Abilene weekly reflector. [volume] (Abilene, Kan.) 1888-1935, 1910-05-12
DR.. HYDE A POOR
WITNESS FOR SELF
The Accused Physician Faltered
Under Cross-ExaminatiOn.
BOUGHT CYANIDE FOR YEARS
Yet Could Not Name One Person OF
Place Where Purchase Had Been
Made Prior to September
Last.

Kansas City, May 11.-Bennett CLARK
Hyde. the man accused of numbering
Col. Thomas H. Swope and attempting
wholesale slaughter in the Swope fam.
| lily for his own financial aggrandize
ment, made poor witness in his own
defense.
He had no plausible explanation for
his purchase of cyanide Of potassium
In five-grain capsules during the
months Of September and December Of
last year, but more than that his own
demeanor on the witness stand came
close to being a body blow to his case.
He was nervous. at times irritable. and
plainly belligerent, pleading once for
flair play" when tangle Of questions
presented itself and sparring for time
by repeating interrogatories that were
put to him before venturing to make
a reply. His voice was scarcely audi.
Bile until Judge Latshaw called his ct.
tention to the fact. Even then it was
little more than whisper that peno-
trated the Jury box.
Damaged His Case.
The attorneys who have bravely
struggled with the defense Of DR.. Hyde
might well have left their star witness
OF the stand.
The expert opinion Of physicians and
chemists who rallied to his support
laid the foundation for a vindieation
as well as a defense for the physician
and the testimony of Mrs. Frances
EwOps Hyde even helped a little, al.
though 1t gave the lie to everyone, In
GLIDING the witness own mother But
Dr.. Hyde, the defendant, underwent .
Cross-examination that very nearly un.
did all the good things that clever at
torneys had done for him.
Capsules Taken From His Office.
DR.. Hyde, just before concluding his
direct testimony charged that cyanide
capsules had been taken from his
ONCE while he was in New York last
December. It was the time he went
to bring Miss Lucy Lee Swope back to
the house of mourning. He said that
the poison and culture tubes were
missing upon his return. This evidence
was ELECTED as the groundwork for the
showing Of plot for the undoing OF
Dr.. Hyde His attorneys have con-
tended from the start byinference and
direct accusation that the grand jury
and the post mortems and
nquests which preceded them were
he outgrowth of a conspiracy to wreck
he reputation Of the physician who
married into the swope family.
Answering the questions OF his at
orney, Frank P. Walsh, he was quiet
ind self-contained, his only show OF
being the opening and
dosing Of his right hand, in which q
handkerchief was clasped.
His Memory Failed.
The physician admitted that for years
le had made a specially of a certain
reatment in which nitrate Of silver il
Employed and that for all Of that time
10 was accustomed to remove the
tains from his fingers with cyanide Of
potassium. He said 1t irritates less
han bichIoride of mercury, which
ONE surgeons use. He could not re-
member where he had purchased 1t.
nut knew that he had It powdered and
ut into capsules because If stored in
metallic boxes 1t corrodes the metal
nd If left open 1t volatalizes readily.
druggists keep 1t in glass bottles.
ut Dr.. Hyde did not take glass into
Is reckonings.