FEMALE PO SONERS AT DEPTFORD.

Colonist, Volume XXXII, Issue 5588, 2 September 1889, Page 4

FEMALE PO SONERS AT DEPTFORD.

FIVE PERSONS POISONED.

A MOTHER AND HER DAUGHTER COMMITTED FOR TRIAL,

At the Breaktpsar Hotel, Brocklty, on July 10, Mr Wood resumed the adjourned inquests on the bodies of Sydney Bolton, pged 11 years, and Williams Sutton, aged 71 years, whose remains were recently exhumed by order by the Homo Secretary. Since the adjournment a thitd body, that d £l?zabeth Frost, aged 47 years, has also been exhumed, and the organs examined, like those of the others, by Dr. Stevenson, analyi&t to tbe Home Office.

Each of the persons whose death formed the subject of inquiry has been, together with others, insured by Mr Winters, of 153, Church-street, Depiferd,

The boy Sydney Bolton lived with Mrs Win'ers, for some tim 6 before his death- His sister also lived there, and was first taken ill but recovered. 'XhQ boy was next seized with similar symptoms and died, Dr Steven3on findiog in the body traces of arsenical poisoning. It was alleged that Mre V» inters declared the insurance policy to have lapsed, but subsequently it transpired that ehe had received £20 fixm one office and £10 from auother.

fufcton appears to have ken iusured for £8 14s. He went out of the workhouse on December 4 hsf, aud died at Mrs Winter's bou3e four days later.

Mrß Frost, whose body was the third exhumed, was insured lor £5. In all, five persons whose lives were insured by Mrs Winters had died, tbe first on July 18, 1886, and the last (Bolton) on Februarj 11 of thia year. The coroner now swore the jury to inquire into the death of Elizabeth Frost, who died on February 7, 1888. Mr Thomas Bond, F.8.C.5., described ths result of the post mortem examination of the bodies of William Button and Elizabeth Frost. In Sutton's case the appearances were quite consistent with death from an irritant poison. In tbe case of Elizabeth Froßt the state of preservation in which the intestines wete found indicated the presence of some preservative euch as arsenic. The intestines were sent to Dr Stevenson. A number of other witnesses were examined.

The jury returned a verdict of ♦ wil ful murder' against Amelia Winters and Eliz-ib'6th Frost, her daughter, in taoh of tbe three cases, addiog that Dr Macnaughton had been reckless in the'manner in which he bad given the certificates, and that the facilities give& by th 9 loose system of some insurance societies is an incentive to wilful murder. The coroner made out hid warrant against tlie two women to appear at the Oantral Criminal Court.

Mra Winters' daughter Elizabeth, who is married to ono of the sons of the .deceased Mrs Frost, was in court with a baby at her breast, and when the coroner's warrant was made out the iras immediately arrested and taken in!o an ante room. Her husband, Who witnessed the arrest, one of tbe charges beicg for murdeiing his mother, was completely broken down with grief, and sol-bed like a child.