At six a.m. on the morning of the 30th a servant went in and saw Sir Theodosius about some business of mending a net. The young baronet then appeared quite well. At seven Lady Boughton came up with the medicine, which she found on the shelf. Sir Theodosius tasted and smelt it, complaining that it was very nauseous. His mother then smelt it, and noticed that it was like bitter almonds, but she persuaded her son to drink off a whole dose. “In about two minutes or less,” she afterwards deposed, “he struggled violently and appeared convulsed, with a prodigious rattling in his throat and stomach.” When he was a little better the mother left him, but returned in five minutes to find him with his eyes fixed, his teeth clenched, and froth running out of his mouth.
The doctor was forthwith summoned. Now Donellan came in, and Lady Boughton told him that she was afraid she had given her son something wrong instead of the medicine. Donellan asked for the bottle, took it, poured in some water, then emptied the contents into a basin. Lady Boughton protested, declaring that he ought not to have meddled with the bottle. Donellan’s reply was that he wished to taste the stuff. Again, when a maid-servant came in he desired her to remove the basin and the bottles, while Lady Boughton directed her to let them alone. But now Sir Theodosius was in his death-throes, and while she was engaged with him the bottles disappeared.
Donellan, after the event, wrote to the baronet’s guardian, Sir William Wheler, notifying the death, but giving none of the peculiar circumstances of the case. Three or four days later the guardian replied that as the death had been so sudden, and gossip was afloat concerning a possible mistake with the medicine, it was desirable to have a post-mortem. “The country will never be satisfied else, and we shall all be very much blamed,” wrote Sir William Wheler. “Although it is late now it will appear from the stomach whether there is anything corrosive in it.... I assure you it is reported all over the country that he was killed either by medicine or by poison.” The step was all the more necessary in the interest of the doctor who prescribed the draught. Donellan replied that Lady Boughton and he agreed “cheerfully” to the suggestion. Sir William wrote again, saying he was glad they approved, and gave the names of the doctors who should perform the autopsy.
When they came, Donellan showed them the second letter, not the first; the mere desire for a post-mortem, not the grounds for it, as set forth in the first, that poison was suspected. Decomposition was far advanced, the doctors were not pleased with the business, and, knowing no special reason for inquiry, made none. After this Donellan wrote to Sir William Wheler, conveying the impression that the post-mortem had actually taken place. Later, another surgeon offered to open the body, but Donellan refused, on the plea that it would be disrespectful to the two first doctors. Sir William, too, having learnt that nothing had been done, reiterated his desire for a post-mortem, and two more doctors arrived at Lawford Hall on the very day of the funeral. Donellan took advantage of a misconstruction of a message, and the body was buried without being opened.
Three days afterwards it was exhumed in deference to growing suspicions of poison, but it was too late to verify foul play. But the doctors formed a strong opinion of the cause of death, and later, when it came to the trial, they agreed that the draught, after swallowing which Boughton died, was poison, and the immediate cause of death. One said that the nature of the poison was sufficiently clear from Lady Boughton’s description of the smell. But the great surgeon, John Hunter, would not admit that the appearance of the body gave the least suspicion of poison. As to the smell, a mixture of the very same ingredients, but with laurel water added, was made up for Lady Boughton at the trial, and she declared it smelt of bitter almonds exactly like the draught.
The introduction of the laurel water followed the important discovery that Donellan had a private still in a room which he called his own, and that he distilled roses in it. A curious bit of evidence not mentioned in the report of the trial is preserved,[9] which shows how a single number of the “Philosophical Transactions” was found in Donellan’s library, and the only leaves in the book that had been cut were those that gave an account of the making of laurel water by distillation. Donellan’s still figured further in the case, for it was proved that he had taken it into the kitchen, and asked the cook to dry it in the oven. This was two or three days after the baronet’s death, and the presumption was that he had desired to take the smell of laurel water off the still. It also appeared that Donellan was in the habit of keeping large quantities of arsenic in his room, which he used, seemingly with but little caution, for poisoning fish.
Donellan’s defence did not help him greatly. It was written, after the custom of those days, and did not attempt to explain why
he had washed or made away with the bottles. He submitted that he had urged the doctors to the post-mortem by producing Sir William Wheler’s letter; but it was the second, not the first letter. On other points he maintained a significant silence. What went against him also were unguarded confidences made to a fellow-prisoner while he was awaiting trial. He said openly that he believed his brother-in-law had been poisoned, and that it lay among themselves: Lady Boughton, himself, the footman, and the doctor. Another curious story is preserved by Sir James Stephen, whose grandfather had long retained a strong belief in Donellan’s innocence, and had written a pamphlet against the verdict which attracted much notice at the time. Mr. Stephen changed his opinion when he had been introduced to Donellan’s attorney, who told him that he also had firmly believed in Donellan’s innocence until one day he proposed to his client to retain Dunning, the eminent counsel, for his defence. Donellan agreed, and referred the attorney to Mrs. Donellan for authority to incur the expense of the heavy fee required. Mrs. Donellan demurred, thinking the outlay unnecessary, and when this was reported to the prisoner, Donellan burst into a rage, crying, “And who got it for her?” Then, seeing that he had committed himself, he stopped abruptly, and said no more.
Donellan was convicted and executed, and to those who aver that the verdict was wrong Sir James Stephen replies that every item of evidence pointed to Donellan’s guilt, and did, in fact, satisfy the jury. The want of complete proof is the chief basis of the argument in Donellan’s favour, backed by the opinion of so eminent a scientist as Hunter. He deposed that he did not see the slightest indication of poisoning, and while he admitted that death following so soon after the draught had been swallowed was a curious fact, yet he could see no necessary connection between the two circumstances. The symptoms, as described to him, and the state of the internal organs, were perfectly compatible with death from epilepsy or apoplexy. Public opinion at the time was, no doubt, adverse to Donellan, and the jury may have been prejudiced against him. He was deemed an adventurer, a fortune-hunter, who had gained a footing in a good family by somewhat discreditable means, and it was assumed that he was prepared to go any length to feather his nest further.