A handy-book of forensic medicine and toxicology / by W. Bathurst Woodman and Charles Meymott Tidy.

Date:
1877
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A handy-book of forensic medicine and toxicology / by W. Bathurst Woodman and Charles Meymott Tidy. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

    1208/1268 (page 1172)
    which port Thomas intended quitting the vessel. There he also con- templated winding up the clockwork, so that after a few days’ journey, when the steamer was on the ocean, every soul should perish. 11 is not yet known how the explosion occurred earlier than was calculated. After about twenty-four hours Thomas made a fresh attempt to commit suicide, by tearing away the bandages from his head. He was trephined, but died a few days after. The clock-work was made by a watchmaker named Fuchs. Thomas ordered a machine to go ten days, without ticking, and also that the elevation, or hammer, which should strike the hour when the clock had run down, should possess a concussive power of thirty pounds! Fuchs executed the order, and Thomas told him to make twenty more ! He called the explosive material “ polishing powder.” He had wound up the clock on the day of the explosion, reckoning that he should have time to get away at Southampton ! His wife appeared to be quite ignorant of his plans, and always thought him a good-hearted, kind, and pious man ! It is said that the explosion was heard at Oldesloe, in Holstein, more than a hundred miles away. Cases XIY. and XV.—The Murder of Harriet Lane, known as the Wain- ivriglit Case, or Whitechapel Tragedy. —The Identity of a Dis- membered Tody. Evidence from the Hair and Teeth. The Uterus doubtfully Multiparous. The “ Thames Mystery ” unsolved. In November, 1875, Henry Wainwright was tried for the murder of Harriet Lane, a woman with whom he cohabited. His brother was tried as an accessory, and a danseuse of their acquaintance was arrested on suspicion, but discharged without any imputation of guilt. Henry was afterwards executed. He was a brushmaker, of good education, and had led a moral and useful life for many years, until a few months before the crime for which he suffered. He murdered his victim by shooting her, for two bullets were fouud in her brain, and a third amongst her hair, flattened out against the skull : and he also cut her throat, through one carotid artery down to the cervical vertebrae. The crime was discovered by one of his workmen, who noticed a mutilated hand protruding from a badly-smelling bundle wrapped in Americau cloth. The prisoner was removing this and another bundle in a cab, and he was smoking to hide the odour. The danseuse referred to was in the cab with him. When a policeman could be found to stop the cab, it was discovered that one parcel contained the decomposed trunk of an adult female body. One side of the parcel disclosed the hand mentioned. The contents of the second bundle disclosed the head of a female, so covered with lime [and chlorinated lime] that it was difficult to guess her age. The arms and legs were also in the parcel. In the Whitechapel premises a new spade, soiled with lime, &c., and a grave under the floor, with disinfectants, were discovered. The poor woman had disappeared nearly twelve months before (September, 1874). She had had two children. The body had been cut into ten different parts. It was identified partly by some jewellery found on the premises. The body was partly mummified, partly converted into adipocere. The ten parts were, head and neck and two hands, two arms, one trunk, two thighs, two legs and feet connected. It was veiy roughly dismembered, so that there were parts of the pelvis with the thighs. The medical witnesses supposed her about twenty-five years of age (from