Dog and a Baby’s Death

Sun (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 86, 2 July 1927, Page 5

Dog and a Baby’s Death

The suggestion was made at in inquest at Birmingham that the death of a two-months-old baby girl, found near an overturned cradle on the lawn of a nursing home, where the child was born, was due to an attack by a dog. The baby had a lacerated wound, a small punctured wound, and scratches on the head, and medical evidence showed that the injury was consistent with an attack by a dog, and that death was due to septic meningitis. Two dogs were kept at the home, and the proprietress, Miss Frances Millar, admitted that no cries were heard, probably because she was playing the piano in the front sitting-room and a nurse was singing at the time. Blood was found on the jaw of her roughhaired terrier. The dogs and the cat had been destroyed since. The coroner, in recording a verdict of accidental death, remarked that it looked as if a dog had been at work, but there was no eye-witness.