The Sun.
London, England, 1867-01-03 00:00:00

EXTRAORDINARY DEATH.

Yesterday Dr. Edwin Lankester held an inquest
at the Bank of England Tavern, Pathlington, rela-
tive to the death of John Wort-All, 20 years of age,
who was cohabiting with a woman, and died from
Lhe effects of a knife wound inflicted under myste-
rious circumstances on Christmas eve.

The first witness examined was Emma Western,
of 54, Great Carlisle-street, Lisson-grove, who said
she was living with the deceased as his wife. The
deceased was a great drunkard. He came home at
a little after twelve on Christmas-eve, and was very
intoxicated. Witness was in bed when he came in,
and was aroused from her sleep by his getting a light
from the matches. He used very bad language,
and, having been fighting; he swore he would have
revenge upon somebody. Witness had been picking
a goose for the Christmas dinner, and some knives
were on the table. He suddenly took up a knife
and came to witness's bedside, when she thought he
was going to murder her. She pushed his hand
away, holding the knife, and he fell down. He then
said, " Emma, Emma, dear; lam bloody." She
found he was bleeding from the left breast, when
she called for the assistance of the landlady and the
police. He was taken to the hospital, and died there
on Saturday.

Thomas Worrall, father of the deceased, said he
did not hear of the death of his son till Saturday
evening. He believed that great blame was attached
to the woman Western, with whom he was cohabit-
ing. _ _

A brother of the deceased, and a young man
named Everett, were next sworn ; the effect of their
evidence being, that deceased told them in the hos-
pital that Emma Western had stabbed him, but
nothing was to be said about it, or the detectives
would take her into custody.

Police-constable Malt, 12 D, deposed to being
called to 54, Great Carlisle-street, at a quarter-past
one on Christmas morning, where he found the de-
ceased lying on the floor near the bed. The wife
was staunching the blood with a wet towel, which
was flowing from the left breast of deceased. The
wife said her husband was dying, and begged of
him to send for a doctor. He sent a brother con-
stable. There were two knives on the table, both
being stained with blood.

The knives (table knives) were here produced,
the one stated to be that with which thp wound was
inflicted being very sharp and pointed.
Witness, in answer to the coroner, said he had
twice seen the deceased in the hospital, where he
said that he was going to stab his wife, and he fell
down on the bed and wounded himself.
Mr. John Land, house surgeon at St. Mary's
Hospital, deposed that between one and two o'clock
in the morning of Christmas-day the deceased was
brought in quite unconscious from loss of blood, and
apparently from drink. He had a wound under the
nipple of the left breast. He was at first unconscious,
but when he recovered he told witness that he had
inflicted the wound himself. Witness found from the
situation of the wound that he could not inflict it
either by the right hand or the left. A fall with the
knife in his hand might have produced the mortal
wound.

By the Coroner—Witness had made a post mor-
tem examination, and externally found a wound
under the nipple of the left breast, an inch and a half
in length, horizontally with the skin. It then dipped
downward between the fifth and sixth ribs, pene-
trating the pericardium and right ventricle of the
heart. It was not a valvular wound, and it was sur-
prising and a rare case that he should have lived so
long. The pericardium was filled with blood and in
a high state of inflammation, the external hemor-
rhage being small. The cause of death • was the
wound of the heart, the shock to the system, and
combining causes.

After some comments by the Coroner upon the
law of the case,
The jury ultimately returned a verdict—That the
deceased died from the effects of the wound to the
heart, but how this wound was inflicted there was
not sufficient evidence to show.

MEMORIAL TO LORD DERBY.—The Provost,
bailies, and council, and principal inhabitants of
Paisley have memorialised Earl Derby, First Loi d of the
Treasury, for an augmentation of the grant from the
Royal bounty, awarded on the death of her husband, "in
recognition of her father's services," to Mary, second
daughter of the late John Wilson, professor of Moral
Philosophy in tho University of Edinburgh, and relict of
John Thomson Gordon, Sheriff of. Mid-Lothian.