PRISONER—
It is said I gave it my father to make him fond of me. There was no occasion for that—but to make him fond of Cranstoun.
Charge to the Jury—
Mr.
Baron Legge
MR. BARON LEGGE[[13]]—
Gentlemen of the jury, Mary Blandy, the prisoner at the bar, stands indicted before you for the murder of Francis Blandy, her late father, by mixing poison in tea and water gruel, which she had prepared for him, to which she has pleaded that she is not guilty.
In the first place, gentlemen, I would take notice to you of a very improper and a very scandalous behaviour towards the prisoner by certain people who have taken upon themselves very unjustifiably to publish in print what they call depositions, taken before the coroner, in relation to this very affair which is now brought before you to determine. I hope you have not seen them; but if you have, I must tell you, as you are men of sense and probity, that you must divest yourselves of every prejudice that can arise from thence and attend merely to the evidence that has now been given before you in Court, which I shall endeavour to repeat to you as exactly as I am able after so great a length of examination.
In support of the indictment, the counsel for the Crown have called a great number of witnesses. In order to establish, in the first place, the fact that Mr. Blandy died of poison, they begin with Dr. Addington, who tells you that he did attend Mr. Blandy in his last illness; that he was first called in upon Saturday evening, the 10th of August last; that the deceased complained that after drinking some water gruel on Monday night, the 5th of August, he perceived a grittiness in his mouth, attended with a pricking-burning, especially about his tongue and throat; that he had a pricking and burning in his stomach, accompanied with sickness; a pricking and griping in his bowels; but that afterwards he purged and vomited a good deal, which had lessened those symptoms he had complained of; that on Tuesday night, the 6th of August, he took more gruel, and had immediately a return of the same symptoms, but more aggravated; that he had besides hiccups, cold sweats, great anxieties, prickings in every external as well as internal part of his body, which he compared to so many needles darting at the same time into all parts of him; but the doctor tells you at the time he saw him he said he was easy, except in his mouth, his nose, lips, eyes, and fundament, and some transient pinchings in his bowels, which the doctor then imputed to the purgings and vomitings, for he had had some bloody stools; that he imputed the sensations upwards to the fumes of something he had taken the Monday and Tuesday before; that he inspected the parts affected, and found his tongue swelled, his throat excoriated and a little swelled, his lips dry, and pimples on them, pimples on the inside of his nostrils, and his eyes bloodshot; that next morning he examined his fundament, which he found surrounded with ulcers; his pulse trembled and intermitted, his breath was interrupted and laborious, his complexion yellowish, and he could not without the greatest difficulty swallow a teaspoonful of the thinnest liquid; that he then asked him if he had given offence to any person whatever. His daughter the prisoner was then present, and she made answer that her father was at peace with all the world, and all the world with him. He then asked if he had been subject to this kind of complaint before. The prisoner said that he was subject to the heartburn and colic, and she supposed this would go off as it used to do; that he then told them that he suspected that by some means or other he had taken poison, to which the deceased replied he did not know but he might, or words to that effect; but the prisoner said it was impossible. He returned to visit him on Sunday morning, and found him something relieved; that he had some stools, but none bloody, which he took for a spasm; that afterwards Norton, the apothecary, gave him some powder, which he said had been taken out of gruel, which the deceased had drank on Monday and Tuesday; this powder he examined at leisure, and believed it to be white arsenic; that the same morning a paper was put into his hands by one of the maids, which she said had been taken out of the fire, and which she saw Miss Blandy throw in. There was a superscription on the paper, "powder to clean the pebbles." There was so little of it that he cannot say positively what it was, but suspects it to be arsenic, for he put it on his tongue and it felt like arsenic, but some burnt paper mixed with it had discoloured and softened it. He tells you that on Monday morning the deceased was worse; all the symptoms returned, and he complained more of his fundament than before. He then desired the assistance of some skilful physician, because he looked upon him to be in the utmost danger, and apprehended this affair might come before a court of judicature. He asked the deceased if he really thought he was poisoned, to which he answered that he really believed so, and thought he had taken it often, because his teeth rotted faster than usual; he had frequent prickings and burnings in his tongue and throat, violent heartburn, and frequent stools, that carried it off again by unaccountable fits of vomiting and purging; that he had had these symptoms, especially after his daughter had received a present of Scotch pebbles from Mr. Cranstoun. He then asked the deceased who he suspected had given the poison to him; the tears then stood in his eyes, but he forced a smile and said, "A poor love-sick girl! I forgive her; I always thought there was mischief in those cursed Scotch pebbles."