The daily dispatch. [volume] (Richmond [Va.]) 1850-1884, 1883-03-08

After the medicine was prepared by Dr.
Butler. as above. this group Of walters was
taken with others from the dispenSary into
the passage (about 81 p. NJ, and were
there nut into the safe, and so remained
(along with several other such groups Of
waters from which no i'll effects were seem
until they were removed by the attendants.
The fatal group was scattered into four
different wards. Each glass was peIma-
nently labelled with the name OF the pa
tient TO whom it went.
From this il is concluded that the medi-
cine, il tempered with at all, must have
been tempered with in the safe in the pas
sage, since to have tempered with it later
would have required the party so intend
Ing TO visit the three rooms Of the three at
tendants. who had the walters, to which it
had been removed preparatory 10 being
administered in the morning.
FIRsT KILLED.
The first man seized and killed was
Leonard wilkins, OF Northampton aged
twenty. lie came TO the asylum suffering
from melanchOlia and baTassed with the
delusion that there were horns blowing in
his ears nearly all the time. Ii he had been
resident OF Richmond 1t might have been
very plausibly asserted that bis mind was
disturbed from the Christmas horn-blowing
torture to which our people are subject.
As il was. he came from a country home,
had rapidly improved, and was about TO be
discharged. He was dead In eight minutes
after ne took bis medicine. His was the
only mug recovered in condition to be
useful TO Professor Mallet. Adams's was
recovered, but about its condition
am not sure. The others had been
washed by the attendants. wilkins had
been in the habit of washing his own
mug, but here illness and death overlook
him too soon. There were some drops in
the mug when il was recovered, and twill
probably prove, in the hands OF the Profess
sor, valuable evidence as TO the character
Of the poison. 1t and the three stomachs
taken away from here to the University
ought TO be quite enough to clear up that
one point.
When Hines took his medicine (bromide
Of potassium was the prescription he said,
"God, amt il hOt": Adams told one
OF the doctors his medicine "burnt all the
way down." Those are clues also.
TUE THEORY THAT 1T WAS THE DRUGGISTS
ERROR.
DIR. Butler, while acknowledging that
any druggist might seize the wrong bottle
and compound its contents, maintains that
such could not have been the case here for
the following reasons:
That the poison got into the medicine
not compounded Che tonic) as well as into
the prescriptions compounded.
That OF the three pols0ns suspected, OF
one (cyanide OF potash) they had none In
the dispensary, OF prlissie acid they had
only small quantity, aud that in a diluted
form, and none OF it Is missing, and no
odor Of this acid was smelt about the bo-
dies.
That as 10 aconite, they had the tIncture,
but 1t would have taken a great dea! OF that
for this purpose, and death could not have
been so quick as II was, and further, that
the symptoms are not OF aconite poisoning.
lie thinks that the medicine was tamper-
ed with in the safe In the passage, and
judging FROM results, thai cyanide Of pot.
ash was the poison.
the LUSA1lc-P0Is0NER THEORY.
IL IL admitted that. lunatic might have
gotten ut the medicine in the passage. The
dispensary, il Is true, IL not in part OF the
building occupied AS ward, but portion
OF the dispensary -r.0m Is used as u library,
and patients who are regarded ~ altogether
harmless, and none other, are allowed to