TRAGIC TEA PARTY

Evening Post, Volume CVII, Issue 35, 11 February 1924, Page 3

TRAGIC TEA PARTY

LITTLE GIRL POISONED

HEMLOCK AND ITS DANGER,

The story of the tragic result of a children's tea party was told before Mr. E. Page, S.M., Coroner, in Wellington this morning. The fatality occurred on 6th February, in Rintoul street, following a party at which several very small children had tea, using a children's toy tea set. The party was held on a vacant section near the brick kilns in Rintoul street. Water was obtained from near by, and the children used this for tea, using hemlock seed as sugar. Hemlock, sometimes called "wild" or ,<'fooy s " parsley, contains a violent poison. Dr. Hector stated this morning that one drop o£ the poison was said to be a fatal dose, and the child who died' hadi taken nearly a desertspoonful. He had no recollection of any previous case of poisoning by this plant in New Zealand, though it was frequent in England. He did not know previously that the plant existed in the Dominion. It must have been imported. Residents in the Rintoul street area state that there is a lot of the plant about. It is somewhat like parsley gone to seed, though the leaves are not so bunched. Hemlock has numerous purple spots on the stalks. The poison is contained in the roots, stalks, leaves, and seed, the seed—sometimes' called berries—being green in colour. The chijd who died was Daphne Phyllis, the 3A-year-old daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Holland, of Rintoul street. She was brought home suffering from pains in the abdomen, but as it was not known' at the time that she had been poisoned, she was put to bed, and given household remedies. A couple of hours later a doctor was called, but could only pronounce life to be extinct. Dr. Hector gave evidence as to a post mortem examination. The stomach showed intense irritation from the poison of the hemlock plant. The Coroner found that death was due to misadventure. He suggested that the attention of owners of sections growing the plant should be called to it, and that if practicable it should be destroyed. At the hearing Sergeant Butler and Constable F. Baker represented the police.

Hemlock ia by no means an uncommon weed in the neighbourhood of Wellington, and in some gardens in the Hutt district it grows luxuriantly. The purple markings on the. stems are its chief badge, and any plant which has finelycut foliage, gloasy green in colour, and purlplfc-patched stems phould be cc|tidemned to destruction.