The morning call., 1893-01-05
A MODERN PoIsONER.


paid so little attention to the career OF
Thomas Neil Crane, the poisoner, who was
hanged in London few weeks ago. The man
was remarkable in that he combined eonsid-
cradle scientific skill with a vilainous pur-
pose in life and that he killed people appar-
entity without any motive, but merely from
a deviliSh instinct Of murder His victims
were almost always young women, and he
does not seem to have made anything by
putting them to death.
Born in Scotland he accompanied his fam
lily to Quebec in 1853. grew up there. stu
died medicine and when he had graduated
opened doctors office. 1t was there OBJ
served of him that he was young man Of
licentious habits and disgusting eonyersa-
tion, so that no one was surprised when he
devoted himself 10 an irregular branch of
practice. lie finally attracted the attention
of the police and was invited to quit the
town. During the next three or fouI years
he established himself in Kingston, Hamil-
ton and Montreal successfully and was
warned out of each by the police. In 1873
he settled in Chicago. There he was sus-
peeted of having caused the death OF sew
cral girls, but no harm came to him until he
gave a young married woman, who was on
bad terms with her husband, a medicine
which, as he told her, would settle him,
and it most effectualiy did. Even then the
crime would have escaped detection il he
had not himself drawn the District Attor-
ney's attention to the facts and tried to in
eriminate some one else. The official looked
nto them, had Crane arrested, and he was
sent to Joliet for life. From this prison he
was pardoned out in 1891 on the petition of
sympathetic visitors. who believed he was
dying.
He returned to England, having during
his ten years in prison brought his knowl
edge of toxieology to perfection. He had
satisfied himself that the only reliable and
effective poison which a murderer could use
was strychnine But the violence OF the
conyulsous which it produces is liable to
reveal It's presence. They are not TO be
reconciled with alcoholic poisoning, whose
symptoms otherwise resemble those pro-
duced by stryehnine. Cream invented q
capsule containing half grain OF strychnlne
and filed the capsule with mOrphia. The
latter lessened the violence of the eonvul-
sions and produced stupor when they had
subsidized, so that the patient could not ex-
plain what had happened to him. Creams
calculation was that the capsule would dis
solve in the stomach in about fifteen
minutes and the poison would permeate the
system, causing death in about forty-fye
minutes more. An hour would thus elapse
between the administration of the poison
and the fatal result-an amply sufficient
time for escape.
Fortified with his discovery Cream opened
a surgeons Office in London and began
fha oil of bly ara
the victims of Jack the Ripper. How
many of them he did to death no one
knows, but quite a number of girls of that
class died last year and the year before in
the London hospitals, the deaths being
aseribed to alcoholic poisoning or to stryeh-
nine self-administered. lie proposed to
make the business pay by accusing persons
of means of having poisoned the girls, and
by threatening exposure if he was not
bought eff. Whenever he poisoned a
woman he went round declaring that she
had died by poison and stFaightway dis
patched a blackmailing letter to some one
who had known her. These letters gen.
orally found their way into the hands of the
police, but for a long time the authorities
at Scotland Yard paid little attention -
them, believing Cream to be crank.
At last he made the acquaintance of two
young women who were living together, and
poisoned them both. Then he flooded Lon
don with matchmaking letters accusing all
manner of people of having put the girls to
death These naturally reached the police,
they were compared with other letters
which were in their possession, and Cream
was arrested. He did not try to escape, and
during his trial be was the coolest person in
court. He told every one it was another
blunder Of the police. But the jury found
him guilty, and in due course be was hanged
This was clearly a case of homicida
mania, and in this country Cream might
have escaped on the ground OF insanity, oil
at most would have been sentenced to the
penitentlary for life. His purpose in the
main involved no malice. and promised nj
gain. In fact most of his murders were pur
poseless. He killed people like Jack the
Ripper. from pure devlishness. Ills ct
tempt to convert bis propensity into source
of profit evnced deficient reasoning fac.
ulty, and in the hands of deXterous coun-
sci would have proved fair basis for an
appeal for acquittal Oh the ground that he
was not responsible for his actions. At the
same time it was clear that he was danger
while ne lived and that il is best for society
that he should have been put where BIT
will stay, and not in prison from which
he might be liberated to resume his murder