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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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that slie died of English cholera . Another medical gentleman , Dr . Knight , —one of the antiquities of Staffordthe deceased ' s very deaf guardian , also signed the certificate with equal facility . He saw the patient twice on Monday , when she was too much reduced to hold any conversation -with him . However , her husband supplied the deficiency , and described all the usual symptoms of English cholera . It does not appear that he ordered anything but a small dose of diluted prussic acid , to relieve the retching , nor is there any reason to believe that he made any further inquiries on the subject till Saturday , when he heard that the poor lady had expired on the previous day . A third medical man , the Benjamin Thirlby , who deals in rupture bandages and broken poppy heads , likewise saw
the sick woman . It was on the day she died , and when she was so completely prostrated as to be unable to answer any questions . " Benjamin" recommended some arrowroot and brandy , which the nurse promised to give her . " Sept . 29 th , Friday . —My poor dear Anne expired at 10 past L" * " Oct . 8 th , Sunday—At church . Sacrament . '' The mortal remains of Mrs . Williams were laid beside her mother and the sporting Bagman . Application was then duly made to the Insurance Offices , which faithfully fulfilled their engagements ; £ 8 , 000 being paid thiough a Mr . Pratt , an attorney , who acted as William Palmer ' s jackal in procuring moriej-. The speculation had proved so profitable that it was worth repeating . Whose life should next be insured ?
eludes in its members a clergyman , a surgeon , and a law-3 er , would anywhere require as cautious handling as a hedge-hog . In Rugeley no man would venture on such a hazardous encounter . The insurance offices , indeed , despatched a Detective to the spot—so called quasi lucus a non lucendo ; but his inquiries were more particularly directed to a proposal that had been made touching the life of George Bate , Esq ., '' a gentleman of good property an < l possessed of a capital cellar of wine . " The amount was £ 25 , 000 . One of the signatures to the proposal was that of John Parsons Cook , another gentleman of sporting ; notoriety , who now appears on the stage for the first time . George Bate , Esq ., proves to be a harmless man , not too much troubled with intellect , but of the ordinary rustic calibre , who had once failed on a small farm , and now went on errands or did odd jobs for the Palmer family . The proposal was not accepted . George Bate , Esq ., is still alive : one of the lions , indeed , of Rugeley , and perhaps better off than if he had received the £ 500 promised to him should the policy be effected .
drunken suspicions of Palmer had evaporated with tile fumes of the brandy . They were again friends and brother sportsmen . In the afternoon they started together for Rugeley , where Mr . Cook engaged a room at the Talbot Arms , exactly opposite to > the snuggery inhabited by Mr . William Palmer , surgeon , and his pleasant-looking handmaid , Eliza Tharme . Thursday seems to have been a dies non , but on Friday Mr . Cook dined with his friend , returning to the hostelry in a state of perfect sobrietythe only evidence to the contrary being his request for a candle to ena"ble him ta . read in his bedroom : he was a
sporting man , be it remembered—still , h « might have wished to consult his betting book , or to read the Racing Calendar . On the following morning he felt qualmish and uncomfortable . He threw up a cap of coffee administered by the chambermaid , and afterwards a basin of broth sent by Mr . Palmer . On Monday morning he was better , and able to eat something , but at night he took two pills which made him excessively ill . He screamed wildly , rolled his eyes about , and beat the bedclothes with his hands , while his head moved convulsively and his limbs soon after straightened . Mr . Palmer being sent for iu haste gave him some comforting words , two more pills , and a thick , dark-coloured draught which smelt like opium . The sick man vomited almost immediately , but there was no appearance of the pills , and presently he fell into a refreshing slumber . The laudanum , if such it were , had
been , administered in too large a , dose for the state of the stomach after so much irritation—otherwise it might have soothed him into asleep from -which there -would have been no awakening . On Tuesday afternoon Mr . W . H . Jones arrived , a surgeon of Lutterworth and a personal friend of Mr . Cook . Old Dr . Bamford , aged eighty-two , had , of . course , been called in before this , and had prescribed two opiate pills , which Mr . Palmer himself took away .. Mr . Jones slept in the same room -with , his friend , the foot of the "beds being opposite to each other , the room sufficiently large , and Mr . Cook lying between the door and tbe window . A little after eleven Mr . Palmer went across and gave the sick man two pills , supposed to be morphine ; vomiting ensued , but the pills remained on the stomach . About midnight Mr . Jones undressed himself and ' turned in . He had not laid down
above twenty minutes , when his friend called to him in alarm and begged that Mr . Palmer rai ^ ht be sent for Immediately . That gentleman was by his bedside within three minutes , foolishly volunteering the remark that he had never dressed so quickly in his life before . He then gave him two pills which he brought with him , saying that they were ammonia pills—ra preparation never kept ready made up , because of evaporation . JS terrible scene now ensued . Wildly shrieking , the patient tossed about in fearful convulsions ; his limbs were so -rigid that it was impossible to raise him , though he entreated that they would do so as he felt that he was suffocating-. Every muscle was convulsed ; ' his body bent upwards like a bow ; they turned him over on his left side ; the aetion of the heart gradually ceasedand he was dead . A post-mortem
, _ examination could not under such circumstances be avoided . But there was no sufficient cause to account for death . Dr . Bamford , however , thought there was congestion of the brain , though Mr . Monkton ' s assistant , Mr . Devonshire , positively swore that there was no e&-travasation of blood , nothing to produce pressure , or irritation , either on the brain or the spinal cord . However , the deceased ' s step father , Mr . Stephens , cut tlie ' gordian knot by sending th « stomach &c to Dr . Taylor , of Guy ' s hospital , for chemical analysis . The conclusion arrived at !> y Drs . Taylor and Rees , who were associated in the inquiry , was most positive , but rather from the evidence than the analysis—Death proceeded from tetanus , and that tetanus was produced by strychnine . Mr . Palmer was therefore committed to gaol on a charge
of wilful murder . This was not all . Every circumstance connected with thi 3 extraordinary inquiry ia stamped with singularity . Mr . Cook received about £ 700 at Shrewsbury , and was entitled to as much more . Of the former sum he had only £ 15 in his pocket ? when ho died ; his betting-book , ¦ which laid on the mantelpiece during his illness , suddenly disappeared after his death—Mr . Palmer coolly observing that it was of no consequence , as all beta were now null and void . On the Monday that poor Cook was lying ill in his yellow-curtained bed at the Talbot Arms , William Palmer hurried up to London to get his friend ' s accounts settled with respect to Shrewsbury Races . With thia view , a gentleman waited upon him at his lodgings , 8 , Beaufort-buildings , Strand , and received bis instructions .
This gentleman held three £ 200 bills of exchange , one drawn by Mr . Cook and accepted by Palmer , tho others drawn by Palmer and accepted by Cook . One of these had been" settled at Shrewsbury ; they were now all cancolled . Tho various /* ums to bo received amounted to £ 1 , 020 , but of this £ 110 was refused on the plea of a setolF . The agent therefore wrote to Mr . Cook , at Mr . 1 aimer s , Kugoley , to that effect , and that consequently ho had not been able to remit the £ 350 to Mr . Tadwiclc , but that ho had duly sent a chequo for £ 450 to Mr . Pratt , tire jackal usually esnployod by Palmer in his ino » iotory transactions . A telccranhic renlv wns directly returned from Colwicb ,
the nearest station to Rugcloy—for there la none tuererequesting him to advance tho amount necessary to make Mr . IPttdwkk all right , and that ho should bo repaid on tho Thursday . Ho prudontly declined , In tho meantime poor Cook died , But when tho original memorandum sent by Palmer to Colwich was sought for , it appeared that th « t man ' s influence hail availed to procure Its restitution . There is consequently no legal proof that it woe in hia handwriting , Tho chapter of oddities does no ! tonninate oven hero . While Dr . Taylor waa instituting his analysis of Cook ' s stomach , &c , ho had occasion tc write to tho solicitor for the prosecution , and , mentioned that ho had not been able to discover any traces of poison , This important letter tho learned Professor rather imprudently despatched in an adhesive envelope—so named foi
While casting his net for thousands , William Palmer was not too proud to seize upon smaller prey . On his brother Waltex ' 3 death , after striving to mitigate his fraternal anguish by working- the telegraphic wires in instructing hisagents to lay various odds in his name , he hastened to Liverpool to break the news te the poor widow . As she naturally desired to see the body of her huaband once more before it was for ever snatched from her sight , he dissuaded her from doing so , by representing the cause of death to have been the rupture of a blood-vessel , and that the corpse was too horrible to be viewed . Not a word of this was true . No vessel had been ruptured , and the body presented no extraordinary appearances of any kind . Towards tbe end of September he applied to his sister-inlaw for the repaj-rnent of various sums alleged to be due to him by the deceased , such as £ 85 , advanced upon the furniture , £ 40 to take up some mysterious bill , and £ 200 to pay off some small debts .
To this strange application the widow replied with much spirit that , as she had never received a farthing from her husband during the whole course of their married life , she did not consider herself bound to pay liis debts ; nor did she believe that his mother was aware of William ' s present proceeding ; that she had reason to believe that her husband did not owe hirii anything whatever , but rather the contrary ; and that he must be cautious how he belied the dead . Foiled in all these attempts to raise money , whether in large sums , pr small , and incessantly harassed by the harpies who had discounted his bills , Palmer was now fairly at bay . Woe to him who crossed his path . With the calm resolution of despair he proceeds to the Shrewsbury races , in companv with his intimate friend , John
Parsons Cook , who was also strangely mixed up with him in sporting transactions generally . ' This gentleman was about twenty-eight years of age , or about two years younger than Palmer , and gen era lty resided at Lutterworth , in Leicestershire , where he still possessed some property , although he ltept race-horses arid had William Palmer for his associate . The latter was clearly the master mind , aud pulled , as he pleased , the strings which moved his puppet . On the 13 th of November these two sporting gentlemen were at Shrewsbury . The races were going on , and Mr . Cook ' s horse , Polestar , was the winner . The owner was naturally somewhat excited bv his triumph , though no Pindar ( not even P « ter ) was there to sing his praises . But a good dinner is no bad substitute for a bard . So he repaired to the " Raven , " bird of ill omen ,
and there entertained his friends with Shrewsbury champagne . The waitress emphatically declares to the present day that his friend , Mr . Palmer , was " a very nice , pleasant sort of gentleman . '' After dinner a cloud drooped around John Parsons Cook , and yet a film fell from his eyes . Bacchus , the ^ god of truth , had warned him against his friend "William—Sweet William no longer . After indulging freely in the foreign wines of an English country town , 150 miles from London , tho owner of Polestar took to brandy and water to restore his Briiish solidity . Tossing off his glass d . la " gentleman rider , " he complained that there was something in it ( the brandy or the empty glass ?) for it burned his throat . Perhaps those who have drunk strong brandy and water with similar h aste may have experienced the same . sensation . Perhaps , also , like Cook have vomited
Mr . , they may even afterwards . As in the olden time it was given to few men to visit Corinth with enjoyment , so at the present day it falls to tho lot of few men to possess that " bibulous cluy" which craveth all things , absorbeth all things , and rotaineth all things . Mr . Cook was not a man of this stamp . lie was not a Prince Kerbino , whom Nature fashions in h « r dainty moods and then casts away tho mould . Ho bolted his brandy and water down « t Palmer ' s challenge , and bolted it up again when it encountered tho cold champagne . That wight ho was very drunk and very sick and very ill . His dinner he cast up into a fcasin , his money ho deposited with Ins friend Ishnmel Fisher , a sporting wine merchant of Shoe-lane , Holborn . Thia gentleman apparently owes hie lovo of sport to liis patronymic , onlv that tho modern Esauidcs kills partridges instead of
gnzolka , and runs horses instead of hunting tho onagraj to hia surname it may bo that ho ia indebted for dealing in liquids , only that , liis piscatoriul tulents nro devoted to tho capture of m-en rather than of fialiet * , after tlio manner of l * o ter : but what a name , it would bo for a Jow bailiff To this Mr . Inhmaol Fiauer , tho owner of Polestar gave £ 700 to keep till next morning , expressing hia belief , at tho same time , that Palmer had " dosed " him lor tho eako of tho money . If « uch had been . Palmer ' s intention , would ho have left Cook at such a moment ? Ho neither followed him from tho room when his stomach rubollod , nor did ho go near him all that night . This neglect showed , indeed , how hollow was his friendship , but it provon his innocence . Guilt would huvo been much more officious . Next morning Cook looked very ill , -as men are apt to do after exceesiv * vinous vomiting . But his
Why not that of Walter Palmer , his brother ? He had already suffered from one attack of delirium tremens , but perhaps that objection might be got over through the usual complacency of medical examiners and the competition between rival offices . Mr . Pratt was accordingly instructed to propose Walter ' s life for £ 13 , 000 to £ -14 , 000 . It is needless to enumerate all his failures , but the object was at length effected . Now , Walter Palmer was the best of a very indifferent family—he was certainly the least selfish . He had the same unhappy taste , however , as his brother William for racing and betting — in short , for sport . Devoting more time to his betting-book than to his ledger , he failed as a corn merchant , and became bankrupt in 1849 . His wife was a Miss Millcrest , a ladj'like
and accomplished person , still most prepossessing in appearance , the daughter of a Liverpool shipbuilder , and possessed of an income of £ 450 a-year . Her sister had married Mr . Joseph Palmar , and strongly dissuaded her from entering sucji a family—of course , in vain . The union was an unhappy one , owing to his intemperate habits . While residing in the Isle of Man , lie had an attack of delirium tremens , during which he attempted to cut his throat . With great reluctance Mrs . Walter was compelled to separate from him , though they seem to have been always tenderly attached to one another : and in August last he paid a visit to her at Liverpool for a few days , abstaining entirely from spirits during the whole time . Previous to this he used to take a
quart of gin a c " avy but gradually reduced the quantity to half a pint or " thereabouts . He had been living for some time with an impudent , brazen-faced fellow named " Walkeden , but a few months before his death removed to Castle-terrace , just over the Railwa 3 ' Bridge at Stafford . This Walkeden , nominally a corn agent , came to live with him 3 and Mrs . Walkeden also slept in the house , leaving her children to themselves at night . It i 3 understood that old Mrs . Palmer allowed Walter £ 2 a-week , and it is whispered that William Palmer gave Walkeden £ 5 a-w « ek as a remuneration for his faithful attendance on hi 3 brother . Walkeden ' s chief business seems to have consisted in supplying his friend and master with gin . Sometimes there was a cask in the house , but more
frequently a bottle was procured as required . The average consumption exceeded a quart per diem , and a bottle , perhaps three quarters full , was placed by his bedside every night , with a water-jug and a glass . Not unfrequently the wretched man would toss off half a tumbler of Taw spirits at a gulp , and then turn quite black in the face . At an early hour of the morning Walkeden tooJk him n cup of coffee , which he would swallow and oast up again . Then he would " set himself up" bv drinking three or four glasses of gin and water . Ife was constantly complaining of pain all over him , but particularly under the ahoulder-blade ; he also coughed every morning very severely , and expectorated a great d « al .
On tho 14 th August , Walter Palmer and hia evil genius , this Walkeden , vent to Wolverhampton to see the races . He was tolerably sober at tho time , and a littlo before twelve o ' clock picked at a small mutton chop , but without an } ' appetite . On his return homo ho waa quite drunk , but Walkeden did not tho less supply him with gin to drink in tho night . All next day , Wednesday , ho was in liquor . On Thursday morning ho was seized with an apoplectic fit , his brother William being at hand , and died before medical assistance could be obtained . A certificate , however , wna not refused as to the cause of ( loath being apoplexy , and agnin application was made for the payment " of tho Life Policies . This time tho oflicoa hesitated . They had been told that tho insurance was intended to cover an advance made by Mrs . Palmer ; but it now nppenfed that the aBBijrnmont had boon made in favour of Willinm , in consideration of nn assumed loan of £ 100 , though tho deceased had octuully received no more than £ (! 0 . Otli < sr circumstances occurred to excite suspicion , and tfee result was that tho different offices combined for their mutual defence , in case any claim should bo made upon them . AJieso HUflpiciona muat liavo boon Btrengthened when no demand wns made for payment , and it seems unaccouiUal > lo that no stops should have b « cn taken fcy tho police to enforce a post niortoin examination Uut Nemesis though halting in gait , nover wearies or lialta In her pursuit of tlio guilty . Thun fur William Palm or had safely set at defiance tho tor rilled whispers of hia neighbours . No one cared to cant tho first atone . In Rugeloy itaolf tho Palmer interest waa omnipotent . A family that In-
Untitled Article
January 19 , 1856 . ] THE LEADEB . 53
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Jan. 19, 1856, page 53, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2124/page/5/
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