FALL ON A TRAM

Evening Post, Volume CXXVIII, Issue 5, 6 July 1939, Page 25

FALL ON A TRAM

DEATH OF LADY HEATH

'A tram conductor described at the inquest at Shoreditch recently how Mrs. Mary,, Sophia Catherine Theresa Williams, 45, formerly Mrs. Elliott Lynn and later Lady (Mary) Heath, fell down the stairs of a tram, receiving injuries from which she died. A verdict of accidental death was recorded, says the "Daily Telegraph and Morning Post."

Mrs. Williams, who died in St. Leonard's Hospital, E., the day after her fall, was a pioneer of flying for women in England and was the first ■woman to fly across Africa.

In 1929 she had a serious crash at Cleveland, Ohio, and it was then stated that she had fractured her skull.

A cousin, Mr. Francis Carnegie Pearce, of Eaton Terrace, S.W., said that he had not seen Mrs. Williams for eighteen months, but had heard of her. Her health'"ways all right. The Coroner,-Mr. Hervey Watt: She had not been quite normal, I understand, since the accident in 1929?— She •was able to walk quite normally afterwards.

Alfred Stokes, of Bedford Road, East Finchley, a tram conductor, said that on the Monday afternoon the woman ■boarded his tram, which was going tcer'-WfriiKt $a Moorgate, at Water-

low Park, Highgate Hill. She went up to the top deck. She seemed very vacant when he asked her for her fare, and it was a couple of minutes before he could get the fare from her.

At Dawson's Corner, City Road, he looked up the staircase and saw nobody coming down, so gave the signal for the tram to start.

"I was still on the platform," he said, "when I heard a commotion on the stairs and a thud I shall never forget. Her head was lying on the controller. Her body was on the stairs and her feet on the staircase."

The Coroner said that the heels were perhaps somewhat high, but not abnormally so.

Dr. Cedric Keith Simpson said that the dead woman had severe injuries to her head and other injuries consistent with a fall down the steps of a tram.

"I found nothing which would indicate that the dead women was under the influence of alcohol," Dr. Simpson added. "I found an old depressed fracture on the left side of the head consistent with an old accident. Underneath it there was an old blood clot pressing on the brain. "This clot could have caused epilepsy, black-outs, and unconsciousness for a short period, or led her to fall."

Returning the verdict of accidental death, the foreman of the jury said that no blame attached to the driver or conductor of the tram.