Chapter XXIV: Appendix: B

CORONERS

The functions of a coroner are not, of course, peculiarly confined to death inquisitions. They extend to inquiries in connection with treasure trove, though the infrequency of such inquiries naturally helps to obscure the coroner’s dual _rôle_ from the general public. The following paragraph supplies a recent instance of an inquiry in respect of treasure trove:

AN INQUEST ON COINS

“The coroner for the Thorpe division of Suffolk is to hold an inquest
to decide between two claims for the coins which were recently found
on the shore at Thorpeness, Suffolk. The Treasury claim them as
buried treasure, and the Receiver of Wrecks claims them as having
been washed ashore.

“Two black cinerary urns containing bones, a red earthenware Roman
vessel, and a black earthenware vessel, barrel-shaped and of drinking
tumbler size, were discovered on Saturday. It is thought that the
site of an old Roman burial-ground has been found. Throughout
yesterday hundreds of people visited Thorpeness on foot and by cycle,
in motorcars, and on horseback.”--_Daily Mail_, April 10th, 1911.

* * * * *

The senseless character, which a coroner’s inquest can sometimes assume, is well brought out in a South American mummy case of a dozen years ago:

“This institution”--the office of the coroner--“which some affect
to consider moribund, seems on the contrary to exhibit both the fire
of youth and the dignity of old age; see the South American mummy
case (Aitken _v._ London and North Western Railway, _The Times_,
December 11, 1901). This was an action against the railway company
for damages for negligence in the carriage of a Peruvian mummy,
which was broken in transit from South America to Belgium. In April,
1899, the package, sent from Liverpool, and addressed to ‘Maison
de Melle, Belgium,’ had been opened at Broad Street. An inquest
was held--verdict, ‘That the woman was found dead at the railway
goods-station on April 15, and did die on some date unknown in some
foreign country, probably South America, from some cause unknown.
No proofs of a violent death are found. The body has been dried and
buried in some foreign manner, probably sun-dried and cave-buried,
and the jurors are satisfied that this body does not show any recent
crime in this country, and that the deceased was unknown and about
twenty-five years of age.’” (Mr. A. T. Carter, D.C.L.).

* * * * *

An interesting fiction, connected with death, at any rate, if not with coroners, though at a somewhat later period it would have come within their cognizance, arose through the provisions of William the Conqueror for the protection of his Norman followers. For every one killed, a fine was imposed upon the hundred in which the body was found. By the reign of Henry I., every dead man was presumed to be French, unless his Englishry could be proved.

“A very neat doctrine for Revenue purposes, as the records show, for
if a stranger is found dead, who can prove that he is English?” (Mr.
A. T. Carter, D.C.L.).

* * * * *

The following newspaper report merits some further publicity:

“At an inquest at Southwark, the need of an early operation in
urgent circumstances was emphasised, and a doctor urged that the
time had come for a reform of the law which makes it impossible to
undertake any operation on a grievously injured child until its
parents have been approached, persuaded, and their consent wrung from
them.... A schoolboy of nine, John Joseph Huggins, of Haddon House,
St. George’s Road, had been riding behind a van, according to the
account of another small boy, and had fallen off before another van,
of which a wheel had passed over his leg.

“Dr. Fritz Kahlenberg, of Guy’s Hospital, said that when the father
was told that an operation was necessary he demurred for some time,
but eventually gave his consent. The witness thought doctors should
be able to operate if it was absolutely necessary without waiting
for consent. Time was everything in many cases, and if consent had
first to be obtained a life might be sacrificed. At Guy’s Hospital
they endeavoured to get the parents’ consent, and, failing the
parents, the nearest of kin. Some ignorant people had an idea that
an operation was an experiment, made for the doctors’ amusement. In
this case the operation was performed at night, and the surgeons were
engaged until five in the morning.

“Asked by the coroner whether he had any suggestion to make, Dr.
Kahlenberg said he thought that in such cases it should be enough if
two or three doctors agreed on the necessity of an operation.

“The Coroner said that perhaps some members of Parliament would take
the matter up. Dr. Kahlenberg, he observed, was suggesting a very
serious change in the law.

“The inquiry was adjourned to enable the father to find witnesses of
his son’s accident.”