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EDITOR'S NOTES 



WILLIAM PALMER 



William Palmer, surgeon of Rugeley, Staffordshire, 

 aged thirty-one, was indicted for the wilful murder of John 

 Parsons Cook, and tried at the Central Criminal Court on 

 May 14, and eleven following days of May 1856. In 

 consequence of the prejudice against him in Staffordshire 

 the case was transferred to London before Lord Chief 

 Justice Campbell, Baron Alderson, and Mr. Justice Creswell. 

 The Attorney-General (Sir A. Cockburn), Mr. Edwin 

 James, Q.C., Mr. Welsby, Mr. Bodkin, and Mr. Huddleston, 

 were for the prosecution, and Mr. Serjeant Shee, Mr. 

 Grove, Q.C., Mr. Gray, and Mr. Kenealy for the defence. 

 The trial was remarkable for the conflict of the medico- 

 scientific evidence, the most eminent men among our 

 physicians and analysts being called on either side, and 

 the most contradictory testimony as to the possibility of 

 detecting strychnia being given. Cook, having been 

 originally brought up as a solicitor, on coming into a 

 fortune of from 12,000/. to 13,000/., abandoned the law and 

 took to the turf, where he became acquainted with Palmer, 

 who had for some years kept racehorses. Originally in 

 good local practice, Palmer had of late transferred most 

 of his patients to a Mr. Thirlby, formerly his assistant. 

 His father, originally a working sawyer, had amassed a 

 fortune as a timber merchant, and dying suddenly in 1837 

 left a fortune of 70,000/. Each of the children took 7,000/. 

 Of the seven children the prisoner was the fourth. As a 

 child he was known for his amiability and kindness, but 

 also for his sly and underhand manner, and his partiality 

 for trying experiments of a cruel nature on animals. He 

 had to leave a firm of druggists in Liverpool when he was 



