The Birkenhead News and Wirral General Advertiser. — 1885-10-28 (Birkenhead, Merseyside, England)

SINGULAR CASE OF POISONING.  On Monday an inquest was. held iv.t the Workhouse, Higher Tranmere, before Mr. Henry Churton, district coroner, touching the death of Marion Dreaper, twenty-three years of age, a single young woman, engaged as an under-nurse at that institution.  Margaret M'Grittli, a servant in the institution, stated that deceased had been a nurse in the infirmary for ahont fear months. Her general health seemed to be good. Witness last saw her alive at a quarter-past nine on Saturday night, when she was in the sittingroom, apparently quite well. At six o'clock on Sunday morning witness went to the deceased's bedroom door, and took from it a pass-key, which opened the other doors in the building. About half-an-hour afterwards, as deceased had not come downstairs, witness called to her, but, receiving no answer, she went into her bedroom. The bed-clothes were half-way down, but the deceased was not in bed. Witness looked under the bed and saw deceased lying dead on the floor, close to the wall, in her night dress. She reported the matter to Ur. Taylor, the master of the workhouse. Witness added that on Saturday the deceased was not in a very pleasant mood, but witness thought it was in c msequence of the amount of work she had to do. Dr. McNeill, medical officer to the institution, stated that he had made a poNt-nortem examination of the body, and foulid all the internal organs healthy. In the stomach there was a quantity of a fluid of a rather dark, greenish colour. The Coroner: What was the cause of death?  Witness: Poisoning. The Coroner: Did you perceive what the stuff was?  Witness: I could not quite, unless there was analysis made. It had a very strong odour of linament of belle donna and camphor. There is a bottle containinz that mixture kept in the nurse's sitting-room ; and my impression is that the deceased swallowed a quantity of it. It is a narcotic poison. and half an ounce has been known to kill. The bottle is labelled "Poison.  The Coroner, in summing up, saiit the case was a singnlar one. Whether the deceased had taken the poison to alleviate sonic pain she suffered was a matter of speculation, but there was nothing to show that she was mentally depressed. It was evident that she had died from the effects of the mixture, but under what circumstances she had taken it there is no evidence to show. It was important that all poisons should be kept apart front medicines. It was quite possible, if that was not done, that a person going for one thing might take something else. Dr. McNeil said that all poisons were kept strictly together and labelled " Poison.so that it was impossible for anyone to take poison by mistake. A Juryman said that the question of whether the deceased had taken the poison herself, or had been administered to her by somebody else, had not been touched. The Coroner said it required a stretch of the imagination to think that anybody but deceased herself had done it.  Another Juryman: firl;;"Opinion we never will know.  At the suggestion of the Coroner, the jury returned a verdict to the effect that death had been caused by poisoning, but whether it had been taken with intent to commit suicide or otherwise there was no evidence to show. The deceased, we undentand, was a native of Liverpool.