Connecticut western news., 1882-09-13
POISONING BY WHOLESALE.
An Awful Story of Crime Among
 Hungarian Peasants

A letter from Vienna to the London 4StGndord says :-Thekla Poppy, the peasant woman who is being tried on a charge of aiding and abetting upward of a hundred women in poisoning their husbands, is very remarkable charac- ter-destined to occupy position at once unique and picturesque in the annals of crime. She is gypsy, and is now some 70 years of age. She lived in little village named Melencze, and it may almost be said that murder was her trade. People say she had her agents and emissaries, whose business it was to keep up her "connectlon," and it must have been horrid and gruesome spectacle to see the grizzly bag seated in her arm chair every day, receiving her customers during business hours, and giving them the diabolical advice and aid they sought.
 They were all married women from the neighboring country side, eager, for husbands who obstinately refused to die who, by Thakla's friendly offices, might art. The wretches paid the old gypsy l for each bottle of poison, and were duly instructed by her in the safest methods of it's exhibition"
 Thekla Popoy's clients were, however, not always married women. Sometimes she had dealings with young girls who quarreled with their sweethearts, and
 who, from jealousy or rage. had deter
 mined to kill them. This woman's ter
 rible trade prospered amazingly for two
 years. She excited no suspicion, because
 the drugs she administered acted slowly,
 though surely, and in their effects stim-
 ulated the symptoms of disease. Even hnow that the bodies of some of her vic-
 tims have been exhumed, they show no
 signs of poisoning, though the stomachs
 are eaten away.
 The first case that set people on the
 alert was that of one Jocza Kukin, 8
 rich peasant, who died at Melencze two
 months ago. Ugly rumors about his
 death were spread, and the gossips ' whispered mysterious hints of foul play.
 There was in consequence an inquest
 but the most careful post-mortem exam.
 ination failed to reveal any traces oi
 poisoning in his case.
 The whole story was slipping out oi the memories of the villagers, when sud ) denly dreadful revelation was made A gypsy girl, the daughter of ole
 Thekla Poppy, came before the court al
 Gross Bedskerek, and mortified it by the
 tale she had to tell. She confessed tha she gave the wife of Jocza Kukin bot } tie of some red liquid poison prepared by her mother. She did this by hel mothers instructions. Having had , quarrel with her respected parent ove
 some property she determined to betray
 her.
 , Thekla Popoy's daughter further de clared that she actually saw Kukin'
 wife pour this poison into his coffee i. and that she told her mother what sh, knew and had seen. The gypsy replied ] "One day l will poison you also unles F you hold your tongue"
 Of course this statement caused Theh f la Poppy and the widow of Kukin to b arrested. They, however, denied tn 7 charge brought against them. Oddl
 enough, the Judge, by clever ruse nc t quite in keeping with English notion : of fair play to accused prisoners, mal I aged 10 overhear the two women talkin things he overheard was Kukin's wido :, say ing to her accomplice:
 q "WelI, I am young and pretty. E
 was old and ugly. Why should he n f die ?" The Judge after that had lit doubt that the prisoners were guilt They were therefore put on their tria 3 and the clue thus unexpectedly plac' 8 in the hands of tho authorities was a l lively followed up. Strange discoveries were soon mad showing that, from the woman Thek Poppy as centre, vast and complt = rarnifcation of crime extended fur nr ] wide throughout the community. Tf . trial has been deferred for sever :. weeks, so that the bodies of men su
 posed to have been murdered by the wives may be exbumed and examine