A DOUBLE INQUEST.

Sun (Christchurch), Volume VI, Issue 1577, 4 March 1919, Page 3

A DOUBLE INQUEST.

MOTHER AND UNWANTED CHILD. __ \ A double inquest was conducted by Mr S. E. McCarthy at the Courthouse yesterday into the deaths of Ivy Trigauee, a single woman, and her illegitimate child. In a statement made by her in the Christchurch Hospital the deceased, Ivy Trigance, said that the child had beeii prematurely born following an accident, and she had thrown it in the River Avon. The hearing of the inquest on the child was resumed.

Ellen Rebecca Trigance, mother of the adult deceased, said her daughter had been confined to her room for about a week prior to going to the Hospital on February 22. Witness did not know of the birth of a child or of her daughter's condition.

Dr T. L. Crooke said that on February 23 he was called to the home of the deceased, Ivy Trigance, when he found in an upstairs rooms the body of a child wrapped in an old skirt. There was a cloth tied round its neck, another round the mouth, and the whole enveloped in a cloth. The child was fully developed, and apparently had been dead over two dars.

Dr A. B. Pearson said that he conducted a post-mortem examination on the body of a female child. The examination disclosed the fact that the child had lived. The cause of death was haemorrhage following strangulation. Dr R. L. Withers, senior surgeon at the Christchurch Hospital, gave evidence regarding the condition of the deceased, Ivy Trigance. The coroner returned a verdict that the child, unnamed, had died on or about February 19, 1919, shortly after its birth, from strangulation, intentionally caused b% r the mother, Ivy Trigance. The inquest on Ivy Trigance was proceeded with, and the coroner's verdict was that the deceased died of septicaemia on February 26, due to her own neglect, following a premature birth.