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.

  • Madeleine Smith
Date:
1857
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

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.

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    does not contain the indigo directed to be used in the Act for the sale of arsenic. It may contain a little of the colouring matter of indigo. But when the colouring matter is detached, it does not give the peculiar reactions of indigo; neither does it impart a blue colour to the arsenic, as good indigo does characteristically; for the colour is a pale greyish black. The colouring matter in this article is also imperfectly mixed. It may be easily removed, in a gi-eat measure, by washing the powder with cold water ; which is not to be accomplished easily, or so perfectly, when good indigo is used. The proportion of the admixture amounts to a 36th part. This is a little less than the proportion which the Act directs— viz., a 32d—when indigo is used. All this I certify on soul and conscience. (Signed) E. Christison. [Shown Nos. 212, 213.] These samples are similar to what I got from Dr Penny. Cross-examined by the Dean of Faculty.—I did not detect colouring matter in the dead body ; my attention was not directed to it. I got only one article in which it might have been found, if my attention had been directed to it—viz., the contents of the small intestine; the others had been subjected to previous preparation. I was not asked to attend to colouring matter. I did not see it, and I did not search for it. Sup- posing soot or indigo to have been administered with the arsenic, I think it might have been found in the stomach. I can't say it would have been found, even by careful examination; many cii'cumstances go to the pos- sibility of its being found. Many of the component parts of soot are insoluble ; and it might have been partially removed by frequent vomiting, but not entirely. It is very difficult to remove soot from arsenic entirely. Indigo would have been found more easily, from the peculiarity of the colour, and the chemical properties being so precise. Currie's arsenic is not coloured with true indigo: it appears to be waste indigo, or what has been used for the purposes of the dyer. I don't know how it is pi'epared. I did not analyse the colouring matter of Currie's arsenic. I ascertained that it was not the indigo directed by the Act to be used, and I ascertained the quantity. I separated the colouring matter from the arsenic, and subjected it to the action of sulphuric acid. Charcoal is one of the chief constituents of good indigo, and necessarily of waste in- digo. The chief constituent of soot is charcoal also. I was informed by Dr Penny of the quantity lie found in the stomach—more than eighty grains. There was also a white powder found in addition. If there was great vomiting and purging, the quantity of arsenic administered must have been much greater than was found in the stomach and intestines. But much would de|)end on whether means were taken to facilitate vomiting. If hot and cold water were freely given, that would facilitate the discharge of the poison. It is impossible to say the proportion ejected ; I think it would be reasonable to suppose that as much would be vomited as remained : it might, without any extravagant supposition, be taken at four or five times as much. There was nothing in the symp- toms mentioned in the last illness in this case inconsistent with death being produced by a single dose of arsenic. The ordinary symptoms in a case of tliis kind are not unlike the symptoms of malignant cholera. I think all the symptoms in this case described to me might have oc- curred from maliunant cholera. If there were a sense of choking and
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