How Mrs. Maybrick Accounts for The Fly-Papers
On this question the prisoner made a statement. She accounted for the soaking of the fly-papers upon grounds which were not only probable, but were corroborated by other incidents. That she was in the habit of using arsenic as a face wash is shown by the prescription in 1878, before her marriage, and of which the chemist made an entry in his books, which came to light, after the trial, under the following circumstances:
Among the few articles which Mr. Maybrick’s brothers allowed to be taken from the house, they being the legatees of the deceased, was a Bible which had belonged to Mrs. Maybrick’s father, and which, with some other relics, came into the hands of Mrs. Maybrick’s mother, the Baroness von Roques, who, months afterward, happening to turn over the leaves of the Bible, came across a small piece of printed paper, evidently mislaid there, being a New York chemist’s label, with a New York doctor’s prescription written on the back, for an arsenical face wash “for external use, to be applied with a sponge twice a day.”
This prescription contained Fowler’s solution of arsenic, chlorate of potash, rose-water, and rectified spirits; and was again made up, on the 17th of July, 1878, by a French chemist, Mr. L. Brouant, 81 Avenue D’Eylau, Paris. It corroborates Mrs. Maybrick’s statement at the trial that the fly-papers were being soaked for the purpose alleged by her. If Mrs. Maybrick had obtained or purchased the seventy or eighty grains of arsenic found in the house after the death, it is inconceivable that she should have openly manufactured more arsenic with the fly-papers. At the time she prepared the statement she had reason to believe that the prescription had been lost. She knew, therefore, it would be impossible for her to corroborate her story about the face wash, and she could have omitted that incident altogether, and contented herself by saying that she learned the preparation while at school in Germany.
[In further explanation I desire to state that during my girlhood, as well as subsequently, I suffered occasionally, due to gastric causes, from an irritation of the skin. One of my schoolmates, observing that it troubled me a good deal, offered me a face lotion of her own preparation, explaining that it was much more difficult to obtain an arsenical ingredient abroad than in America, and to avoid any consequent annoyance she extracted the necessary small quantity of arsenic by the soaking of fly-papers. I had never had occasion to do so myself, as I had a prescription from Dr. Bay; but when I discovered that I had mislaid or lost this, I recalled the method of my friend, being, however, wholly ignorant of what quantity might be required. The reason why I wanted a cosmetic at this time was that I was going to a fancy dress ball with my husband’s brother, and that my face was at that time in an uncomfortable state of irritation.—F. E. M.]