The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle. — 1868-07-11 (Stourbridge, West Midlands, England)

POISONING.  One of those rouses eiAbres has just been tried at Posen which would almost justify the belief that men are occasionally born into the world as entirely destitute of all principle of conscience as others are of sight or hearing. The trial its.elf presented no particular points of interest beyond that of clearly establishing the guilt of the prisoner, who e crimes almost eclipse those of the notorious Palmer, of detestable memory. The facts are shortly as follows : • • •  A master bookbinder, Wittmann, was accused of having poisoned six person, ill six years, namely—his four wives and two children. Wittman hail worked as journeyman for a bookbinder named Pirsch, of Wollin, where he made the acquaintance of Marie Gehm, Pirsch's housekeeper. Wittmann was on a visit at Wollio at the cod of 1836 and beginning of 1056, on January 1, in which year Pirsch died very budileilly, and Marie Gehm, according to a previous arrangement, came into the possession of all his property. Soon after this wittmann commenced business in %Yellin, and in February, 1860, niarried Marisaliehm, who, in addition to Pinch's property, had also inlMted some money through the sudden death of an aunt. Two sous, John and Paul, were the result of this marriage. Mrs. Wittmann died very suddenly in 1062, leaving all her property to her husband anal two children, of whom the eldest died in the same mysterious manner three months later. In June, 1063, Wittmann married his second wife, Charlotte Ilohn, who possessed some fortune. The latter made her will In the following Dgcember, leaving everything to her husband. and died a aback afterwards. In April, 1064, Wittmann married Ins third wife, Augusta Kornotzky, who was richer than bee predecessor, tier fate May be deeeribid in almost the same words. She died in August, 1865, leaving her property between her husband and her mother. Only two months after her sleuth Wittmaiin married lea fourth, and by tar the richest, wile, the widow Dose, who hail oar child by her first marriage. li's child sickened immediately alter its mother's wedding, and died in a day Or two, by which the fourth Mrs. Wittwann inherited At property Wittman]) then removed tram Wallin to NOM It In hardly noweaaty to add that  the fourth Mrs. Wittman's life was not of very long Auration, as she died In September, 1066, having made a will in favour of her husband a month or two before. Under the pretext that she had died of cholera, Wittruann had made arrangements for burying her the day after her death. But the extraordinary mortality in the Wittmann family had already excited attention. The police here took the matter up, and their first suspicions were strengthened when they found that Wittnnum had called in no medical advice. Wittman was arrested just as the funeral procession was about to start, and burial of the body was prohibited. On searching the house a large lump of arsenic, sufficient to poison a hundred persons, was found locked up in a chest. AU the bodies of Wittmann's farmer wive!, as also thom of his two children, were then exhumed, and submitted to a chemical investigation. The result was the same in all six cases ; a large quantity of arsenic was detected, and there could not be the shadow of a doubt that Witmann had poisoned his four wives and two children.  He has Lem found guilty and sentenced to death. If we consider that the motive for these crimes was no higher passion than avarice, and then remember the relation in which he stood to his victims, and the deliberate perfidy with which he entered upon those relations, it is doubtful if the whole record of crime can show a blacker case. Indeed, it is not improbable that he committed eight murders, as the very sudden death of Pirsch during Witmann's visit, and also of his first wife's aunt, are extremely suspicious coin. cidences under the above circumstances.