the jury, look upon the prisoner and hearken to her charge. She
stands indicted by the name of Mary Blandy, of the parish of
Henley-upon-Thames, in the county of Oxford, spinster, daughter of
Francis Blandy, late of the same place, gentleman, deceased, for
that she not having [as in the indictment before set forth]. Upon
this indictment she has been arraigned, and upon her arraignment has
pleaded not guilty, and for her trial has put herself upon God and
her country, which country you are. Your charge therefore is to
inquire whether she be guilty of the felony and murder whereof she
stands indicted, or not guilty. If you find her guilty you shall
inquire what goods or chattels, lands or tenements she had at the
time of the felony committed, or at any time since. If you find her
not guilty you shall inquire whether she fled for the same. If you
find that she did fly for the same you shall inquire of her goods
and chattels as if you had found her guilty. If you find her not
guilty, and that she did not fly for the same, say so, and no more;
and hear your evidence.
The Hon. Mr. Barrington then opened the indictment. After which,
[Sidenote: Mr. Bathurst]
The Hon. Mr. BATHURST[1] spoke as follows:--
May it please your lordships and you gentlemen of the jury, I am
counsel in this case for the King, in whose name and at whose
expense this prosecution is carried on against the prisoner at the
bar, in order to bring her to justice for a crime of so black a dye
that I am not at all surprised at this vast concourse of people
collected together to hear and to see the trial and catastrophe of
so execrable an offender as she is supposed to be.
For, gentlemen, the prisoner at the bar, Miss Mary Blandy, a
gentlewoman by birth and education, stands indicted for no less a
crime than that of murder, and not only for murder, but for the
murder of her own father, and for the murder of a father
passionately fond of her, undertaken with the utmost deliberation,
carried on with an unvaried continuation of intention, and at last
accomplished by a frequent repetition of the baneful dose,
administered with her own hands. A crime so shocking in its own
nature and so aggravated in all its circumstances as will (if she is
proved to be guilty of it) justly render her infamous to the latest
posterity, and make our children's children, when they read the
horrid tale of this day, blush to think that such an inhuman
creature ever had an existence.
I need not, gentlemen, paint to you the heinousness of the crime of
murder. You have but to consult your own breasts, and you will know
it.
Has a murder been committed? Who ever beheld the ghastly corpse of
the murdered innocent weltering in its blood and did not feel his
own blood run slow and cold through all his veins? Has the murderer
escaped? With what eagerness do we pursue? With what zeal do we
apprehend? With what joy do we bring to justice? And when the
dreadful sentence of death is pronounced upon him, everybody hears
it with satisfaction, and acknowledges the justice of the divine
denunciation that, "By whom man's blood is shed, by man shall his
blood be shed."
If this, then, is the case of every common murderer, what will be
thought of one who has murdered her own father? who has designedly
done the greatest of all human injuries to him from whom she
received the first and greatest of all human benefits? who has
wickedly taken away his life to whom she stands indebted for life?
who has deliberately destroyed, in his old age, him by whose care
and tenderness she was protected in her helpless infancy? who has
impiously shut her ears against the loud voice of nature and of God,
which bid her honour her father, and, instead of honouring him, has
murdered him?
It becomes us, gentlemen, who appear here as counsel for the Crown,
shortly to open the history of this whole affair, that you may be
better able to attend to and understand the evidence we have to lay
before you. And though, in doing this, I will endeavour rather to
extenuate than to aggravate, yet I trust I have such a history to
open as will shock the ears of all who hear me.
Mr. Francis Blandy, the unfortunate deceased, was an attorney at
law, who lived at Henley, in this county. A man of character and
reputation, he had one only child, a daughter--the darling of his
soul, the comfort of his age. He took the utmost care of her
education, and had the satisfaction to see his care was not
ill-bestowed, for she was genteel, agreeable, sprightly, sensible.
His whole thoughts were bent to settle her advantageously in the
world. In order to do that he made use of a pious fraud (if I may be
allowed the expression), pretending he could give her £10,000 for
her fortune. This he did in hopes that some of the neighbouring
gentlemen would pay their addresses to her, for out of regard to him
she was from her earliest youth received into the best company, and
her own behaviour made her afterwards acceptable to them. But how
short-sighted is human prudence? What was intended for her
promotion, proved his death and her destruction.
For, gentlemen, about six years ago, one Captain William Henry
Cranstoun, a gentleman then in the army, happened to come to Henley
to recruit. He soon got acquainted with the prisoner, and, hearing
she was to have £10,000, fell in love--not with her, but with her
fortune. Children he had before; married he was at that time, yet,
concealing it from her, he insinuated himself into her good graces,
and obtained her consent for marriage.
The father, who had heard a bad character of him, and who had reason
to believe, what was afterwards confirmed, that he was at that very
time married, you will easily imagine was averse to the proposal.
Upon this Captain Cranstoun and the prisoner determined to remove
that obstacle out of their way, and resolved to get as soon as
possible into possession of the £10,000 that the poor man had
unfortunately said he was worth.
In order for this, the captain being at Mr. Blandy's house in
August, 1750, they both agreed upon this horrid deed. And that
people might be less surprised at Mr. Blandy's death, they began by
giving out that they heard music in the house--a certain sign (as
Mr. Cranstoun had learned from a wise woman, one Mrs. Morgan, in
Scotland) that the father would die in less than twelve months. The
captain, too, pretended he was endowed with the gift of second
sight, and affirmed that he had seen Mr. Blandy's apparition. This
was another certain sign of his death, as she told the servants, to
whom she frequently said her father would not live long. Nay, she
went farther, and told them he would not live till the October
following.
When it was she first began to mix poison with his victuals it is
impossible for us to ascertain, but probably it was not long after
November, 1750, when Mr. Cranstoun left Henley. The effects of the
poison were soon perceived. You will hear Dr. Addington, his
physician, tell you Mr. Blandy had for many months felt the dreadful
effects of it. One of the effects was the teeth dropping out of his
head whole from their sockets. Yet what do you think, gentlemen, the
daughter did when she perceived it? "She damned him for a toothless
old rogue, and wished him at hell." The poor man frequently
complained of pains in his bowels, had frequent reachings and
sickness; yet, instead of desisting, she wanted more poison to
effect her purpose. And Mr. Cranstoun did accordingly in the April
following send her a fresh supply; under the pretence of a present
of Scotch pebbles, he enclosed a paper of white arsenic. This she
frequently administered in his tea; and we shall prove to you that
in June, having put some of it into a dish of tea, Mr. Blandy
disliking the taste, left half in the cup. Unfortunately, a poor old
charwoman (by name Ann Emmet), glad to get a breakfast, drank the
remainder, together with a dish or two more out of the pot, and ate
what bread and butter had been left. The consequence was that she
was taken violently ill with purging and vomiting, and was in
imminent danger of her life. The poor woman's daughter came and told
Miss Blandy how ill her mother was; she, sorry that the poison was
misapplied, said, "Do not let your mother be uneasy, I will send her
what is proper for her." And, accordingly, sent her great quantities
of sack whey and thin mutton broth, than which no physician could
have prescribed better, and thus drenched the poor woman for ten
days together, till she grew tired of her medicines, and sent her
daughter again to Miss Blandy to beg a little small beer. "No, no
small beer," the prisoner said, "that was not proper for her." Most
plainly, then, she knew what it was the woman had taken in her
father's tea. She knew its effect. She knew the proper antidotes.
Having now experienced the strength of the poison, she grew more
open and undaunted, was heard to say, "Who would grudge to send an
old father to hell for £10,000?" I will make no remark upon such a
horrid expression--it needs none. After this she continued to mix
the poison with her father's tea as often as she had an opportunity.
Soon afterwards Susan Gunnell, another witness we shall call,
happened to drink some which her master had left; she was taken ill
upon it, and continued so for three weeks. This second accident
alarmed the prisoner. She was afraid of being discovered. She found
it would not mix well with tea. Accordingly, she wrote to Mr.
Cranstoun for further instructions. In answer to it, he bids her
"put it into some liquid of a more thickish substance."
The father being ill, frequently took water gruel. This was a proper
vehicle for the powder. Therefore from this time you will find her
always busy about her father's gruel. But lest Susan Gunnell, who
had been ill, should eat any of it, she cautioned her particularly
against it, saying, "Susan, as you have been so ill, you had better
not eat any of your master's water gruel; I have been told water
gruel has done me harm, and perhaps it may have the same effect upon
you." And lest this caution should not be sufficient, she spoke to
Betty Binfield, the other maidservant, and asked her whether Susan
ever ate any of her father's gruel, adding, "She had better not, for
if she does it may do for her, you may tell her." Evidently, then,
she knew what were the effects of the powder she put into her
father's gruel; for if it would "do for" the servant, it would "do
for" her father.
But the time approached beyond which she had foretold her father
would not live. It was the middle of July, and the father still
living. At this Mr. Cranstoun grows impatient. Upon the 18th of July
he writes to her, and, expressing himself in an allegorical manner,
which, however, you will easily understand, he says, "I am sorry
there are such occasions to clean your pebbles; you must make use of
the powder to them by putting it in anything of substance, wherein
it will not swim a-top of the water, of which I wrote to you of in
one of my last. I am afraid it will be too weak to take off their
rust, or at least it will take too long a time."[2] Here he is
encouraging her to double the dose; says, he is afraid it will be
too weak, and will take up too much time. And, as a further
incitement to her to make haste, describes the beauties of Scotland,
and tells her that his mother, Lady Cranstoun, had employed workmen
to fit up an apartment for her at Lennel House.
Soon after the receipt of this letter she followed the advice. And
you will accordingly find the dose doubled. Her father grew worse,
and, as she herself told the servants, complained of a fireball in
his stomach, saying, "He never will be well till he has got rid of
it." And yet you will find she herself, fearful lest he should get
rid of it, was continually adding fuel to the fire, till it had
consumed her father's entrails.
Gentlemen, I will not detain you by going through every particular,
but bring you to the fatal period. Upon the 3rd of August, being
Saturday, Susan Gunnell made a large pan of water gruel for her
master. Upon Monday, the 5th, the prisoner will be proved to go into
the pantry where it was kept, and, after having, according to Mr.
Cranstoun's advice, put in a double dose of the powder, she stirred
it about, for a considerable time, in order to make it mix the
better. When, fearing she should have been observed, she went
immediately into the laundry, to the maids, and told them that "she
had been in the pantry, and, after stirring her papa's water gruel,
had ate the oatmeal at the bottom," saying that, "if she was ever to
take to the eating anything in particular, it would be oatmeal."
Strange inconsistence! She who had cautioned the maid against it not
above a fortnight before, who had declared that it had been
prejudicial to her own health, is on a sudden grown mighty fond of
it. But the pretence is easily to be seen through. That afternoon
some of the water gruel was taken out of the pan and prepared for
her father's supper. She again in the kitchen takes care to stir it
sufficiently, looks at the spoon, rubs some between her fingers, and
then sends it up to the poor old man her father. He scarce had
swallowed it when he was taken violently ill, and continued so all
the next day, with a griping, purging, and vomiting. Yet she herself
orders a second mess of the same gruel for her father's supper on
the Tuesday, and was herself the person who carried it up to her
father and administered it to him as nourishment. The poor old man,
grown weak with the frequent repetition, had not drank half the mess
before he was seized, from head to foot, with the most violent
pricking pains, continual reaching and vomiting, and was obliged to
go to bed without finishing it. The next morning the poor charwoman,
coming again to the house, unfortunately ate the remainder of the
gruel, and was instantly affected in so violent a manner that for
two hours together it was thought she would have died in Mr.
Blandy's house. The prisoner at this time was in bed; but the maid,
going up to her room, told her how ill dame Emmet had been, at the
same time saying she had ate nothing but the remainder of her
father's water gruel. The prisoner's answer was, "Poor woman! I am
glad I was not up, I should have been shocked to have seen
her"--should have been shocked to have seen the poor charwoman eat
what was prepared for her father, but was never shocked at her
father's eating it, or at his sufferings!
Gentlemen, in the afternoon of the Wednesday, notwithstanding the
poor man, her father, had suffered so much for two days together,
yet she again endeavours to give him more of the same gruel. "No,"
says the maid, "it has an odd taste; it is grown stale, I will make
fresh." "It is not worth while to make fresh now, it will take you
from your ironing; this will do," was the prisoner's answer.
However, Susan made fresh, after which wanting the pan to put it in,
she went to throw away what was before in it. Upon tilting the pan,
she perceived a white powder at the bottom, which she knew could not
be oatmeal. She showed it her fellow-servant, when, feeling it, they
found it gritty. They then too plainly perceived what it was had
made their poor master ill. What was to be done? Susan immediately
carried the pan with the gruel and powder in it to Mrs. Mounteney, a
neighbour and friend of the deceased. Mrs. Mounteney kept it till it
was delivered to the apothecary, the apothecary delivered it to the
physician, and he will tell you that upon trying it he found it to
be white arsenic. Mr. Blandy continued from day to day to grow
worse. At last, upon the Saturday morning, Susan Gunnell, an old
honest, maidservant, uneasy to see how her poor master had been
treated, went to his bedside, and, in the most prudent and gentlest
manner, broke to him what had been the cause of his illness, and the
strong ground there was to suspect that his daughter was the
occasion of it. The father, with a fondness greater than ever a
father felt before, cried out, "Poor love-sick girl! What will not a
woman do for the man she loves? But who do you think gave her the
powder?" She answered, "She could not tell, unless it was sent by
Mr. Cranstoun." "I believe so too," says the master, "for I remember
he has talked learnedly of poisons. I always thought there was
mischief in those cursed Scotch pebbles."
Soon afterwards he got up and came to breakfast in his parlour,
where his daughter and Mr. Littleton, his clerk, then were. A dish
of tea, in the usual manner, was ready poured out for him. He just
tasted it and said, "This tea has a bad taste," looked at the cup,
then looked hard at his daughter. She was, for the first time,
shocked, burst into tears, and ran out of the room. The poor father,
more shocked than the daughter, poured the tea into the cat's basin,
and went to the window to recover himself. She soon came again into
the room. Mr. Littleton said, "Madam, I fear your father is very
ill, for he has flung away his tea." Upon this news she trembled,
and the tears again stood in her eyes. She again withdraws. Soon
afterwards the father came into the kitchen, and, addressing himself
to her, said, "Molly, I had like to have been poisoned twenty years
ago, and now I find I shall die by poison at last." This was warning
sufficient. She immediately went upstairs, brought down Mr.
Cranstoun's letters, together with the remainder of the poison, and
threw them (as she thought unobserved) into the fire. Thinking she
had now cleared herself from the suspicious appearances of poison,
her spirits mend, "she thanked God that she was much better, and
said her mind was more at ease than it had been." Alas! how often
does that which we fondly imagine will save us become our
destruction? So it was in the present instance. For providentially,
though the letters were destroyed, the paper with the poison in it
was not burnt. One of the maids having immediately flung some fresh
coals upon the fire, Miss Blandy went well satisfied out of the
room. Upon her going out, Susan Gunnell said to her fellow-servants,
"I saw Miss Blandy throw some papers in the fire, let us see whether
we can discover what they were." They removed the coals, and found a
paper with white powder in it, wrote upon, in Mr. Cranstoun's hands,
"Powder to clean the pebbles."[3] This powder they preserved, and
the doctor will tell you that it was white arsenic, the same which
had been found in the pan of gruel.
Having now (as she imagined) concealed her own being concerned, you
will find her the next day endeavouring to prevent her lover from
being discovered. Mr. Blandy of Kingston having come the night
before to see her father, on Sunday morning she sent Mr. Littleton
with him to church; while they were there she sat down and wrote
this letter to her beloved Cranstoun--
Dear Willy,--My father is so bad, that I have only time to tell you,
that if you do not hear from me soon again, don't be frightened. I
am better myself. Lest any accident should happen to your letters,
take care what you write. My sincere compliments. I am ever yours.
"My father is so bad." Who had made him so? Yet does she say she was
sorry for it? No; she knew her father was then dying by that powder
that he had sent her, yet could acquaint him she was herself better.
Under those circumstances could caution him to take care what he
wrote, lest his letters should be discovered! What can speak more
strongly their mutual guilt? This letter she sealed with no less than
five wafers. When Mr. Littleton came from church she privately gave it
to him, desiring it might be directed as usual, and put into the post.
Mr. Littleton was at that time too well apprised of this black
transaction to obey her commands. He opened the letter, took a copy of
it. Upon further recollection, carried the original to the father, who
bid him open and read it. He did so. What do you think, gentlemen, was
all the poor old man said upon this discovery? He only again dropped
these words, "Poor love-sick girl! What will not a woman do for the
man she loves?"
Upon the Monday morning, after having been kept for two days without
seeing her father, by the order of the physicians, her conscience, or
rather fear, began to trouble her; she told the maid she should go
distracted if she did not see her father, and sent a message to beg to
see him. Accordingly she was admitted. The conversation between them
was this--"Papa, how do you do?" "My dear, I am very ill." She
immediately fell upon her knees and said, "Dear sir, banish me where
you will; do with me what you please, so you do but pardon and forgive
me. And as to Mr. Cranstoun, I never will see, write, or speak to him
again." He answered, "I do forgive you, but you should, my dear, have
considered that I was your own father." Upon this the prisoner said,
"Sir, as to your illness I am innocent." Susan Gunnell, who was
present, interrupted her at this expression, and told her she was
astonished to hear her say she was innocent, when they had the poison
to produce against her that she had put into her father's water gruel,
and had preserved the paper she had thrown into the fire. The father,
whose love and tenderness for his daughter exceeded expression, could
not bear to hear her thus accused; therefore, turning himself in his
bed, cried out, "Oh that villain! that hath eat of the best, and drank
of the best my house could afford, to take away my life and ruin my
daughter!" Upon hearing this the daughter ran to the other side of the
bed to him; upon which he added, "My dear, you must hate that man, you
must hate the very ground he treads on." Struck with this, the
prisoner said, "Dear sir, your kindness towards me is worse than
swords to my heart. I must down upon my knees and beg you not to curse
me." Hear the father's answer, a father then dying by poison given by
her hand--"I curse thee, my dear! No, I bless you, and will pray to
God to bless you, and to amend your life"; then added, "So do, my
dear, go out of the room lest you should say anything to accuse
yourself." Was ever such tenderness from a parent to a child! She was
prudent enough to follow his advice, and went out of the room without
speaking. His kindness was swords to her heart for near half an hour.
Going downstairs she met Betty Binfield, and, whilst she was thus
affected, owned to her she had put some powder into her father's
gruel, and that Susan and she, for their honesty to their master,
deserved half her fortune.
Gentlemen, not to tire you with the particulars of every day, upon
Wednesday, in the afternoon, the father died. Upon his death the
prisoner, finding herself discovered, endeavoured to persuade the
manservant to go off with her; but he was too honest to be tempted by
a reward to assist her in going off, though she told him it would be
£500 in his way. That night she refused to go to bed. Not out of grief
for her father's death, for you will be told by the maid who sat up
with her that she never during the whole night showed the least
sorrow, compassion, or remorse upon his account. But in the middle of
the night she proposed to get a post-chaise in order to go to London,
and offered the maid twenty-five guineas to go with her. "A
post-chaise! and go to London! God forbid, madam, I should do such a
thing." The prisoner, finding the maid not proper for her purpose,
immediately put a smile upon her face--"I was only joking." Only
joking! Good God! would she now have it thought she was only joking?
Her father just dead by poison: she suspected of having poisoned him;
accused of being a parricide; and would she have it thought she was
capable of joking?