HUSBAND AND WIFE CO MAD.

Colonist, Volume LIII, Issue 13052, 11 March 1911, Page 4

HUSBAND AND WIFE CO MAD.

A remarkable story of a doctor and his wife who both suddenly went mad was told at the Matlock sessions, when Dr. Percy Bradshaw Isherwood and Mrs Isherwood, who is saJd to be an authoress, were, committed to- an asylum.

They went to live, at a Matlock Mansion named Mas&on Mount a year ago. They were connected with county families in Kent and Lancashire, and nothing unusual in their manner was Jiotieod until a week ago. At five o'clock one, morning Mrs Isherwood sent for a policeman, and said hor husband was going to (murder her. "It is a cold morning," said the policeman when he met Dr. Isherwood. "Yes," was the unexpected reply, "but there is a hotter place.' '

Dr. Isherwood stated that he was told in a dream to strangle his wife, and Mrs Isherwood agreed that it was lira- husband's duty to do so. She had been half strangled, and the disorder of her room showed that there had boen a violent struggle.

The police were again summoned to thci house, and removed Mrs Isherwood to the police station. She said she wished to die at the stake, and insisted on making a will in favour of tho police- sergeant. Efforts were made to capture her husband, but hc> shut himself up in a room, and resting a gun on the ledge of tlie window, threatened to shoot anyone who came near. The sioge lasted from 8 p.m. until 2 a.m., when the police succeeded in capturing hini, and found that the gun only contained a discharged cartridge.

He had burnt his clothes, and appeared in court wrapped in a .rug, while his wife wore a -man's cap and overcoat. They had boen without food for some time.