The Van Buren press., 1878-08-27
POISONED BY A MANS BITE.
Ii is Safer to be Bitten by Twenty
Dogs than One Angry man-The
Rapidity with which the Poi
Son Acts, aud its Virulencc.


Th death of NJ. j, Russell, of 214,
Franklin street. Grecnpoint Brooklyn,
on Friday, resulted from wound that
was inflicted by n tenant Thomas Kelly,
with his teeth. 1t was n small cut on the
second finger Of the left hand.
The house owned by Mr.. Russell is di.
vidcd into two dwellings,, each OF which
contains three or four families. The
landlord resided in one. Thomas Kelly
hired the front half of the second story,
and Mr.. Scarson, the rear rooms. One
evening in March last, the dwellers in
the second story had all drank pretty
freely, and, in a wrangle, Kelly beat
Mrs. Searson, knocking her down. On
the next day her husband met Kelly in
the street, and beat him in return. The
fight was renewed al home on the 23a of
March. Complaints of their noisy char
actcr reached Mr.. Russell. lie had re,
monstratcd with them, and attempted to
act rs pcacemakcr.
Kelly set upon him with a club, with
which he gave him II terrible blow on
the head. Then he seized his finger bo-
tween his teeth, and bit it wolfehly.
When Officer Holmes, Of the Greenpoint
Police Squad rushed into the house, Rus
sell was menaeed by an iron bar, in the
hand Of Kelly, and its immediate descent
would have crushed iis skull, and killed
him,
The first practitioner that Mr.. Russell
visited was Dir. Il. l.. Van Giesen, of 81,
Kent street, Grccnpoint. DR.. Van Gle
sen said, yesterday :" ! had very little
to do with this case. 1t was two or three
days after the biting that Mr. Russell
came to me | Immediately advised him
to have the whole finger amputatcd, and
predicted that he would have serious
trouble withit, if he did not do SO. He
went away, seeming to be offended. |
heard no more of it for Il month. 1t
must have been more than four weeks
afterward that he went to the hospital,
and it was then too late to check tho
progress of the poison by the nero cut
ting off of the finger. By the time tho
second operation took place, there must
have been still less hope for his cure.
i" | have had few cases of mayhem
under treatment. To one man | gave
the same advice that l did to Russell,
and he brusquely rejected it. He had Il
little abrasion near the end of his thumb.
Some time afterward he returned, and it
was then necessary to amputate the en-
tire hand and wrist. The inflammation
was only checked by applying tho most
powerful caustics that are known. An
other man who refused To submit to tho
amputation, when it was first proposed,
died from tho orysipclas, induced by the
poison. Why, l had rather be bitten by
two, yes, twenty, dogs, than one man.
The virus, | believe, is in the saliva, and
is most deadly when the person who
bites is enraged."
The first operation performed upon
Russell, was by DR.. Alexander Mott, of
So, Madison avenue. DR.. Mott said, last
evening: " The bitten finger, when ex-
posed to me, was swollen to four timos
its normal size. The wound was in the
second joint. The bone was diseased,
and an liberation had begun. After the
operation he apparently did we'll. The
vn,r or tne nnSer ncaicu up.
The second operation was performed
by Dr. Motifs assistant, DR.. James r.
Taylor, of l34, East Twelfth street.
lilo took out the whole of the second
finger, including the mctcarpal bono.
This wound, too, apparently healed. But
meanwhile there had boon absorption of
the poison in tho higher glands, and an
abscess formed in the palm of the hand.
All the vessels were diseased. Pyacmia
orysipelas followed. There was death
of the bone.
After Mr.. Russell returned home, tina
wound, from which no blood had come,
in the operation, commenced bleeding.
The probable cause was the eating of an
ulcer into large blood vessel. Thus
weakened, the patient all the moro rap
idly succumbed.
The younger DR.. Mott, son of the for
mer, visited Mr.. Russell twice, in Green
point. He thought the case u not very
unusual one. Erysipelas would follow
from any poisoned wound. He did not
think that anger would make the bite Of
man more dangerous. Exactly what
the virus is is not known.
The elder Dir. Mott said that he had
frequently had cases like Russclls under
treatment at the Dispensary, and had
sometimes taken quart of matter from
single gland in the armipit. The ac-
ton of the poison was very much like
that sccretcd in dead human tissues, tho
effect of which innoculatod in the human
system, is invariably fatal.
DR. McCreory, of Bellevue Hospital,
said that any bite penetrating the bony
tissues, was likely to be very serious.
A newsdealcr, who lives in the house
of the late Mr.. Russell, and who attend
ed him in his last hours, said that the
patient was three days and nights in dy-
ing. In life he had been very robust
man. After the modification began, he
did not move, except in breathing, and
the greater part of his body was cold.
His eyes stared at tho ceiling and his
breathing was thick and short. Exactly
at 8 o'c!oel. on Friday he gave q great
gasp aad expired. New York Sun.