Chapter VII: Some Classical Poisons and Their Histories

Arsenic appears to have had an extraordinary fascination for the poisoner for centuries past and has, perhaps, been more frequently used than any other substance for criminal purposes. Through its history runs a vein of mystery and romance which has continued until the present day.

It was known to the Greeks as early as the fifth century before Christ. Hippocrates, the father of medicine, who flourished 460–377 B.C., used it as an external remedy for ulcers and similar disorders. It was known to the Greeks in that time in the form of sulphuret of arsenic or realgar, also as arsenic sulphide or orpiment, which is found native in Greece and Hungary. Dioscorides knew it in its latter form and also mentions its properties when applied externally. There is no allusion at this period to its employment either as a poison or for internal treatment of disease.

The golden colour of orpiment caused many of the early alchemists to consider it the key to the philosophers’ stone, and this is said to be grounded on some enigmatical phrase attributed to the Sibylline oracles. The Emperor Caligula (A.D. 12–41), according to Pliny, ordered a large quantity of orpiment to be melted and manipulated so that the gold it was supposed to contain could be extracted from it, but he was no doubt disappointed by the result.

Diocletian (A.D. 260) is said to have collected all the books dealing with the transmutation of metals possessed by the Egyptians whom he had conquered, and destroyed them; but, when the Arabs overran Egypt, the Jews who fled to Europe, carried with them the knowledge of chemistry they had acquired from the Arabs who kept the lamp of alchemy alive.

In the eighth century there arose a great Arab alchemist called Jábir ibn Háyyan, whose writings were known under the name of Geber. He is said to have been a native of Tarsus and believed to have been the first in Europe to obtain what is now known as white arsenic (arsenious acid) by heating realgar. He gave it the name which it still bears to distinguish it from orpiment or yellow arsenic. From his works we know that he was acquainted with metallic arsenic and apparently knew, that under certain conditions, it deposited a dull silver coat when in contact with bright copper. This discovery was not without its disadvantages to mankind, as from this period probably dates the time it became used for criminal purposes. On the other hand, its medicinal properties, when properly administered, became known and recognized by physicians.

Before white arsenic or arsenious acid was known, most of the poisons recorded by the early writers had something peculiar in regard to their taste, smell or colour, but white arsenic put a new instrument in the hands of the cunning poisoner who sought for something powerful and tasteless for his evil designs, which we shall see later developed into a diabolical art in several parts of Europe.

In India, arsenic has been commonly used for criminal purposes from ancient times down to the present. The reports of the Analyst of the Bombay Government throw considerable light on the methods pursued by native poisoners. In most cases the poison is introduced into sweetmeats and generally distributed by a “strange woman” who has been met in the bazaar or street and who mysteriously disappears. This “strange woman” is found in nearly every analyst’s report for the past fifty years and under much the same circumstances. Most of the cases are typical of the people among whom they occur, as instanced in the account of a man who went into a shop one day and entered into friendly conversation with a stranger he met there. By way of thanking him, the stranger presented him with some sweets for distribution among his friends. The result was that five men and a boy were poisoned, and the obliging stranger has never been heard of since.

It is difficult to account for the rationale in such cases, but still they occur and the professional poisoner in India—for there are many such—is rarely caught or even suspected. In many instances, crimes of this kind are taken little notice of by the community and sometimes the criminal apparently thinks nothing of poisoning a whole family in order to make sure of his victim. The utter absence of motive in many cases would point to the conclusion that they are largely the result of homicidal mania.

In the Middle Ages there was a prevalent idea that all poisonous substances possessed a powerful and mutual elective attraction for each other, and if a portion of the substance was worn suspended round the neck it would intercept and absorb all other noxious matter and even preserve the body from contagion of disease. During the Great Plague of London amulets containing arsenic were worn suspended over the region of the heart and were believed thus to preserve the wearer from infection.

It is characteristic of arsenic, antimony and mercury that their presence may be detected and demonstrated years after they have been taken into the body. Many cases might be cited in corroboration of this, but the following is one of peculiar interest. A wealthy farmer died and was buried in the grave where his father had been interred thirty-five years previously. An examination of certain of the bones of the father revealed particles of a metallic-looking substance which was collected, and on analysis proved to be mercury. It had thus been preserved in the remains for more than a third of a century, the probability being that he had been in the habit of taking it medicinally during the latter part of his life. Another case worthy of record came under the notice of a Bristol analyst, in which he found abundant traces of arsenic in the remains of young children after they had been buried for eight years.

A curious case, proving how the advance of science may influence the rendering of justice, is shown in a striking way by a decision of the Judicial Committee of the revision of trials in France in February, 1904. Twenty-five years previously one Dauval, a chemist, had been found guilty of the murder of his wife by poisoning her with arsenic, and was sentenced to transportation for life. Scientific evidence having since come to light, tending to show that he was innocent of the crime, he was granted a free pardon eighteen months previous to the meeting of the Judicial Committee. The evidence on which Dauval was found guilty was purely scientific, and later investigation showed the evidence in question to be open to doubt. At the trial in 1879, all the expert witnesses swore that the quantity of arsenic—namely one milligramme—found in the body of Dauval’s wife after the post-mortem examination, could not possibly have existed in the system under natural circumstances. It was held to be proved that the presence of such a quantity of the poison was incompatible with life. Since the trial Gautier and Bertrand and other scientific workers have demonstrated that the quantity of arsenic mentioned can, and frequently does, exist in the human body in a normal condition. The presumption thus set up in Dauval’s defence was, that the presence of arsenic in his wife’s remains was owing to her having been in the habit of taking the drug in medicinal doses.

A strange story is related by the late Sir Richard Quain that came under his notice, and one which would have proved a profound mystery to this day but for his practical knowledge and acumen. He was asked to make a post-mortem examination on the body of a man who was by trade a stone-mason. To continue the story in his own words; “One day, on coming in to his dinner, he went into the scullery, washed his hands, and going into the kitchen he said to his wife, ‘It is all over; I have taken poison.’ ‘What have you taken?’ ‘Arsenic,’ he replied, and she at once took him off to the Western General Dispensary.

“The senior surgeon was out when they got there, but two young students of his happened to be in, who thought it was a very important case, and they would treat it pretty actively. So they gave him tartar emetic, pumped out the stomach, and pumped oxide of iron into it, and performed a good many other operations. The poor man was extremely ill and died in twenty-four hours. The coroner’s beadle went to the chemist and said: ‘How did you come to sell this man poison?’ He replied, ‘I sold him no poison; I thought he was off his head when he came.’ ‘What did you give him?’ ‘Oh, I gave him some alum and cream of tartar and labelled it poison.’” “He swallowed this in the belief it was arsenic,” says Sir Richard. “When I made the post-mortem examination, to my amazement I found a great deal of _arsenic_ in the stomach. This was rather puzzling. I said, if it is in the stomach it ought to go farther down. So I searched the intestines, but there was no trace of arsenic anywhere. The simple explanation of it was this, these two young fellows, horrified to find the man had died without taking arsenic after all, pumped some into the stomach.”

Another instance that terminated in a less tragic manner, in which a would-be suicide was frustrated by a watchful chemist, happened some years ago. One morning a tall, decently-dressed man, of seafaring aspect, entered a chemist’s shop in the neighbourhood of the docks of a northern seaport, and in a solemn and confidential manner asked for a shilling’s worth of _strong_ laudanum.

“For what purpose do you require it?” asked the chemist.

“Well, you see, sir,” the man explained, “I’ve just come off a voyage from ’Frisco, and I find my sweetheart has gone off with Jim, you see, sir, and now it’s all up with me. Give me a strong dose please, and if you don’t think a shilling’s worth will be enough——”

“But, my good man——” interrupted the chemist.

“I’ll shoot myself if not, sir, I will,” replied the man, thrusting his hand into his pocket.

“All right, then,” said the chemist; and seeing that argument was useless, he proceeded to mix an innocent but nauseous draught of aloes.

“Now put in a shilling’s worth of arsenic.”

“Very well,” replied the chemist, adding some harmless magnesia.

“And you might as well throw in a shilling’s worth of prussic acid,” said the broken-hearted lover.

The chemist carefully measured a little essence of almonds into the glass and handed it to the would-be suicide. He paid, swallowed it at one draught, and solemnly walked out of the shop. Crossing the street, which was quiet at the time, he deliberately laid himself flat on his back on the footpath and closed his eyes. A group of children gathered round, and stood gazing with their eyes and mouths open in wonderment, and an occasional passer-by stopped a moment, cast a glance at the unwonted sight and then passed on. After lying thus quite motionless for about five minutes, he suddenly raised his head, took a look round, then with one bound jumped to his feet and made off as hard as he could run.

A parallel case occurred quite recently at Dartmouth, when a naval stoker after a quarrel with his fiancée, entered a chemist’s shop and asked for an ounce of strychnine. The chemist, noting his excited manner and becoming suspicious, to pacify him gave him an ounce of borax which he took away, and obtaining a glass, mixed it with water and went out on the cliffs and drank it. Finding it only made him feel very unwell he resolved to throw himself over the cliffs into the sea, but the police arrived just in time to prevent him and found the glass with the remains of borax in it at his side. In this case it ended in a charge of attempted suicide.

Arsenic has been the favourite medium of female poisoners from early times, and in two celebrated poison cases of recent years, in which women were accused of murder by the administration of arsenic, it has been pleaded that the poison had been used by them for cosmetic purposes. The effect of arsenic on the skin is well known, and also that it is frequently used by women both internally and externally to improve the complexion. That this practice may lead to the taking of arsenic as a confirmed habit there is also evidence to prove, and there are many cases recorded where the habit of taking arsenic in solution has been contracted by women.

Formerly, many cases of chronic arsenical poisoning have resulted from arsenic which at one time was used in making cheap green wall-papers and green sweets (both coloured by Scheele’s green or hydrogen copper arsenite), the arsenic in the wall-papers being given off in gaseous form during warm damp weather. It is also found in some artificial flowers, in carpets, furs, dress fabrics dyed with aniline dyes, and in black stockings. Murrell examined a number of coloured tobacco and cigarette covers and found arsenic in one-third of them. Used as an insecticide for spraying fruit, it remains on the skins and is sometimes eaten. In these minute doses it seldom does any harm, but may produce chronic poisoning, with loss of hair, neuritis and other harmful results.

Arsenic is poisonous to all animals with a central nervous system (brain or spinal cord) and to most of the higher plants. Mice show the greatest resistance and next come hedgehogs, rabbits, dogs and cats.

In 1903 an analysis of sweets in the Isle of Wight revealed the presence of ¹⁄₁₅th of a grain of arsenic per pound. When arsenic is taken for some time it finds its way into the hair within about two weeks and remains there for years.

The alleged practice of eating arsenic or taking it as a habit has long been a matter of discussion, and as far back as the early part of the last century toxicologists were sceptical as to the statement that the inhabitants of Styria, and other parts of Hungary where arsenic is found, had contracted the regular habit of taking the drug until they had almost become immune to its effects.

In 1865, Maclagan of Edinburgh visited Styria for the purpose of investigating these statements, and he affirms in an account of his visit given in the _Edinburgh Medical Journal_, 1865, that while he was staying at the village of Legist in Middle Styria, two men were brought to him, and in his presence one took about 4½ and the other 6 grains of white arsenic. He brought back samples of what they had swallowed, and on testing it found it to be undoubtedly white arsenic. It was taken by one man on a piece of bread, and by the other was washed down with a draught of water. How extensively the habit existed in the district Maclagan was not able to ascertain, but he mentions that the peasants called it Hydrach or Huttereich. One of the men took a dose about twice a week, the other generally once a week, and he learned they had commenced the habit with doses of less than a grain. The effect was said to be tonic and stimulant and was believed to aid the respiration when climbing. Once having acquired the habit, like that of other poisons, an occasional dose is much missed if omitted.

Arsenic has been a subject of interest to some of our most eminent chemists, one of whom at least, has fallen a victim to it. The first to make an accurate investigation of its chemical nature was Georg Brandt, a Swede, in 1773. The famous Swedish chemist Scheele (1742–1786) also worked on the subject, and discovered arsenic acid in 1775, and impure arseniuretted hydrogen. Soubeiran, the French chemist, together with Pfaff, succeeded in obtaining pure arseniuretted hydrogen, but so little was known of its deadly nature that in 1815 Gehlen, the professor of chemistry at Munich, died owing to inhaling a minute quantity of the pure gas. Both Berzelius (1779–1848) and Bunsen contributed much to the scientific knowledge of arsenic, and the latter in 1842 discovered an organic radical containing arsenic and methyl, which became known as cacodyl, the salts of which have since been introduced into medicine for certain diseases with satisfactory results.

From the end of the eighteenth century the founders of the modern science of toxicology, Orfila, Raspail, Christison, Taylor and Thomas Stevenson, devoted the best part of their lives to the discovery of new and accurate tests for poisons. Orfila (1787–1853) did his best to make their detection a matter of certainty by insisting that poisons should be looked for in other parts of the body and not only in the alimentary canal. It was in his time that the three principal tests by liquid reagents became known.

Robert Christison (1797–1882) worked under Orfila in Paris, and devoted much attention to methods of testing for arsenic. He was professor of medical jurisprudence in the University of Edinburgh until 1882, and was called as toxicological expert at the trial of Madeleine Smith and in other famous cases.

Reinsch, who developed the test of the deposition of metallic arsenic on a bright copper plate, published his results in 1842, and this was followed by Marsh with his still more important test with nascent hydrogen in 1846. Fresenius and von Babo discovered a method for the systematic search of the organic matter of the viscera in 1844, and in 1850 Stas published his process by which alkaline poisons could be extracted from the viscera.

As the science of toxicology has progressed, so the chances of the criminal poisoner have grown smaller and smaller, till at the present day there is a very slight chance of the arsenical poisoner going undetected.

The story is told of a distinguished medical professor who used to impress on his students that they should never dismiss from their minds the possibility of murder in the case of a mysterious illness, however little suspicious the circumstances might be. He used to give an illustration from his own experience in a case where he was called in consultation by a local practitioner, who was baffled by the illness of the wife of a clergyman. The professor, after the consultation, asked the husband, “Has the possibility of poisoning occurred to you?” “It has,” was his reply, “and I have been so careful to guard against it that I have actually made it a practice to prepare my wife’s food myself.” “Then I dismiss the thought,” replied the doctor, “but as I have already taken a sample of the food in the bedroom, I may as well have it analysed as a matter of form.” The clergyman thanked the physician for his scrupulous care, the latter returned to London, and the former shot himself. According to the story, the truth of which is not vouched for, the wife recovered and erected a memorial to her husband in the parish church.

Mercury, one of the most fascinating of all the elements, has traditions that carry it back to an unknown period of antiquity. In the form of sulphide it is recorded in the Papyrus Ebers (1550 B.C.) as being used by the ancient Egyptians, but it is said to have been known at an even earlier date in the form of quicksilver in China and India.

The metal was probably named after the Roman divinity Mercury on account of its volatile nature and its elusive properties when handled. It has the peculiar property of absorbing other metals and forming amalgams. As well as being found native, it was obtained by the ancients by sublimation from cinnabar the oxide. By the alchemists it was represented by the same sign as the planet Mercury. It is alluded to by Theophrastus in the fourth century B.C., but it is to Dioscorides in the first century A.D. it owes the name of hydrargyrum or fluid silver.

For a long time the liquid metal was believed to be poisonous and the native quicksilver was thought to be different from hydrargyrum obtained from the sulphide. Berthelot has shown that the protochloride of mercury was prepared and known as far back as the time of Democritus in the fifth century B.C. In 1386 Chaucer alludes to it as “quicksilver yclept mercurie.”

The Arabs, who doubtless derived their knowledge of the metal from the Greeks, were much attracted by it, and Geber describes perchloride of mercury, also the red oxide from which Priestley afterwards prepared oxygen. Avicenna, the Arab physician, was the first to doubt the poisonous properties of the metal itself, and noted that many persons swallowed it without any ill effects, as it passed through the body unchanged. Fallopius (1523–1562) records that shepherds gave quicksilver in his time to sheep and cattle to expel worms, and Brassavola (1500–1555) says that he had given it to children in doses from two to twenty grains for the expulsion of worms.

About 1497 it was first used in the treatment of syphilis, in the form of inunction, plasters and fumigation. Beringario de Carpi of Bologna, who lived in the early part of the sixteenth century, is said to have made large sums of money from his treatment of syphilis by inunction with mercurial ointment. John Vigo advised fumigation in obstinate cases. The first to record its use internally was Peter Matthiolus, the commentator of Dioscorides (1501–1577). Paracelsus popularized its use, and since the sixteenth century mercury has come to be recognized as a valuable medicine throughout the world.

Robert Boyle, who was born in 1627, and is regarded as the father of chemistry in Great Britain, commenced his experiments in a little laboratory in Oxford in 1653. He afterwards founded the Royal Society, and used to make the oxide by heating mercury in a bottle fitted with a stopper provided with a narrow tube by which air was admitted. The product was known as “Boyle’s Hell,” on account of the belief that it caused the metal to suffer extreme agonies.

The many ways in which mercury can be transformed and the numerous products which can be made from it, have had a fascination for chemists throughout the ages. Homberg (_c._ 1675), a German chemist, found that by putting a little mercury into a bottle and attaching it to the wheel of a mill that the metal was turned into a blackish powder (protoxide). It is to Sir Theodore Turquet de Mayerne that we owe the popularity of calomel, another product of mercury, for medicinal purposes. Mayerne was the favourite physician of Henry IV of France, but being compelled to leave Paris, he settled in London and served in the same capacity to James I and Charles I.

Mercury has been credited with certain occult properties, and in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries it was a common practice in London to carry in the pocket a quill filled with quicksilver and sealed at the end, as a protection against rheumatism. This superstition has survived to the present day, and in some chemists’ shops in the City little glass tubes containing mercury, sealed and placed in wash-leather bags, are still sold, and carried in the belief that they will ward off attacks of rheumatism while the phial is on the person.

Antimony has played an important part, both in medicine and chemistry, from a very early period. Known to the ancients as “stibium” or “stimmi,” the native sulphide was used by women in Egypt and in the East over three thousand years ago, for darkening the eyebrows and eyelids. Arab women still use it in the form of “kohl,” finely ground for making lines between the eyelids, which they regard as an aid to beauty. It was a favourite metal with the alchemists, who hoped to obtain from it a remedy for all ills. They soon discovered how readily it formed alloys with other metals, and found it a simple matter to make salts of the metal. They knew that by simply heating crude antimony in a crucible they would sometimes get a vitreous substance, in consequence of some of the silica of the crucible combining with the antimony. They found that by digesting it in wine, the tartar of the wine formed a tartrate of antimony, and by other processes they got various salts which they discovered had medicinal properties.

The white oxychloride which was called “Algaroth’s powder” or the “mercury of life” was one of the most popular emetics in the sixteenth century; it was introduced by Victor Algarotti, a physician of Verona. Another celebrated antimony compound was Kermes Mineral, which is said to have been discovered by Glauber about 1651. The process for making this orange-red powder was kept secret, and wonderful cures are declared to have been effected by it.

In the seventeenth century it was probably one of the most popular remedies in France for ague, dropsy, smallpox, syphilis and other diseases. Louis XV bought the formula for its preparation for a considerable sum in 1720 from La Ligerie.

In the early part of the seventeenth century, Mynsicht is said to have re-discovered the properties of tartar emetic, which has probably been more frequently used in medicine than any other salt of antimony. It was regarded at one time as a specific for fevers, but used more especially for its emetic properties.

In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries cups were made of an alloy of antimony and tin, called “antimony cups” (_pocula emetica_). The cup was filled with wine, which was allowed to stand in it for some little time and become slightly impregnated with tartar emetic, so that the liquid when drunk produced vomiting. These cups were frequently found in monasteries, where it is said they were kept in order that the monks who took too much wine could be punished by having to drink some more which had been kept in the _poculum emeticum_.

In the seventeenth century Basil Valentine, a German monk, whose identity is still a matter of dispute, published a work entitled the “Triumphal Chariot of Antimony,” in which he describes its virtues as a remedy, and the forms in which it could be prescribed. It was translated into English and published in London in 1678.

Antimony has several times been employed as a poison for criminal purposes, and the cases of Dr. Pritchard and Chapman or Klosowski, who used it, are described in later chapters.

A curious case, which shows how by accidental means a poison may find its way into human remains after death, came to light some months ago in Yorkshire. After the death of a young man, who was certified to have died of gastro-enteritis, his friends found that they could not obtain an order to cremate the body until a partial post-mortem examination had been made. This was done and a small quantity of antimonious oxide was found, which was supposed to have contributed to the cause of death.

A further examination was therefore ordered, and the organs of the body were sent to the Home Office analyst. He found that these were entirely free from antimony, but he discovered that antimonious oxide was present in the rubber rings of old pickle jars which had been used to send the remains to London for examination. From this source the organs had become contaminated and the certificate that death resulted from natural causes was confirmed.

It is probable that in this case if the analyst had not found antimony present in the rubber bands of the stoppers of the glass jars—which of course should not have been used—it might have been declared that the man had died from the effects of antimonial poisoning, as presumably he had been actually taking antimony in the form of medicine and the result would have been another unsolved poison mystery.

One of the peculiarities of antimony when given in large doses is its property of preserving the tissues of the body after death. In the Klosowski case the body of one of his victims, whom he had poisoned with antimony, was exhumed after five years, and was found to be completely mummified and as well preserved as if it had only been buried a few days.