The Scranton tribune. [volume] (Scranton, Pa.) 1891-1910, 1897-02-13
MRS. CAREV AND HER CRIME.
Review OF the New Maybrick Case.


Now that the death sentence of Mrs.
Edith Carew has been committed to
life imprisonment by Sir E. M. Satow,
the British minister to Japan, the case
is an exact parallel of the more fa-
nous Maybrick case of London. In
both cases the husband was accustomed
to consume large quantities of poison;
in both the widow was not suspected
until some time after the victims
DEATH in both the drug used was ar
senic; in both letters were found from
another man to the wife anticipating
marriage with her; both women were
sentenced to death and the sentences
of both We're commuted to Tmprison-
ment during life. Mrs. Carew's case
is, in every detail, quite as interesting
as that of Mrs. Maybrick. But Mrs.
Maybrick has one advantage. She did
not tamper with the documentary evil
dence. 1t is doubtful whether a con-
viction could have been had in the Ca
rev case had not Mrs. Carew been
caught almost in the very act of steal
| ing part of an exhibit of evidence. The
| missing document was found concealed
! in the cuff Of her jacket.
The Carews We're members of the
| fashionable set in the English colony
at Yokohama, Japan. They lived in
| pretty house on THE Bluff" that
| quarter of the city set apart for foreign
| residents. The family had been in
| Japan since 1890. Mr.. Carew-whose
| full name was Walter Raymond Hal
| lowell Carew-went to Yokohama from
| Singapore, in India. where he was in
| the government civil service. After his
| arrival in the big Japanese town he
was made secretary of the Yokohama
United club. Mr.. Carew was well
known and very popular, and he and
Mrs. Carew We're favorites in the best
English society in Japan. The case
| was therefore one of special interest
and owing to it's close resemblance to
the famous Maybrick case was widely
published after Mrs. Carew was put
on trial for her life January 5.
Mrs. Carew is a handsome woman of
29, of good English family. Her father
is the mayor of Glastonbury, in Corn
wall, and before her marriage to Walter
Carew in May, 1889, she was Miss Edith
| Mary Porch. She was a charming girl
and although her husband was fifteen
years older than she, the match was
| considered g, happy one. CareWs fam
| lily belongs to the best gentry in Eng
land. His father is Major CareW, of
| IIXmOuth, in Devon, and the dead man
was an Englishman of the sturdy, ath-
letic type. He met his wife at a ball
in the country, loved her, and after q
rather short engagement they We're
married CareW's family was not with
out political influence, and the young
man was given q desirable position in
the Indian civil service. After one
years residence in India an opportunity
presented itself for better advancement
in Yokohoma, and thither the couple
went to live. Mrs. CareW was rather
vain of her beauty and her talent as
an amateur of the stage, and she was
widely admired in the English colony
for both.
one day last October Mr.. Carew was
suddenly stricken with illness. The
family physician was sent for and he
was puzzled with the patients symp-
toms. His medicines seemed only to
make the malady more pronounced, The
doctor advised that Carew be taken to
the marine hospital The advice was
followed, and the Englshman soon aft
erward died in great pain. The hospital
DllNSlNlttllS hli iipl ilht lILt loOhS VI the
case and decided to investigate. In the
post mortem it was found that the dead
mans viscera were full of arsenic, and
this discovery set the legal machinery
in motion, and the coroner was called in,
The testimony at the inquest was re-
markable. 1t was found out from Mary
Jacob, a nursery governess in the Carew
household that Mrs. CareW was in the
custom of purchasing large quantities
of arsenic from japanese druggists,
; Just before CaTew's death her mistress
had sent her for an extraordinary large
quantity of FOWler's solution, prepar-
alton of arsenic, and for sugar of lead,
This testimony aroused suspicion, and
from that moment Mrs. Carew was new
er clear Of doubt
Miss Jacob, in her testimony before
the coroner, said that the druggist had
asked her for what purpose her mis-
tress wanted so much deadly poison.
The woman said she did not know,
whereupon the druggist told her that
Mrs. CareW had bought considerable
quantities of arsenic the day before
and the day before that, too, Miss
Jacob did not inform Mrs. Carew of the
conversation with the chemist, but did
! tell MIS-, CaleW DiplNel, MT. IufCn,
who expressed surprise at the impu-
dence Of the man. Mr. Porch did not
seem to be struck with the significance
of his sisters having bought so much
poison, The governess testified that
Mrs Carew alone attended to the work
of nursing her husband The servants
of the house had no part in this work.
1t was the wife who administered all
the medicine, Mr., Porch vas often in
his brother-in-law's room