177 
professor taylor’s report on poisoning. 
statement respecting the discovery of arsenic in the shop:—“ I went into the shop, and 
saw Whittaker and Garner (the two prisoners), and the former pointed out the place 
Avhere the arsenic was kept. It was placed upon a shelf under the counter. There 
Avould be half a hundredweight at least, in pound and half-pound packages. I saw a 
pound packet of white arsenic which had been broken into; it was three and a half 
ounces deficient. It had evidently been recently broken open, but neither Garner nor 
Whittaker could account for it. Both asserted it had been recently opened. The string 
was cut, and not to be found. They complained that the parcel had been opened by 
some one who had no business to open it. There was another parcel, which had been 
open some time, as it was very dirty, and both stated that this package only should 
have been broken into. It contained white arsenic.” 
In reference to this discovery of the mode in which arsenic in large quantities was 
kept in a village shop, it may be stated that during the illness of the prisoner’s wife in 
March, 1861, she was attended by a woman who gave her arrow-root and milk, the former 
being procured from the shop. The woman used occasionally to taste the arrow-root, 
and she suffered like the wife from sickness and purging. The wife died, as it was 
afterwards proved, from the effects of arsenic; and the nurse suffered from paralysis, as 
a result of the action of arsenic, and Avas for a period of ten Aveeks an in-patient at an 
hospital. Nearly two years after the death of the Avife and the illness of the nurse, the 
police took from the prisoner’s shop a large drawer, labelled in ink-writing on paper, 
“Arrow-root and Baking PoAvder. 2d. per oz., 2s. per lb.” This was submitted to me 
for analysis. The draAver contained a pound and a quarter of starchy powder, having 
the appearance of common arroAV-root. On analysis, it was found that this arrow-root Avas 
mixed Avith about 140 grains of arsenic. All parts of it were more or less poisoned, and 
a tablespoonful, Aveighing 550 grains, yielded nine grains of white arsenic. There Avas 
no baking powder in the drawer. The draAver had no cover, and Avas one of many, open¬ 
ing as usual from the counter, Avithout anything to indicate the deadly nature of its 
contents. Any person applying for arrow-root or baking powder might have been served 
from this drawer. There Avas no evidence, how, Avhen, or by whom the poison was 
mixed Avith the arrow-root. 
The death of the Rev. Dr. Alexander, in April, 1857, shows that no class of society is 
safe against mistakes of this nature. On the 16th March a servant was sent to the shop 
of a grocer in Ferbane, for one pound of arrow-root. The shopman, not having so much 
in the bottle Avhich he placed on the counter, took from a paper parcel a sufficient quantity 
of a white powder to make up the proper Aveight. Arrow-root Avas prepared with it in the 
usual way, and Dr. Alexander, his daughter, and two of his servants partook of it. 
They all suffered from symptoms of poisoning by arsenic, and Dr. Alexander died from 
the effects of the poison on the sixteenth day. The white powder Avhich the shopman 
had employed to make up the deficient Aveight, Avas proved to be white arsenic. 
Dr. Alexander’s steAvard, who Avent to the shop after the accident to make inquiries, 
found rice, corrosive sublimate, jalap, and oxalic acid in different papers in the same 
draAA'er, and all under the care of an ignorant boy.* 
murder by arsenic, as well as the two mentioned in the text, are necessarily entered in the 
returns of the Registrar General as deaths from natmal causes. 
When causes of death are certified as cholera, choleraic, or bilious diarrhoea, gastro-ente- 
ritis, convulsions, etc., without any inspection of the body, the fact that there may have 
been really symptoms of poisoning is altogether overlooked. At the trial of Catherine 
Wilson for murder at the Central Criminal Court in September, 1862, I declined to accept 
a certified cause of death from disease, as a proof of the real cause, believing it, as it tvas 
proved to be by the conviction and execution of the prisoner, a death from poison oA r erlookecl 
in its true features at the time of its occurrence. I then stated that on eight different occa¬ 
sions I had given evidence at inquests, or on trials for murder by poison, in Avhich death 
had been certified from natural causes; and on exhumation of the bodies, many months 
afterwards, poison was found in them, and this had really been the cause of death. That 
statement was at the time received Avith something like incredulity on the part of the 
counsel for the prisoner. Since that trial I find, on reference to my notes, that I have 
examined sixteen exhumed bodies where death had taken place from poison, and natural 
causes had been certified. This number is exclusive of three exhumations of the victims of 
Catherine Wilson. Here natural causes had been certified, although, as the learned judge, 
Mr. Justice Byles, remarked, the deceased persons had been destroyed by poison. 
* See ‘ Medical Times and Gazette,’ April 18, 1857, p. 38. 
