The Washington herald., 1915-02-28

Bellevue hospital whence he
was taken after his confession
of deliberately Staying eight Of the
aged and infirm inmates of the German
Odd Fellows Home near Yonkers, n. Y.
This subject reincarnate from the dark
est pages of Edgar Allan Poe's most
morbid stories was talking calmly, even
POLITICALLY, of his crimes.
Is he insane? Is he suffering from a
Authorization? Or is he one of the I'm
balanced, irrational beings who hover
between the states of sanity and in
sanity? Believes alienists are unable
to say. The most experienced mental
experts in New York state have been I'M
able to determine.
Mors declares he put away eight men
and women because they were too old to
live and because their pain-racked cries
haunted him at night. He never heard
of DR.. Osler, wko once set the world on
its ears by asserting that the time would
come when all men Of f1fty-fve or over
would be chloroformed as useless bur-
dens. Yet this same Frederic Mors, once
porter, later orderly at the German
home, goes into detail concerning his
eight observations"
First he tried arsenic, but the patients
did not die quietly enough to suit him.
So he fixed on chloroform as his instru-
Inent OF forever relieving pain and
agony.
az prevented the fumes of the chloro-
form from escaping by very simple
process which had learned in Vienna
when 1 was studying medicine" con-
tinued Mors with perfect calmness
First, would pour drop or two of
the anesthetic on chunk of absorbent
cotton and hold it to the nostrils of the
old person whom l wanted to assist out
Of the world.
soon my man would swoon. Then |
would close every orifice OF the body up
with cotton. would stuff cotton in the
ears, up the nOstrils, etc. Next | would
pour little of the chloroform down the
throat and stuff enough cotton in the
mouth to prevent any of the fumes from
escaping that way.
In a moment I would place my head
against the persons chest. Generally
the heart had stopped beating, and |
knew had accomplished my purpose and
one more soul was freed of misery and
suffering. | consoled myself with the
thought that all was for the best. Now.
however, l know that was wrong. My
conscience tells me | should not have
done these things. and that is why am
so glad to tell all about them
No study of Poe's could have been
more deliberate. cautious and calculat-
ing Will Frederic Mors live TO know
the ensuing tortures of the mind, the re-
lentless remorse and fatal hauntings that
characterized the murderers of Edgar
Allan Poe?
II only hope. if the poor old men and
women were poisoned. as Frederic Mors
says, they never knew what happened to
them" said Dr. Woods Hutchinson, the
distinguished author, physician and
Rlenist. But he hasn't been proven
sane All his accusations against him
self and others may be groundless. |
have known insane men TO tell terrible
stories against themselves. and there will
always be others to take up hue and
cry and say these things after them.
That Nors' action should be con-
nected with euthanasia and 'osleriza-
ton the doctor swept aside as popu-
lar misconception. No prominent medi-
cal authority advocates putting people
out of pain when they get old. With
modern medicine the field of pain has
been narrowed so that very few persons
die painful deaths, and the movement
called euthanasia, which was discussed
some twenty-five years ago, has been put
aside The only discussion ever held
among medical men was whether hope
less incurableS should have the right
with their own consent to be put out OF
misery If they desired this, it was sug-
gested that a consultation of medical men
and a Judge of a court should sit before
acting There is no question of anything
like that in this case.
Sir William Osler said that the day
might come when we would put all the
old men over ifty-five out of the way as
nuisances, but he was only quoting An
thony TrolIope as a joke
None try to justify Mors' terrible
leeds, but many see palliation in the con-
dition of his mind. He has admitted
that, ever since the days of his medical