The Sun.
London, England, 1847-07-17 00:00:00

ALLEGED DEATH from VIOLENCE.;
Yesterday an extraordinar) special meeting of " The
Committee of Visitors" of the Surrey County Lunatic
Asylum was held in the board room of the asylum. to
inquire into the cause of the death of James Burden, a,
lunatic, whose decease was alleged to have been caused
by violence received whilst an inmate of that institution.
The chairman, Mr. Kemble, M.P., stated that no one
was charged with any specific offence.
Mr. Bridgeland, tne steward, said that on Monday,
June the 14th, Mr. Holland, the medical officer, reported
to him that the deceased had had a pain in his side for
five days past. He visited the patient, who said that he
was very unwell during the night, and about ten or
eleven o'clock he knocked hard at his door to be let out,
and on the door being opened he received a severe blow
in his side from some man with a long pole. The force
of the blow drove him back against the wall with great
violence. Since that time, which was three days before;
he had suffered much pain, and had great difficulty in
breathing. During this interview deceased appeared
quite rational.
Mr. Joseph Holland, resident surgeon of the institu-
tion, stated that on Sunday, the 10th, he found deceased.
suffering from diarrhoea, and iu a state of great exhaus-
tion. He treated him accordingly, but at eight o'clock
in the evening he found him breathing with great die-
' culty; his pulse was quick, and skin hot. Witness
was about to ask the deceased some questions, when
the attendant, John Steel, remarked that he had made
a strange complaint to Sir Alexander Morrison, to the
effect that be had been ill-used by him, Steel. He
examined the deceased, and discovered that he had a
broken rib on the right side; there were two contusions
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showed that the eighth rib was fractured, and that that
injury was the cause of death. He found deceased, on
one occasion, locked up in his room till between ten and
eleven o'clock, and he was then in a most filthy state.
John Logan Steel said deceased had complained of a
pain in his side from the time he was admitted. De-
ceased had told him that he had quarrelled with Roberts,
another patient, who had kicked him in the side, ge
told Sir Alexander Morrison that he was kicked. Re
bad also told witness be had been violently assaulted in
Brixton gaol.
James Burden, the son of the deceased, said that his
father bad told him, his wite, and his mother, that his teeth
had been knocked out, his eyes blackened, his head
knocked against the wall, and he hod been violently
thrown against the side of the bedstead, which had hurt
his ribs. Deceased told his mother he had been struck
with a piece of the beds:ead. The keeper Steel appeared
to be attentive to deceased. Steel turned the conversa-
tion on two or three occasions when deceased was about
to speak.

The committee consulted for a few minutes, and ex-
pressed their opinion on the case in a resolution that
•" the committee are not enabled to decide whether the
injury from which the deceased died was occasioned by
a blow received on or about the let of June, in a scuffle
which took place between him and a lunatic of the name
of Roberts; whether it was from the injury received in
a fall which he got in attempting to get through the
ventilator over the door of his ward; or from the Wow
stated by him to have been inflicted by some of the at-
tendants. They regret the unsatistactory manner of
this conclusion, but they feel that it would be unjust
to the attendants to throw upon them, or any one of
them, a stigma which is not borne out by the evidence."