October 14,1671.] THE PHARMACEUTICAL JOURNAL AND TRANSACTIONS. 
317 
tinned so nearly the rest of the day. He talked wildly 
■when spoken to. She saw a paper in the room, labelled 
<l poison,” but with nothing in it. She had no idea what 
he could have required poison for. They had dogs and 
rats, and deceased said two or three weeks ago that one 
of the dogs (a black one) would have to be poisoned. It 
had not been poisoned. 
Mr. E. Parkes, chemist and druggist, Piccadilly, said 
deceased came to his shop on Wednesday, and said lie 
wanted a little arsenic to poison a dog. Witness told 
him he must bring a witness to the sale, or he could not 
let him have it, though he knew him well, for the law 
must be complied with. He went out and returned with 
Mr. Ivelsall, ginger-beer manufacturer, and witness then 
sold him an ounce of arsenic mixed ; that is, equal parts 
of pure arsenic and a colouring powder. The purchase 
was entered in a book and signed by deceased and Mr. 
Ivelsall. Mr. Wooldridge was not at all excited, and 
stood chatting with witness a few minutes after making 
the purchase. 
Mr. W. W. Ivelsall said he met the deceased on 
Wednesday about one o’clock. Mr. Wooldridge asked 
him to go to the Smithfield Inn and have a glass of beer, 
and he consented. On the way deceased went into Mr. 
Parke’s shop, and presently came to the door and called 
to witness, to whom he said, “ I want you to sign a book. 
I am going to poison a dog, and it requires some sign¬ 
ing.” Deceased had a very savage vicious dog, which 
had been sent him from Wolverhampton. Witness 
signed the book, and then they went to the Smithfield, 
where witness stayed till seven o’clock with deceased, 
whom he left there. Deceased was sober and was per¬ 
fectly calm. 
Mr. W. IP. Folker, surgeon, said when he went to the 
house of deceased on Thursday morning his sister told him 
deceased had taken poison, and, looking round the room, 
he saw a paper with a “poison” label upon it, and a 
half-pint mug, which had a bluish sediment in it. He 
asked deceased if he had taken poison, and ho replied, 
“ Yes.” Witness at once prepared an antidote, and 
asked the deceased to drink it immediately. He asked 
what it was for, and when told, said, “I will not take 
that or anything else, and if I get well I will take some 
more” (poison). He added, “I expected they would 
send for you, but I hoped I should have ‘ pegged out ’ 
"before you came.” The poison had begun to work be¬ 
fore witness arrived, although deceased vomited again 
while he was there. Pie visited him again three or four 
times during the day, and administered several things, 
•which deceased took in the hope of being relieved of the 
very great pain he suffered. It was impossible to save 
"him after such a dose of poison. He had swallowed it 
two hours before witness saw him. Less than a hundredth 
part of the quantity of arsenic he took would kill a man. 
He had known deceased for some time, and he should 
never have suspected him of doing such a thing, but his 
manner and language when with him on Thursday, his 
■saying he had taken poison and meant it, and if that did 
not answer he would take more, coupled with the taking 
of the poison, led witness to the conclusion that he was 
then not sane. 
Mr. D. Groom, managing clerk to Messrs. Tennant, 
solicitors, said he had seen a great deal of Mr. Wooldridge 
during the last fortnight. On Wednesday fortnight he 
came to the office, and said he was glad, witness had 
come back from his holiday, a§ he had been in trouble 
for a long time and was almost mad; he had neither 
been able to eat nor sleep for a long time. He came 
afterwards every day, sometimes twice a day, and when 
he came the second time he would ask again the question 
which had been answered in the morning, having ap¬ 
parently forgotten everything he had been told two or 
three horns before. About the middle of the previous 
week he came to the office and cried bitterly for an hour 
and a half. He continually complained of not being 
able to think of anything, to attend to his business, or 
to sleep, and said unless some disputes were arranged it 
would kill him. 
The coroner having summed up and put tho issue be¬ 
fore the jury, they found, after a few minutes’ conside¬ 
ration, a verdict of “ Temporary insanity.”— Staffordshire 
Weekly Times. 
Alleged Poisoxixg of a Child. 
On Friday night, October 6, Mr. Richards resumed an 
inquiry at the Prince of Wales Tavern, Banner Street, 
St. Luke’s, into the circumstances attending the death of 
William Jackford, aged nine months, the infant child of 
a woman living at 13, Baltic Street, whose death is al¬ 
leged to have been caused by lead poison, administered 
by a woman with whom the child had been farmed. 
When the deceased was six weeks old it was farmed with 
a Mrs. Elizabeth Peck, who received 7s. a week (latterly 
reduced to 5s.) for its keep. This woman kept deceased 
until the 27th ult., on which day she took it back to tho 
mother in a perfect state of health, according to her ac¬ 
count. From the time the child was taken home it be¬ 
gan to sicken, and vomited violently all the next day, 
dying in a fit of convulsions on Thursday night. Dr. 
Thomas Warder had made a post-mortem examination of 
the body, and found tho stomach red and inflamed, with 
black specks all over it. These specks he had ascertained 
were lead, and he was, therefore, of opinion that the con¬ 
vulsions had been caused by lead-poisoning. He had 
kept the contents of the stomach for a chemical analysis, 
which he thought ought to be made, and the inquiry was 
adjourned for a week to enable a professor to make tho 
necessary experiments.— Daily News. 
Poisoxixg by Carbolic Acid. 
An inquest was held on Tuesday last at Bangor to 
inquire into the death of a young woman named Jones. 
It appeared from the evidence that on the previous 
Saturday the deceased went to Mr. Baker, chemist, of 
Upper Bangor, and asked for two-pennyworth of car¬ 
bolic acid for the purpose of cleansing a dress of some 
tar. Mr. Baker expressed his doubt whether the acid 
would not burn the material, but she wished, she said, 
to try it, and after informing her of its poisonous pro¬ 
perty, ho supplied her with two drachms of the acid, 
placing a “poison” label upon the bottle, although, as 
he explained in answer to some remarks made by the 
coroner, carbolic acid is not included in the schedule of 
poisons necessary to be labelled. It is surmised that 
while walking home she tore the label off the bottle, 
pieces of it being afterwards discovered in her pocket. 
When or how she took the poison is not known, but she 
died in a very short time after coming back. A surgeon 
(Dr. Humphreys) was sent for, but he did not arrive 
while she was alive, and observing no appearance of 
anything unnatural, he attributed death to some ordinary 
cause. Subsequently, however, another surgeon, Dr. 0. 
T. Williams, saw the body at the request of Mr. Baker, 
,and then the bottle was discovered in the pocket of the 
deceased’s dress. Neither of the medical men could say 
that death was occasioned by poisoning, the mouth being 
entirely free from the blistering that would be expected, 
and a post-mortem examination was therefore ordered by 
the jury. This revealed that the deceased had undoubt¬ 
edly taken the carbolic acid, the stomach being greatly 
congested and corroded; but the doctors were of opinion 
that deceased died from suffocation caused by the closing 
of the glottis, which would account for the suddenness. 
The coroner was disposed to cast some reflection upon Mr. 
Baker for indiscretion, but the jury, in returning a ver¬ 
dict of “ Temporary insanity,” completely exonerated 
him from blame.— Liverpool Mercury. 
