Whether strangulation be induced by the suspension of the body by the
neck, or by a ligature drawn tight, or by any other pressure upon the
trachea, the physiological phenomena of death are the same; where,
however, the person has died from manual strangulation, the marks about
the neck will probably be more evident, and the discolouration will
correspond with the marks of the fingers and nails; and we may also
expect to find traces of violence upon the chest, for since the weight
of the body is not obtained in such a case, additional force becomes
necessary to consummate the fatal act. On opening the bodies of those
who have been taken off by manual strangulation, _Dr. Smith_ thinks that
the usual appearances of this kind of death may not seem so conclusive
as in other cases: an opinion in which we feel inclined to coincide; for
in consequence of the greater resistance of the sufferer, the functions
of respiration and circulation may continue in some measure for a longer
period than in drowning or hanging, which must be considered as more
summary processes of suffocation. In the case of a woman who had been
thus strangled by two men, _Littre_ found the tympanum of the left ear
lacerated, whence flowed about an ounce of blood; the vessels of the
brain were unusually turgid, red blood was extravasated in the
ventricles, as well as at the base of the cranium; the lungs were
distended and their membrane vascular; not more, however, than an ounce
of blood was found in the right ventricle of the heart, and it was fluid
and frothy, like that in the lungs; this circumstance deserves
particular notice, and can only be explained by supposing that the
respiration and circulation were not at once arrested, but that the
unhappy sufferer was enabled to inhale air, at intervals, during the
protracted struggle[45]; and yet in certain cases, death may be very
easily occasioned by manual strangulation, of which the murder of _Dr.
Clench_, in the year 1692, may be adduced as an example; this gentleman
was strangled in a hackney coach by two men, while driving about the
streets of the city, without the coachman having the slightest knowledge
of the transaction, until he afterwards found him quite dead, kneeling
down with his head on the seat, and a handkerchief bound about his neck,
in which was a piece of coal, placed just over the windpipe.[46]