Report of the trial of Madeleine Smith : before the High Court of Justiciary at Edinburgh, June 30th to July 9th, 1857, for the alleged poisoning of Pierre Émile l'Angelier / by Alexander Forbes Irvine, advocate.

Smith, Madeleine, 1835-1928.

Date:: 1857

Credit: Report of the trial of Madeleine Smith : before the High Court of Justiciary at Edinburgh, June 30th to July 9th, 1857, for the alleged poisoning of Pierre Émile l'Angelier / by Alexander Forbes Irvine, advocate. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, Harvard Medical School.

309/330 (page 291)

$cup of cocoa at her -sdnclow between ten and eleven o'clock at night, which she had prepared herself, was very remarkable, but became more important still when taken in connection with her statement foi'ther on in the declaration, that she thought her using it must have been known to the servants, as the package containing it lay on the mantelpiece in her room, no one in the family using it ex- cept herself. Now, said his Lordship, that poor gu'l's young sister was brought in to say that she drank the cocoa at breakfast time, and that it was openly kno^vn in the family. There was a fire in her room, while she merely stated that she got hot water fi'om the servants. In reference to her statement that she had been ad%'ised to use arsenic as a cosmetic, by washing the face, by a young lady, the daughter of an actress, while at school, he did not think there was a particle of truth in it, neither had any newspaper been dis- covered in which there was a single word recommending the prac- tice. Then the prisoner's alleged object in writing the first letter to the Bridge of Allan was to have a meeting with L'Angelier, to tell him of her engagement to Mr Minnoch; but, if that was her only object, could she not have told him so in writing? On the sup- position that that was her object, her language was most unaccount- able. According to that, it was to clasp him to her bosom, and tell him she was engaged to another man—a very odd mode of makinn; known her eno;ao;ement. He then went over the evidence of Miss Jane Buchanan, who had accompanied the prisoner into Cui'rie's shop when she bought the arsenic. She stated that the shopman had suggested phosphorus, and the prisoner then said that they were leaving their town house, and that there would be no danger in laying the arsenic in the cellars. In reference to the denial of Miss Guibilei (now ^Irs Walcott) that she had ever advised the prisoner to use arsenic as a cosmetic, it was certainly very plausible that the daughter of an actress should have been fi xed upon to recommend its use for that purpose; but unfortunately, the statement was disproved by the lady herself—a most respectable- looking ])erson. The panel also said, that she had read recom- mendations to this effect in certain publications. In reference to the latter assertion, his Lordship remarked, that not one of tlie ])ub- lications produced contained anything of the kind. With regai'd to the young lady designated as the daughter of an actress, she was a very respectable lady of very prepossessing apjiearance, married to an English solicitor, and she distinctly declared that she had never iiad any conversation with the ])risoner on the subject of cosmetics. William Smith, her father's page, deponed to having been sent on one occasion for prussic-acid l)y the ])risoner, who told him that she wanted it for her hands. That, saicl his Lordship, was another ex- traordinary u^ to which to apply poison. Having adverted to the evidence of fiie druggists from whom the arsenic had been pur- chased by Miss Smitli, he read that of A\'illiam C'anipsie, the gar- dener at Kowalyen, who said lie never lind got any nrsenic fi'oin$