The Birkenhead News and Wirral General Advertiser. — 1894-02-10 (Birkenhead, Merseyside, England)

TRAGIC AFFAIR AT SEACOMBE.  MURDER AND SUICIDE BY A MOTHER. tragic occurrence took place on Friday night week at Seacombe, when a young married woman named Hannah Adams, wife of a dock labourer, residing at 21, Shakespeare-road committed suicide in a small pit at the end of Geneva-road. It appears that the woman had only been confined on the previous Sunday, and during Friday night she was missed from the bedroom along with her child. The alarm was given by the husband, who was assisted in the search by the police, but it was not until the following morning that the bodies of both the unfortunate woman and her infant were found drowned in a pit a short distance away. The sad affair naturally caused much excitement in the . .  neighbourhood: On Monday morning an inquest was held on the two bodies at the Bird-in-Hand Hotel, before Mr. Churton. Mr W. Danger (Clerk to the Load Board) wan present at the inquiry. The first witnees called was Joseph Adams, dock labourer, 21, .Shakespeare-road, who said the deceased woman was his wife, and was aged 29. The child was hardly a week old, having been born on Saturday, the 29th January. His wife was attended by a midwife, and she was going on pretty well after her confinement, this was her second child, the first being still-born. The child appeared to be very healthy, and had taken to the breast the second day. Since the Tuesday after her confinement the deceased had been at times very strange. She rambled from one subject to another, but never gave him any idea that she intended to do anything to herself or her child. He last saw his wife alive on Friday night, when she was joking and jesting with him. She did not complain of any pain at all, but she was very excited all the week. On Friday night the baby was in the same bed with the mother, and witness had • shakedown on the floor. He went to bed at 8-30, being very tired, and at 11-30 he woke up with the cold, as the fire had gone out. He raked the ashes out, and then looked towards the bed, and found his wife was not there. Thinking she had gone downstairs, as was her habit when she had the first child, he shouted at the top of the stairs, "Hannah." He got no answer, and then he went to the bed and looked under the clothes, and found that the baby was also gone. The lamp was burning as before, and underneath the lamp he found a piece of paper with these words written on :—" Don't blame anyone, for what I have done.—Hannah Adana." It was in her handwriting, but was written in • trembling hand. He then went downstairs, and found the back door (which he had locked the night before) wide open. He informed his next-door neighbour of what had occurred, and a search was instituted. At twenty minutes past? the following morning he found the body of his wife in the pit,and got it out with a clothes prop. She was quite dead. He did not then see anything of the body of the child. The witness added that his wife, when found, was not dressed, having merely thrown her ulster over the things she lay in. If she had wanted her clothes she would have had to pass over his feet. . P.C. Sudlow stated that about 10-30 on Saturday morning he recovered the body of the child from the same pit from which the mother had been previously taken, and conveyed it to the house of the father. There were no marks of injury on the child. The Coroner said it WAS a very melancholy Cape, and all their sympathies must be with the father under such painful circumstances. He thought if his recollection was right that he had never had a similar 1 one in that pariah although he had had them elsewhere. Such cases were by no means noveL It frequently happened that when a young married woman gave birth to children she had often time • large overflow of milk into the breast, commonly called lactation. There could be no doubt that at such times they were subject to a complaint called puerperal fever, and numberless cases had been quoted by the best authorities in the country, among the rest by Professor Taylor. All the manner and conduct of this poor woman quite coincided with the general view taken by medical men in such like cases. There could be no doubt that she left the house and took with her her child. People were giyen in her state of mind to sudden impulses. -and often a suicide' tendency manifests itself. No power on earth could have prevented her, except her hirland had happened to Ire awake. There could be no doubt she must have destroyed her child herself and committed a suicidal act by throwing herself into the same pit, which was • very deep and dangerous one. No doubt in the first place she was responsible, and would have been responsible for the life of that child had she lived herself, and no doubt might have been committed for wilful murder. With regard to herself there could be no doubt that she committed suicide while labouring ender temporary insanity, and being in that state would scarcely be responsible for any action she committed. After a brief consultation the jury found that the deceased WOMAA had destroyed her child, and committed suicide herself while labouring under temporary insanity.