The Queen v. Beaney : extraordinary charge of murder against a medical man, in consequence of a diseased womb being ruptured after death : with medical notes and observations / by C.E. Reeves.

Reeves, C. E. (Charles Evans), 1828-1880

Date:: 1866

Credit: The Queen v. Beaney : extraordinary charge of murder against a medical man, in consequence of a diseased womb being ruptured after death : with medical notes and observations / by C.E. Reeves. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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$three Coroners—Messrs. Candler, Rudall, and Pugh ; and it was patent that what Mr. Candler did not know, Mr. Rudall* or Mr. Pugh did. The Coroner’s charge to the jury was neither more nor less than the lucubrations, “opinions,” and “thinks” of Messrs. Rudall and Pugh; but the animus displayed in doing what he must have known was illegal when he refused to hear the evidence offered on behalf of Mr. Beanev, and the coolness with which he cut up and rubbed his tobacco, and filled his short black pipe, and puffed the smoke into the faces of men who could not (amusing as it might possibly be to him) participate in his insouciance after committing a brother practitioner to prison on a charge of wilful murder, was all his own. At first Mr. Rudall said, after describing the appearances which he found in the body — “I have no knowledge how the rupture (in the womb) was causedbut subse- quently he said, “ from violence applied to the interior of the womb.” A little further on he said — “ The introduction of the hand into the uterus in order to remove a tumour by a medical man, properly qualified \qy., like himself], would be in the highest degree unlikely to cause rupture of the uterus.” On the second day he said, “ the rupture might have been caused by a ‘ pushing or a pulling force/ ” and this has been the burden of his cry, as Pugh’s has been—“ the human hand, and only the human hand,” could * There is a considerable part of the evidence given by this gentle- man on the last day of the inquest missing. What has become of it ? Was it considered to be too favourable to Mr. Beaney ? Who was respon- sible for its safe keeping ? The following is all that could be found at the Crown Law Office. Those present at the inquest—the newspaper reporters and others—will be able to say whether something was not said about “I have no knowledge of midwifery;” and something more:— “ The deponent, James Thomas Rudall, on his oath, saith as follows : —“ The os uteri of the deceased was dilated to the size of a five-shilling piece, or very nearly. I passed my hand quite through it readily ; there were no signs of injury about it. “ JAMES T. RUDALL, F.R.C.S. “ Taken and sworn before me, the 21st day of March, a.d. 1866, at East Collingwood. “ C. Candler, Coroner.1$