the sooner it was done away with
the better.”
On the second point, whether if aconitia was given, it was given by the
prisoner, _Mr. Montagu Williams_, after alluding to the way in which
his admitted poverty had been pressed against the prisoner, called the
attention of the jury to the facilities the prisoner would have had of
poisoning his brother-in-law during the boy’s visit at his house in
the summer, or his projected visit at Christmas; to the fact that the
supposed attempt was made in the full light of gas, and in the presence
of both the master and the victim; that there was no proof that he had
brought a capsule ready charged with poison, and that he must have
manipulated one before their eyes, and that it was not by his request
that powdered white sugar was brought. “What was there to prevent lump
sugar being brought?” As to the pills found with the capsules,
“Where did they come from? No pills were given to the boy by the
prisoner, for Mr. Bedbrook was present the whole time and no mention
was made of pills. Where was the boy all the afternoon? In the room
downstairs, and able to move about, though this was studiously
concealed by everyone from Blenheim House. In this room was the box
in which two pills were afterwards found, one of which was charged
with aconitia. Were there other pills in that box? It was known that
Percy John kept medicine unknown to everyone in the establishment,
although it was against the rules of the school; it being the duty
of the master to administer all medicine. The poor fellow was called
‘the swell pill taker,’ and what was more likely than that, with the
fascination of the new capsules before him, he should have taken a
pill for the heartburn from which he was suffering. Did he do so? It
was suggested that these pills were some sent by the prisoner, but
Mr. Bedbrook had exploded that idea. He swore that he thought he had
destroyed those referred to, but at any rate he had never given them
back to the prisoner. Now did these four or five pills, found on the
table, come from the box? Was there any evidence to show that the boy
did not carry pills in his pocket, and took one in consequence of the
heartburn? What did the prosecution mean? Did they mean to say that
there was a pill hidden in the capsule? If the boy had thought of
such a thing, would he not have asked Mr. Bedbrook or Banbury whether
they felt in a similar state? The boy was in the possession of all
his faculties when questioned, but he did not say one word about the
capsules.”
_Mr. Montagu Williams_ then alluded to the admission of Mr. Whalley
that poisons were occasionally left in the house after the chemical
lectures, and to the probability that so large a dose of aconitia
as was assumed to have been given would have acted sooner, as Dr.
Stevenson admitted that 1/21 of a grain might kill, and 1/13 would
certainly have a fatal effect. As for the medical note-book found in
the prisoner’s possession, he reminded the jury of Lord Campbell’s
opinion in Palmer’s case that nothing was more natural for a
professional man, and added, “It had no more bearing on the case than
if ‘Russell on Crimes’ had been found in his own possession, on a
charge of murder.”
On the proof of the purchase of aconitia at Allen’s, he begged them to
note, that on the 5th of December the police commenced their enquiries,
on the 6th the assistants at Allen’s communicated with them, saying
that the prisoner had purchased atropia, and that it was not until
after that that they changed their opinion and were convinced that
it was aconitia. It was true that no entry of 3_d._ was found in the
cash book, but there was one of 8_d._, and one of the chemists had
deposed that the wholesale price of atropia, to a medical man, was
4_d._ a grain. But even if it was aconitia that the prisoner then
purchased, it was only natural for him so to do, as he was suffering
from rheumatism, of which it was a cure. Again, though they knew where
the larger quinine powders, which were not poisoned, came from, it had
not been proved whence the smaller came, which it was the duty of the
prosecution to have done. “Oddly enough, they were tied up with a piece
of string, a most unusual thing coming from a chemist’s shop. They had
traced twelve quinine powders, but they had failed to trace the pills
sent from America which Mr. Bedbrook swore were not given back to the
deceased. He, Mr. Williams, could not say where the smaller powders
came from, nor where the pills came from. The burden was not on him to
do so, but on the prosecution.”
Turning then to the evidence of the visit to the boy at Shanklin,
_Mr. Williams_ said he would deal with that important episode most
successfully.
“Albert Smith,” he said, “proved that on the 28th of August he sold to
prisoner three grains of atropia and one grain of aconitia, charging
4_d._ per grain for the first and 1_s._ 6_d._ per grain for the last
named. The suggestion on the part of the prosecution was that in the
month of August the assassin was at work and an attempt was made on
the life of the lad. In his judgment he would make that melt into the
thinnest of thin air. The 28th of August was a Sunday, and on the
previous day Mr. and Mrs. Chapman and the boy arrived. At that time
there were four persons of the name of Lamson residing at the Isle of
Wight—namely, the prisoner’s father and mother, and himself and his
wife. On the 27th of August they met the boy at the station, and went
to Mrs. Jolliffe’s lodgings, and here again there appeared a kindness
and solicitude for the deceased. The 28th was Sunday, and it was said
that he bought aconitia on that day, and that he was present on the
29th, and in order to prove it it was said that a parcel was left at
the station in the name of Lamson, when there were four persons on the
island named Lamson. It was further said that the deceased suffered
from illness after taking something given to him by the prisoner, and
from that they assumed it was aconitia bought at the shop of Mr. Smith
that he had taken. The proof was all the other way, as the symptoms
upon which the prosecution relied all through the case were not those
which could be assigned to aconitia, while he recovered within a few
hours. Beyond that, it was shown that he suffered from indigestion,
especially by the fact that although he dined at one o’clock on the
day of his death, undigested food was found in the vomit at nine
o’clock at night. The prisoner purchased the atropia and aconitia on
the 28th of August, he was to leave for America on the 30th. This
mixture was the very thing he would have taken, and the very time he
would have bought it for the purpose of going on the voyage. The dates
exactly suited.”
Counsel’s explanation of the story told by the prisoner to the witness
Tulloch was ingenious.
“The prisoner did not deny that he went down to Wimbledon on December
2 with Tulloch, but if he contemplated assassination then would
he have been likely to have taken Tulloch with him? That was an
observation worthy of some note. He would try and imagine a state
of things to have existed, which was not impossible but more than
probable. It was admitted that upon the 2nd of December the boy had
been passing an examination. It was also admitted the first thing the
prisoner was greeted with on the 3rd was, ‘I am glad you did not come
yesterday.’ When he went down on the 2nd what was more likely than
that he met some one, perhaps one of the boys, for it was a holiday,
who told him it was an examination day, and he therefore postponed his
visit until the next day? All the importance of this visit depended
on the evidence of a man who had altered his evidence as originally
given, and who, it was suggested, was on that night the worse for
liquor.”
With the remarks that the flight of the prisoner to Paris, where he
could have been arrested, and his return to England and surrender to
the police, were not the acts of a guilty man; that, to obtain the
pecuniary gain from the boy’s death, the prisoner must have applied to
the Court of Chancery, and if there had been suspicion of foul play
would find, instead of receiving £1,500, the hangman’s halter round his
neck, and a fervid appeal on behalf of the wife who had stood by him in
Court, and his young child, _Mr. Montagu Williams_ concluded his minute
and able survey of the case against his client.
THE REPLY.
The _Solicitor-General_, in his comparatively brief reply, directed
the attention of the jury to the following points. He admitted that,
in this case, they had to traverse a branch of science but little
known, that little was known of aconitia, and everything speculation.
He urged, however, that “that argument, whilst fair, might be pressed
too far, as then a man desirous of taking life had only to use some
poison but little known, and then to ask that he should not be rendered
liable for the results of his crime. They found, no doubt, from time
to time, fresh materials used for the commission of crime. If a man
from his knowledge used a poison little known and little used, still
science, with unerring precision, and working as fast as him, could
bring the crime to light.” The idea of death from natural causes had
apparently been abandoned by the prisoner’s counsel, so that it was
impossible to doubt that it was due to poison, and what that poison
was must rest on the evidence of the scientific witnesses, “the first
in their profession, of the highest skill, not called in to prop up
any theory, but to frame an independent opinion. The presence of a
third party would not have been likely to assist the analysis, while on
the other hand it might have led to difficulty, and even mistake.” He
disputed the correctness of the quotation from Dr. Tidy. What he really
did say, was, “Experiments on animals may furnish us with much useful
information in cases of suspected poisoning, but their value must not
be over-estimated.” In this case they were only used to strengthen
the evidence from taste. “The two tests must be used together. It
was their combined force that drove home to the mind the conviction
that Dr. Stevenson was right when he said that what he found in the
body was aconitia, and nothing but aconitia.” “As to the cadaveric
alkaloids, they had in evidence that they were only produced along with
putrefaction, and that their results on animals were totally different
from those of the extracts from the boy’s body. Would they not say that
Dr. Stevenson’s experiments had been conducted in every way to exclude
error, and must they not, looking at the whole of the scientific
evidence, accept his judgment?”
As to the possibility of the boy himself obtaining this poison, it
was fenced round with such safeguards that not even a medical man,
unless personally known, could obtain it without a record being kept.
His story about the visit to Wimbledon was pure invention, and the
explanation of it by counsel ingenious, and no more. Falsehood seemed
to have been uttered by him at every turn. The taking Mr. Tulloch with
him was a mere blind: his return and surrender intended to divert
suspicion. Had he remained in France he must have been arrested, and,
if he had no money, he was compelled to return to England.
THE JUDGE’S CHARGE.
In his charge to the jury, after pointing out that the two points to
which they had to direct their attention were whether the boy died
from poison or a natural disease, and if by poison, whether it was
administered to him by the prisoner, Sir Henry Hawkins alluded to the
alleged motive—the prospect of an accession of fortune at the time
when the prisoner was in great pecuniary difficulties—and the fact
that until the day of his death the deceased, though a cripple, was
free from any mortal disease. Then, after referring to the details of
the prisoner’s visit to the boy on the 3rd of December, the judge made
the following remarks on the results of the chemical analysis, and the
comments of Mr. Williams on them:—
“The presence of morphia was, he said, accounted for, as it had been
injected beneath the skin for the purpose of allaying the pain. With
regard to the dark fluid in the stomach, it contained, according
to the evidence of Dr. Stevenson, traces of food, an apple, and a
raisin, and from it an alkaloidal extract was obtained; on applying
which to the tongue a slight taste of aconitia was produced. The
sensation extended to the lip, although the extract did not touch
it. The sensation was a burning, tingling, numbing one difficult to
define. Salivation and a desire to expectorate were produced—there
was a sensation at the back of the throat, a swelling up: this was
followed by a peculiar seared sensation of the tongue, as though a
hot iron had been passed over it or strong caustic. Experiments were
made with extracts from the liver, spleen, and kidneys, from the
dark fluid, and from the stomach itself, and within nine minutes mice
showed symptoms of poisoning, and died in about twenty-two minutes
afterwards. The same sensation, in fact, was produced on the mice as
had been produced on his own tongue previously. In the urine there
was a taste of aconitia, which brought on a sickening and a burning
sensation. Mr. Montagu Williams had said that the experiments upon
mice were hardly a test as to what the effect of the extract would be
upon human beings. Granted; but they were about the only tests that
could properly be made, and they proved the presence of aconitia.
The drug, Dr. Stevenson said, produced a sensation to the tongue and
throat which was unmistakable, and its property of killing was proved
by its test upon the mice. Could they believe Dr. Stevenson mistaken
about that, it was asked—were there not other vegetable alkaloids?
There were; and Dr. Stevenson said they all had peculiar tastes
which differed from that of aconitia. He further said that, having
made himself acquainted with between 50 and 80 vegetable alkaloids,
aconitia differed in taste from any of them. The learned Judge
proceeded to read the evidence given by Dr. Stevenson as to the action
of the extract and of prepared aconitia on the mice. Dr. Stevenson had
minutely examined the vomit to endeavour to trace some of the fibre of
monkshood from which aconite was extracted, and which, as was known,
had sometimes been mistaken for horse radish, but not a particle could
he find. But he obtained all the symptoms of aconitia upon his tongue,
and death resulted in 15½ minutes when a small quantity was injected
into the back of a mouse. He gave it as his opinion that 1-13th of a
grain was sufficient to kill, and that he found enough aconitia in
the stomach to cause the death of two persons. Dr. Stevenson had been
submitted to a severe cross-examination, and it would be for the jury
to say whether they believed that he had really found aconitia. Mr.
Williams had said they were embarking in a new region in aconitia
poisoning. It might be they were not very learned in it, though they
would doubtless advance as fresh experiments were made and fresh tests
applied. At present it was true there was no chemical test. That was
admitted. Mr. Williams, in the course of his cross-examination, had
spoken of phosphoric acid, but Dr. Stevenson said that only applied
to foreign aconitia, and not to Morson’s English preparation. They
had before them the explanation of Dr. Stevenson. It stood for what
it was worth, and it was for them to say if he was correct, after the
experiments he had made, in saying that he had found aconitia. Dr.
Stevenson had explained the only tests, physiological and otherwise,
to trace aconitia, and had formed his opinion that death arose from
that substance. With reference to cadaveric alkaloids, Dr. Stevenson
did not admit that poisonous cadaveric alkaloids were to be found in
the human body. He did not dispute there were cadaveric alkaloids, but
he disputed their being poisonous. He did not say they were not so;
it was still an open question. The result of the 22 experiments he
had made by tasting cadaveric alkaloids never gave him any taste like
aconitia, and in only one case did death ensue to a mouse experimented
upon, which was where the little animal’s spine was injured by the
needle used for the injection. Another circumstance spoken to by Dr.
Dupré was that no trace of quinine was found in the vomit, but that
might be due to the fact that a portion of the vomit was thrown away.
Upon the testimony as to the cause of death the prosecution said that
there was no possibility of accounting for death by natural causes,
and it was for the jury to say whether the death was from aconitia.”
Then going through the evidence of the prisoner’s pecuniary
embarrassments, he alluded to the sending of the pills from America as
showing that if he had entertained the design of poisoning the boy, he
had done so long before the fatal act.
“Mischief, it was held, had been concocted long before the lad died.
Prisoner went to America in the early part of 1881, and returned about
the 2nd July, and whilst there, as Mr. Bedbrook had said, he sent over
a box of pills, saying that he had found them to be useful in the
complaint under which the boy suffered. The boy had one pill given
to him, and Mr. Bedbrook believed that as he did not like it he took
the box and threw the remainder away. In the month of August aconitia
was, it was said, administered to the boy whilst at Shanklin, and that
it came from powders contained in a box. These circumstances did not
lead to death, but they indicated, as was contended, the desire of
the prisoner to do mischief to the unfortunate boy. It was a question
certainly whether the pills given were the same as those which the
prisoner sent over from America, and which Mr. Bedbrook believed
he had thrown away. In the bedroom at Wimbledon was found a box of
quinine powders—six large and fourteen small ones. Eleven of the
small ones were of pure quinine, but three of them were more or less
mixed with aconitia. Dr. Stevenson said that one of the powders—No.
16—contained 1 and eight-tenths of a grain, and that the proportion
of quinine to aconitia in it was as 83 to 96. Dr. Stevenson tested it,
and the sensation upon his tongue lasted three hours. One-fiftieth
part of a grain was tried on a mouse, and it was dead in six minutes
and a half afterwards. They would judge how fatal a quantity was in
the powder if they bore in mind what they had been told as to the
fatality of 1-13th part of a grain. In Nos. 17 and 19 there was some
trace of aconitia, but in neither of them anything like the quantity
in No. 16. The box in which those powders were found had been in
common use, and one of the boys had actually taken one of them.
Anybody, of course, might have taken one of the eleven pure powders,
and the lad himself—with the exception of once, at Shanklin—had
never shown any symptoms that might be considered anything like
aconitia poisoning. No doubt three of the powders did contain aconitia
in considerable quantities, and they had to consider how did the
aconitia come into them? Among other things found in the boy’s box
were two pills in a tin pill-box. A tin pill-box, it was suggested,
was sent over from America. Mr. Williams said that Mr. Bedbrook stated
he had destroyed them, but the fact remained that the box with the two
pills—one of which was poisoned—were found in the play-box. It was
true there was no evidence that the box was the same, but Mr. Bedbrook
said it resembled that which he received from America, but which he
said he thought he had destroyed.”
_Mr. Williams._—“Pardon me, my Lord, but Mr. Bedbrook, I think, never
said he destroyed the box; he said he had destroyed the pills.”
_The Judge._—“ I think he said he threw them away.” His Lordship
referred to his notes, and said that Mr. Bedbrook in his evidence
stated that he took the box downstairs, and was under the impression
he threw it away. When he saw the box, however, it appeared to him
exactly like that which came from America, and the pills were also
exactly like them.
_Mr. Williams._—“Mr. Bedbrook said he never gave the pills back to
the deceased boy.”
_The Judge._—“That is so. He said he was under the impression he had
thrown them away. It was said that the boy could not get aconitia
himself, but though he could not do so the prisoner could. Next they
heard what had occurred at Shanklin in October, 1881. The prisoner
was going to America, and sailed on the 30th August. On the 27th of
that month Mr. and Mrs. Chapman, with the boy, went to Shanklin, and
found on the platform to meet them the prisoner and his wife. They
had some conversation, and prisoner promised to call on Monday, 29th,
to say ‘Good-bye.’ On the night of Sunday, the 28th, they had it
on the testimony of Mr. Smith, a chemist, that the prisoner called
on him and bought, amongst other things, three grains of atropia
and one grain of aconitia. It was endeavoured to be shown on the
part of the prosecution that he had called pursuant to his promise
on the 29th, and in evidence of that it was sought to produce the
cloak-room book of the railway station. On the 29th, however, the boy
was unquestionably unwell. It was clear that on the 27th the prisoner
saw him, and said he would call again on the Monday, but there was
no direct evidence that he did, although he bought aconitia on the
28th, which Mr. Williams said might have been bought with an innocent
motive, as the prisoner at the time was suffering from neuralgia.”
Reviewing then the prisoner’s conduct in London, and the story invented
by him about his pretended visit to the boy on the 2nd of December,
“which,” he said, “did not amount to much, but must be taken, with the
other circumstances of the case, to show that the prisoner’s word was
not to be relied on,” the learned judge then referred to the incidents
of the fatal night. As to the two boxes of capsules, he continued:—
“The prosecution suggested that these two boxes of capsules were
brought by the prisoner, but they did not suggest there was poison
in any of them. They were clearly innocent capsules, as two of them
did no harm either to Mr. Bedbrook or to the lad Banbury, each of
whom swallowed one. What the prosecution suggested, however, was that
whilst Mr. Bedbrook was examining the capsule he had taken from the
box, the prisoner took another, in which there was aconitia, from
another box, and that over that aconitia he put in the sugar, and then
administered it to the boy. That was the suggestion made. They asked
for those facts to be put together—the boy was in as good health as
he ordinarily was, in as good spirits as usual, having neither eaten
nor partaken of anything in which there was a suggestion of poison
during the day, and yet within half-an-hour, or less, of seeing the
prisoner and swallowing the capsule he was taken ill. The cake, the
sweets, and the capsule were all three given him by the prisoner, and
within a short time he showed the first symptoms described, viz.,
heartburn, which was followed rapidly by painful sensations, and the
contraction of the throat, retching, vomiting, agony, and raving to
the time of death. On these facts the prosecution asked them to come
to the conclusion that he not only died by aconitia, but by aconitia
administered to him by the prisoner, it being clear that no other
person administered anything to him during the prisoner’s visit. The
prosecution contended farther that they had shown the prisoner to be
possessed of aconitia, upon the evidence of two purchases of aconitia
by him, one from the chemist at Ventnor on the 28th August, and the
other about the 20th November at Allen and Hanbury’s, in Plough Court.
Then again placing before the jury the two questions he had referred to
in the opening of his charge, and warning them not to allow sympathy
either for the poor boy or the prisoner to bias their decision, Sir
Henry Hawkins left the case in their hands.
In less than three-quarters of an hour the jury returned a verdict of
“Guilty.” When called upon as usual to say why judgment should not be
passed upon him, the prisoner, standing with arms folded, in a loud
voice, “protested his innocence before God,” and with very few words,
the learned judge pronounced sentence of death.
EVIDENCE OF LAMSON’S STATE OF MIND.
Within a short time after the conviction of the prisoner, Mr. Lowell,
the American Minister, by the instruction of President Arthur,
requested the Home Secretary to suspend the execution, on the faith
of a statement from the United States Attorney-General that evidence
bearing on the state of mind of the prisoner, was preparing in America,
and would be shortly forwarded to England. To this novel application
Sir William Harcourt acceded, in courtesy to the applicant. The
promised affidavits arrived, and were considered by the Home Secretary
as insufficient. Again a further application for delay was made, on
the promise of further evidence, and acceded to for the term of a
fortnight, with clear notice to Lamson that if the promised affidavits
were not more satisfactory than the preceding ones, the sentence
would be carried out. Such they proved in the opinion of Sir William
Harcourt, and Lamson was at length executed on the 28th of April.
The proffered evidence not only covered the whole of Lamson’s life from
the days of his medical pupilage at Paris till his trial, but sought
to establish “a marked hereditary tendency to insanity,” from the fact
that his grandmother had been in the New York Bloomingdale Asylum from
the age of seventy-six till her death four years after, and had been
previously suffering from “senile dementia,” the apparent cause of
which was entered in the Hospital Register as “predisposing;”—that
her brother, a sea captain, at the age of eighty, was in the same
asylum, having been suffering for two years from “dementia,” also
entered as “predisposing;” and that her daughter, a Mrs. McGregor, at
the age of thirty-one, was a patient until her death about three years
after—her mania “puerperal,” and also entered as “predisposing.”[215]
No evidence, however, was offered of the mental condition of any less
remote ancestors.
As a _Medical Student_ in Paris in 1869-70, Lamson is described as
suffering from cerebral anæmia with a tendency to melancholia, given
to imaginary complaints about the surgical theatre, apt to take
offence, with a passion for chemical experiments of a morbid character,
generally genial in manner, and taciturn of speech. When employed in
the American Ambulance during the siege of Paris in 1870-71, “his
behaviour was so wild, erratic, and bad, that his associate aids were
not prepared to say whether it was that of an idiot or the result
of special wickedness—his mind so disordered that he could not be
entrusted to administer medicines, as to the effects of which he seemed
to be utterly destitute of judgment and common sense—just as likely to
give a large and dangerous dose as a smaller and safe one, no matter
how particularly instructed, and seemed to be utterly reckless of
results.”[216]
From this date to the year 1877, no evidence was offered of his conduct
or state of mind. In that year he acted as a surgeon for the Red Cross
Society at Bucharest, in the Servian War. Whilst there “he exhibited a
mania for the administration of aconitia in almost every case, using
it in season and out of season, and in such quantities as to alarm the
medical staff and render his recall to England necessary. Here, too, he
appears to have commenced on himself the extravagant use of hypodermic
injections of morphia, to which he subsequently became so notoriously
addicted, on the plea that he was in constant pain and misery,” and to
have been constantly under the influence of some anæsthetic. He was
also habitually incoherent and inconsistent in his way of talking,
boasting of adventures in the American Civil War, when he could have
been only twelve years of age. His father, who was with him, seemed to
keep a constant watch over his son, and frequently expressed his wish
that some other surgeon should be associated with him.[217]
In 1879 Lamson purchased a medical practice at Bournemouth, and during
the two years that he remained there, according to the testimony of
friends and servants, behaved in a most erratic and strange manner.
Whilst there his habit of injecting morphia under his skin increased
in a most extraordinary degree, one witness saying that “he was hardly
ever in his company for more than an hour that he did not use the
hypodermic syringe.” When visiting patients he seemed not to know
why he had come, or what he ought to do, behaving so strangely that
his services were eventually dispensed with. His habit of telling
extravagant stories grew rapidly upon him. His eyes had a fitful and
nervous look as if afraid of phantoms. He seemed to be perpetually
trying to look sane, and the witness (Warren, an artist) who spoke
to these symptoms said “he had frequently seen him walking along
quickly, his head hanging down, when he would stop suddenly, turn
back, and branch off in some other direction, crossing backwards and
forwards over the road without rhyme or reason.” Mr. Radcliffe Hall, of
Welbeck-street, to whom Lamson had made in writing a perfectly baseless
statement about Mrs. Hall’s antecedents, and afterwards could remember
nothing about it, had seen him inject morphia twenty times a day.
His servants thought him mad, and humoured him accordingly, and the
patients who attended at the dispensary which with another medical man
he managed, with only one or two exceptions, refused to be attended by
him.[218]
From April to May, 1881, Lamson was staying at Rouse’s Point, New York,
with the Rev. Irving McElroy, the rector of Christ Church, during which
period his habit of injecting morphia was continued, and, according
to the testimony of the rector and his wife, Dr. Winston, the Medical
Director of the New York Mutual Life Assurance Company, Dr. Murray,
Physician of Rouse’s Point, Dr. Hall, and others who knew him, it was
seriously affecting his brain. On one occasion he was found in the
public street with no coat on, and his left arm bared. He had a syringe
in one hand, and with the thumb of the other was pressing down the
place where the injection had been made.[219] At his friend’s house
he passed the greater part of the day on the lounge, either dozing or
attempting to read. He was then using a mixture apparently of morphia
and atropine, but told them he preferred aconitine, but could not
procure it in that section of the county. To one of the witnesses he
admitted that his whole existence depended on the constant use of
morphia. The marks of these repeated injections were detected by Dr.
Williamson of Edinburgh whom Lamson consulted in New York in October,
1881, who marked the serious change that had taken place in his
health, and urged his discontinuance of this baneful practice. Dr. Hall
considered Lamson “not a perfectly sane man,” Dr. Winston considered
that he “had become a helpless victim of the habit (of injecting
morphia) which had seriously impaired his mental powers and destroyed
his moral responsibility,” and in Dr. Murray’s opinion “he was utterly
irresponsible for his acts.” It is admitted, however, that at intervals
his conversation was perfectly clear and lucid, and to none of the
medical men appears to have been put the legal test question, “did he
know the difference between right and wrong, at the time wherein he
committed the crime?”[220]
Lastly, we are offered testimony as to the condition of Lamson’s
mind for a few days immediately preceding the fatal occurrence, and
that of his father and wife as to his strange conduct for some time
previous. All, however, that this evidence amounts to is, that he was
so strange and extravagant in his manner and conduct, that he was
spoken of by friends and acquaintance as a lunatic, that “for a year
past his wife’s fears and anxieties had been greatly and increasingly
aroused for the soundness of his mind—that his brain, predisposed to
weakness, or constitutionally liable to disturbance, was unsettled
by ill-health and trouble, and its disease aggravated by the use of
morphia.” His father spoke to the wild and fanciful delusions in which
his son indulged—the whole being myths, and believed “that for at
least eighteen months he had been in an unsound state of mind, steadily
increasing in its character and blinding him to the natural and
inevitable effects of his acts; and that the balance of his mind had
been quite destroyed.” His solicitor deposed that “he could obtain no
assistance from him in the preparation of his defence—that he appeared
to have no memory and to be incapable of appreciating the bearing of
any of the facts of his case, or the gravity of his position; that he
laboured under extravagant hallucination, whilst his statements were
either incoherent, inconsistent, or manifestly the creations of a
disordered brain.”
Three medical men of experience speak to the effects almost certain
to be produced by such an habitually excessive use of morphia or
opium, as that of which Dr. Lamson was the victim. Dr. Coghill, of
the Ventnor Consumptive Hospital, and for eight years municipal
medical officer and consulting physician to a general hospital in
China, where he had unusual facilities for becoming familiar with
the effects of opium smoking and eating, has no hesitation in saying
that “anyone in the habit of using opium to such an extent would be
incapable of self-control, and have his moral senses and powers of
judgment deteriorated to a degree rendering him incapable of resisting
morbid influences.” Dr. H. H. Kane, of Fort Washington, New York,
who had written on the effects of “these drugs that enslave,” and on
the “Hypodermic Injection of Morphia,” and was then in charge of a
hospital devoted to the treatment of opium smokers and eaters and the
like habits, admits that “as regards the question of insanity from the
habitual use of opium or its alkaloids, more especially morphia, but
little definite is known. Insane Asylum reports,” he adds, “record
every year from six to eight cases of insanity attributed to the
prolonged use of opiates; and physicians in general practice recognise
it as a rare, though well-established, form of insanity. A person
with an hereditary tendency to insanity, or with a mind weakened from
any combination of circumstances, or from bodily disease, using this
drug in large amount for a considerable time, could hardly escape some
unsettling of his mental and moral powers. Actual mania, melancholia,
and dementia are probably rare, but have undoubtedly occurred from
this cause. Of all the forms of the opium habit that by hypodermic
injection, as a rule, works the most harm in the shortest time.”
Dr. R. M. Miller, of Norwood, who saw Lamson professionally in
July, 1881, when his friends were alarmed at his condition, is of
opinion “that morphia and atropia, taken in such quantities, would
gradually ruin the powers of the nervous system and also the powers of
self-control.”
Such is the substance of the testimony of the cloud of witnesses
proffered in support of the appeal for a scientific investigation
into the mental state of Lamson at the time when he committed the act
for which he was arraigned. To what does it amount? Even if it goes
beyond proof that he was occasionally nervous, disconnected in his
ideas, aimlessly untruthful, and with a hobby for the administration
of aconitia as a panacea for all diseases, and a loss of vital nerve
and energy, there is no evidence to suggest that these eccentricities
were dangerous or ever assumed the form of homicidal mania. “If,”
said a contemporary writer, “Lamson could appreciate the pecuniary
benefit he would derive from Percy John’s death—and why else should
he have selected his victim?—he could realise the wickedness of
his act. A symptom of dangerous madness is that it acts without
apparent motive—the immediate circumstances of the murder pointed to
the exercise of a crafty deliberation, which, though not in itself
inconsistent with homicidal mania, was not as aimless as homicidal
mania.” Is it not a parallel case to that of Dove, a weak and erratic
mind, in that case further weakened and unhinged by drink, in this case
by the vicious use of morphia? Are not the words of Baron Bramwell
in Dove’s case strictly applicable to this? “The rules of law,” said
that judge, “are that it must be clearly proved that, at the time of
committing the act, the party accused was labouring under such a defect
of reason, from disease of the mind, as not to know the nature and
quality of the act he was doing; and if he did know it, that he did not
know he was doing wrong.” Until the law is altered it is impossible
to doubt that the Home Secretary was right, “that he could find in
the affidavits and statutory declarations no sufficient grounds for
advising an interference with the sentence of the law.”