FEATURE

POISONAND
THE VICTORIAN
IMAGINATION
Criminal poisoning at once fascinated and terrified Victorian
society. Anonymous and coldly calculating, poisoners, observers
feared, were drawing on the advances made hy modern science to
inflict a new and insidious form of violence. To counter this
threat, the public looked to an emergent field of scientific expertise
- toxicology. Here Ian Burney shows how tbe extraordinary case
of a doctor, banged in 1856 for allegedly poisoning an acquaintance.
tbrew up deep-rooted anxieties ahout poison, detection, and
professionalism in Victorian society.

^ T am innofcnl of poisoning Cook hy and a serial poisoner who perverted his

I strychnine'. With these words the
_L doctor William Palmer went to the
scaffold, convicted of having perpetrated
the very crime he denied to the last. His
twelve-day trial in May 1856, described
by Laiv Times as "the longest, greatest,
gravest and most important criminal trial
of the nineteenth century', ended just as
it had begun - witb a question hanging
over the centra! contention against him.
I he case enthralled contemporary
observers, and by its close most had
become convinced of Palmer's utter vil-
lainy: a gambler, a forger, an adulterer.
standing as a licensed medical practi-
tioner to further his murderous ends,
Palmer's fate provoked little in the way
of sympathy. He had been convicted of
murdering his friend and gambling asso-
ciate John Parsons Cook along 'scientific'
lines, secretly employing carefully cali-
brated, minute doses of strychnine to
poison without a trace. Yet his scaffold
declaration provoked widespread con-
cern. His enigmatic statement, neither
directly denying his guilt as a poisoner
nor ratifying the precise grounds upon
which his conviction rested, struck at
the heart of the case against him, tor
though strychnine was named as the poi-
son that had killed Cook, none was
detected in his body. Palmer's words
reverberated in the medical and lay
press: in dealh as in life, he lapped a
deep vein of anxiety running through
Victorian society.
William Palmer was born In 1824 in
the Staffordshire town of Rugeley, the
son of a wealthy timber merchant. After
sen'ing a mcdicLiI apprenticeship. Palmer
went to London to pursue his studies at
Barts Hospital. He qualified with a
licence from the Royal College of Sur-
geons in 1846, and then returned to
Rugeley, intending to set himself up in
provincial practice. A year later he mar-
ried the twenty-year-old Anne Thornton.
Anne was the illegitimate daughter of
C'olonel Brooke, a wealthy former East

Above: William Palmer's death mask. c. 1860

Lefd unnatural and invisible causes of death,

body snatching, the professionalizaiion of
medicine and the role of the gothic in Victorian
culture contributed to the anxieties touched
upon by the Palmer case.'Found Drowned' by
George Frederick Watts, 1848-50.

HISTORY TODAY MARCH 2008

 THE VICTORIAN POISONER
THIS PICTURE SHEWS THE WAY IN WHICH DOCTORS, BY T H E H E L P OF POIMNS, GET THE
THE ONLY IUKKKHKNCE BCTW'KEN OMB AM) THK OTHfiB ( iiSlfST IN A FEW
'i rtiif ( i l l Ml ibr PHBSCHIPTIONS.
klhr iljri'RAUKnr IKHTTUIU. .f < lU
NK HKIIK'JNALLVi)
vid . >i>aia of
India official, and Brooke's housekeeper,
N4ary Thornton. Brooke had committed
suicide in 1834, It-aving a suhstantial
amount of property and an annual
income of several hundred pounds to his
daughter. Another considerahle hequest
made to Anne's mother was to pass at
her death to her daughter. Anne's legacy,
however, was arranged as a life-interest
only, meaning that on her own death it
would revert to the Brooke family.
The Palmers soon commenced huild-
ing a lite of apparent exemplar)' domestic-
ity, producing five children hetween 1850
and 1854. Four of these, however, died in
inlancy, the cause of each of which was
certified as 'convulsions'. These domestic
tragedies notwithstanding. Palmer
appeared a solid mcmhcr of the provincial
middle classes: he was likened in physical
ajipearance to a typical hale and hearty
'John Bull' character, stout, ruddy
cheeked, with a broad and open face. I le
displayed the traits of civility and charity;
especially to those of a lower social stand-
ing, and a devoutness suggested hy his
olt-spied prayer hook and his regular
church attendance. Palmer's standing as a
pillar of solid middle England belied a
more complex reality His true passion,
increasingly, was not medicine but the
turf. On his return to Rugeley Palmer
acquired a stable of racehorses, v\hich he
36 MARCH 2008
chemist's shop.
to launch an investigation into the claim.
hred and bet upon. An activity famously
draining on capital reserves. Palmer
quickly found himself in need of i'resh
sources of funding, and proceeded to
construct an increasingly baroque edifice
of credit, primarily secured on his moth-
er's and wife's inrlunes.
In January 1849, Palmer's mother-in-
law died whilst visiting the Palmer
home, and as a result, the Brooke legacy
passed to Anne, but again only for the
duration of her own life. Facing the
prospect of lost access to this suhstantial
inheritance on the death of his wife.
Palmer insured her life for a total of
13,000. These policies, in at least one
case medically certified by Palmer bimself,
came into effect in January 1K54. In
September that year, Anne took ill soon
after returning home from a visit lo
Liverpool, and fell under the attentive
care of her husband. She died shortly
thereafter, and her deatb was attributed
to cholera, which was present in Liverpool
at the time. Palmer had no difficulty col-
lecting on bis wife's policies. In January
IH55, Palmer took out a furtber policy
on his elder hrother Walter, a hankrupted
and notoriously dissipated corn-merchant,
who then died six months later.
At the time of Walter's death. Palmer
himself was deep in deht, and his position
was made more difficult by the decision
Left historical and fictional poisoners queuing
for poisonous medicines at a Victorian
ot one of Walter's insurance companies
It is al this point tbat John Parsons C'ook
enters the story Co(jk was a twenty-
eight-year-old former apprentice solicitor
who. having inherited a small fortune on
death of bis father, had turned to the
race-track, and had become one of
Palmer's close associates. In November
1855. the pair travelled to the Shrews-
bury racecourse, where, on November
13tb, Cook won a sizeable sum. I hai
evening, after celebrating his victory.
Cook suddenly fell ill. He and Palmer
returned to Rugeley shortly thereafter
and Cook took up temporary residence
at tbe Talhot Arms, directly opposite
Palmer's home. He died in tbe early
hours of November 21st, following ati
erratic pattern of physical distress that
appeared to coincide with Palmer's
ministrations.
Cook's executor quickly became sus-
picious, and at his insistence an inquest
was called, witb a post-mortem examina-
tion to be made by local doctors -
Palmer included. His reported actions at
the post-mortem, notably bis seemingly
intentional attem]it to spill tbe contents
of Cook's stomach, heightened suspi-
cions. At the completion of the post-
mortem, jars containing Cook's visceral
fluids were forwarded to Guy's Hospital
for analysis by the leading to.vicologist of
tbe day Professor Alfred Swaine Taylor
(1806-80). Witb bis colleague C O .
Rees, Taylor conducted tests for a wide
range of poisons, but could find only a
small amount of antimony, a commonK
prescribed mineral emetic wbicb. it
given in repeated doses, could be fatal.
Accordingly. Taylor arrived at tbe Cook
inquest in December 1855, prepared to
Above: part of a prescription issued to Palmer
for strychnine, opium and prussic acid, on
November 20th, 1855, the day before Cook's
m/sterious death.
 THE VICTORIAN POISONER

testify only to the possibility ot antimony atmosphere in Stallordshire - 'divided

as the cause of death.
But the testimony of one witness
altered Taylors opinion. Elizabeth Mills,
the chambermaid at tbe Taibot Arms
who had ministered to Cook during his
final illness, recounted Cook's reaction
lo pills given hy Palmer on the night
prior to and of his death. Mills described
Cook's convulsive move-
ments, followed by a
stiffening of the limbs,
[be wild look about his
eyes, and his agonized
declarations that he was
ahout to die. At this
point Taylor inquired
whethfr any external
lai.eralions were found
on the body that may
bave linked the convul- an hour after the
sions to an ordinary
case of traumatic administration no operated
tetanus. Hearing tbat
no such marks had
chemical
been found, Taylor present known
announced that Mills
hatl aecuralely described
could
the symptoms produced by small doses
of strychnine, and that, in his view, this
had been the cause of death.
There was, Taylor admitted, one dilii-
culty that presented itself to this solu-
into Palmerites andAnti-Palmerites, in
the words of The Times - that, in a hid
for an impartial jury. Parliament rushed
through legislation enabling the trial to
be moved to the Old Bailey In the volu-
minous comment on lhe impending trial,
one problem dominated - the disjuncturc
between Taylor's belief that strychnine
had caused Cooks
death, and the fact thai
he had not heen able
to trace this agent in
bis body.
This e\'idential void
fed one of tbe principal
anxieties about modern
criminal poisoning.
Contemporary com-
mentators, both scien-
tific and lay, saw it as a
form of violence that
beneath the
Above: in what is described as 'the only
authentic likeness' of Palmer, from The Illustrated
test at threshold of percep- Ufe and Career of William Palmer {1856), a
tion. This, for them. moralistic version of the story, the doctor is
made poisoning an
shown standing in front of a race horse.
detect it 9 archetypal crime of Left: detail from a medical cabinet thought to
'civilization', one which have belonged to Palmer, showing bottles of
they contrasted explicitly with the pharmaceutical preparations commonly used by
licensed Victorian practitioners.
'direct' characteristics of crimes perpe-
trated in 'ruder' societies. Uncivilized Below: "Palmer and Party in a fix returning from
the Derby', from The Illustrated Life ofWilliam
crimes were direct in the psychology of
Palmer, which devotes several pages to tfie doctors
their execution, spontaneous, unpremed- weakness for racing, betting and gambling.

tion: namely, that he had found no

strychnine in Cook's body. Yet Taylor
insisted that this absence admitted of a
scientific explanation. Unlike the more
familiar mineral poisons like arsenic or
antimony, which remained in the body
and could in principle be made the sub-
ject of unambiguous analytical demon-
stration, an organic substance like
strychnine was liable to be 'so speedily
absorbed in the blood that in the course
of an hour after the administration no
chemical test at present known could
detect it". The jury returned a guilty ver-
dict, and Palmer was committed for trial
on a coroner's warrant.
The case gripped ibe publie imagina-
tion as no other poison trial had done
before. Press coverage was intense from
the first reports in December 1855
through [o the conclusion of the trial the
following June, with both the lay and the
medical press devoting dozens of leaders
to the case. The intensity of national
interest was more than matched at the
local level. Indeed, so charged was the

HISTORY TODA MARCH 2008 37


itated, committed in passion. They were
direct, moreover, in that they used
instruments that acted mechanically and
physically. Bludgeons and knives
depended on immediate contact
between assailant and victim and, work-
ing from the outside in, left physical
traces on tbe bodys surface. Neither poi-
son nor the poisoner could play a part in
such a crude world of violence. Poison-
ers eschewed face-to-face conflict; they
never revealed their intentions, using
false pretences to mask their murderous
designs. Poison similarly disguised itself.
The ideal poison was tasteless, odourless
and colourless. It could dissolve itself
into the stuff of everyday life, substances
that in their apparent intent were signed
as henign.
The body of the victim, moreover,
conformed to this framework of secrecy.
In the view of the founder editor of the
Lancet, the radical surgeon, coroner and
politician Thomas Wakley, 'nineteen-
iwentieths of all the poisons leave no
mark or sign of the dreadful work that
has heen going on internally, on tbe
external surface of tbe body'. This had
clear implications for the investigation of
modern homicidal violence. As William
Baker, Wakiey's coronial colleague,
observed in 1840:
In the rude ages, the means resorted
to ... was always of a bold and violent
description, and left its traces
behind, but now villainy is so
refined, ... that the murderer leaves
scarcely a clue to bis discovery.
38 MAHCH 2008 HISTORY TODAY
Left: a woman gazes trustingly at the modest.
yet assured young professional in T h e Doctor',
C.I 860, by Miles Arthur, an idealized portrayal of
the mid-Victorian patient/doctor relationship.
Below: part of a page from Palmer's diary for 1855
in which he notes his attendance on Cook and the
latter's death on the morning of November 21st.
The market that most interested the
speculative poisoner, commentators
agreed, was life insurance. Long associ-
ated with gambling, insurance threat-
ened to suhsume lite and death under
impersonal tnarkct forces. By bestowing
upon any given individual life a potential
tnonetary worth, the insurance industry
had introduced a profound shift in the
distribution of value across the social
spectrum, one wbich invited fraud, and
ultimately murder. Unlike other hoom
This view of poison dovetailed with industries like the railways, insurance
contemporary analyses of 'modern' civi- companies required little capital invest-
lization, in which commentators identi- ment, just the mere semhlance of sol-
fied an intricate set of parallels between vency. Critiques by journalists and novel-
the properties of poi- ists such as Dickens
and Thackeray of
son on the one hand, a quest for public the proliteration of
and the defining
attributes of modern recognition of 'new' insurance offices,
Britain on the other. especially in the
medical men as a 184ns and 50s,
Britain, in this view,
was tbe quintessential distinct, credible tocused on tbeir
liheral bourgeois soci- deceptively 'profes-
and trusted group sional' appearances -
ety, wbose prosperity
derived from a disciplined collection of mahogany clad offices, and ledger books
rational individuals acting upon one anoth- tilled with meticulously compiled actuar-
er in anonymous urhan and commercial ial tahles - which masked a hollow,
networks. Poison - introduced by stealth duplicitous reality.
and calculation, working at a distance,
Poison seemed a perfect means of
leaving behind an inscrutable coqise - was
taking advantage of this potentially
the ideal weapon of this prosaic, material-
fraudulent system for revaluating indi-
ist, calculating age. Modern poisoners,
vidual life. In the unremarkable lives of
unlike their historic antecedents in the
the insured, the Illustrated Times
courts of imperial Rome or of Renaissance
warned, 'the floating capital of criminali-
Italy such as Locusta and Lucrezia Borgia,
ty has found a new investment'. This
were inspired by petty greed rather than
crime thus exemplified poison's descent
bigh politics or heroic passions, and took
into the banal: he who poisons to cheat
advantage of new market arrangements to
an insurance office, can have no motive
ply their trade.
but tbe pence'.
. E l fHllMV (T 1>1 O
-<^ A ^'
MSATllHUAY
nt-ffx^tii.. o

Palmer's subversion of ihe disL-ipIined
pr()l't;ssi(niilism allribLiled lo modtrn
life insurance practices broaches what
cnniemporaries took to be another
delininy characteristic of bis crimes - bis
credentials as a member of the medical
profession. The 1850s was a crucial
decade in the long-running campaign to
make medicine a recognized profession,
culminating in tbe passage of tbe 18S8
Medical Hegistrati()n Act. This campaign
Wjis a t]uest for public recognition of
medical men as a distinct, credible,
and trusted group, the disinterested
representatives of an acknowledged body
of expertise used for the individual and
collective good. Of course, tbis vision o
medicine as a licensed guarantor of
personal and social order was itself deeply
contested. Controversies surrounding
tbe system of pauper dissection following
tbe 1832 Anatomy Act. and the on-going
practice of animal experimentation were
prominent examples of a widely held
suspicion of medical orthodoxy. So, too.
was the attack on regular practitioners
by tbe growing ranks of medical botanists,
naturopatbs, hydropatbs. mesmerists,
and the like wbo accused ortbodox
medicine, witb its toxic pbarmacopeia,
of poisoning patients in tbe interest ot
profit and professional advancement.
William Palmer was a licensed medica!
man cbarged witb systematically abusing
tbe trusts invested in bim. If guilty, he
bad repeatedly manipulated bis medical
credentials for malign ends. He had laid
tbe foundations of bis crime by acting as
medical certifier for an insurance policy
tbat be had himself proposed, and that
named bim as beneficiary. He bad then
THE VICTORIAN POISONER
1 ; Left:Taylor,Rees and others attending the
inquest into Cook's death inside theTown Hall
g^ Rugeley from The Triol of William Palmer
Below: the toxicologists Alfred Swaine Taylor and
G.O, Rees performing their analysis on Cook's
visceral fluids,from TheTrial op//illiam Palmer.
used his professional position to gain bis ends. He was notbing if not a man of
access to his victims, using medicine not his time.
to cure, but to kill. His machinations at Forensic medicine, too, was \'ery
tbe autopsy table showed him willing to much a modern suhject. and within the
subvert the solemn responsibility growing nuinber ol texts devoted to it no
entrusted in members of his profession. topic was more widely discussed tban
His crime, moreover, was effected with poisoning and its science of detection -
all the subtlety befitting a man trained in toxicology. Toxicology's notoriety was hy
tbe science of medicine, eschewing, as no means confined to professional litera-
t b e Pharmaceutical fournal put it, ' t b e ture: amply covered in newspaper trial
clumsy method of poisoning by large accounts, it figured as an exemplary
doses of arsenic' in favour of poisoning instance of the application of scientific
'as an exact science'. His practice, more- expertise to pressing social concerns.
over, drew on tbe latest developments in Toxicology's prominence stemmed in
experimental pbarmacology. His cbosen large part from the enigmatic quality of
agent, strychnine, was itself a notable its quarry. Against the tbreat of an
product of this unseen agent of
research field, isolat- ( ( he used his position crime, toxicology,
ed in a French laho- tbrougb tbe work-
ratory in 1818 and to gain access to ings of tbe cbemical
put to work by his victims, using laboratory, promised
Franois Magendie a restoration of
and otbers in animal medicine not to sigbt, Toxicologists
experiments aimed cure but to kiii j like Alfred Swaine
at developing a truly Taylor and bis
scientific pharmacology. Palmer the
Scottish contemporary, Robert Cbristison
medical man, like Palmer the speculator,
( 1797-82), claimed that of all the evidence
thus ajipeared adept at harnessing all
produced at poisoning trials, it was the
modern means at his disposal to attain
results of the cbemical lab tbat were the
most eagerly awaited, both as a matter of
TBUL & EKECUTii OF WN, FALIEL science and of persuasion. 'The chemical
evidence in charges of poisoning'.
For PolMiiiing at
Christison observed in bis 1829 Treatise
on Poisons, 'is generally, and witb justice,
considered as tbe most decisive of all tbe
branches of proof. Taylor agreed: it was
cbemical evidence was that was "deemed
most satisfactory to the public mind, and
whicb is earnestly sought for by our law
Above: Palmer the poisoner on the gallows. authorities on cbarges of poisoning. Tbe
Detail from an execution broadside. reason,' be continued, "is that in most
HISTORY TODAV MARCH 2008 39
THE VICTORAN POISONER

and contention. Not only might it misrep-
resent toxicoiogical practice, but, more sig-
nificantly, public expectations of tangible
demonstration could ultimately undermine
toxicoiogical witnessing and the credibility
of the evidence it offered. In Taylor's view,
the public had been led to believe in an
inflated view of chemical evidence - that
'no man can die of poison except poison be
found in his body, and that unless the
material instrument of death be always,
and under all circumstances, forthcoming.'
Though undoubtedly the most desirable
form of proof, it was unrealistic to bold
toxicology to this standard in every case.
Palmer's case captured perfectly the
promise of and tensions within toxicological
Left the new offices of the Royal Insurance
Company, Lombard Streec, London, 1859.
Bdlow: as a patient suffers the adverse effects of a
dose of strychnine, the doctor explains to his wife
'... you have the satisfection at least of knowing
that your husband has been POISONED according
to act of parliament, and I need not say what a
pretty widow you'll make'. Lithograph, c. 1850.
cases, it demonstrates at once the means
of death.'
The form that this demonstration was
expected to take, and the value attributed
proof, as the following contrasting
assessments of expert evidence at the case
show. First, a professed celebration of
toxicoiogical evidence that appeared in
tbc weekly newspaper the Examiner
(subsequently reprinted in The Times).
In tbis editorial, ihe central image was that
of a 'speaking body'. The dead woman has
spoken, and science has presented itself
as interpreter," the Exannner proclaimed;
Not only is the tale of poison told
with wonderful precision, but the
poison itself is produced in court.
The antimony in this bottle, says
what remains of the murdered
woman, was given to me days
before I died; here is the antimony
given only a few hours before my
death; this again is the poison that
ran through my heart.
The Examiner'fi testifying corpse
speaks through analytical demonstration,
but this is a selective review of the
Ui
*"

to it by toxicology's broader audience, is , PiiUNtD is

clear in the comments of one of England's
leading legal theorists, William Wills:

Of the various chemical tests,

unquestionahly those which,
applied to the human body or its
contents or excreta, reproduce the
particular poison which has been
employed, are the most satisfactory.

Wills's comment highlights the extrac-

tion and reproduction of poison as the
chemist's unique contribution to trials
involving a charge of criminal poisoning.
By enabling experts to reproduce poison
in its tangible form, chemical demon-
stration held out the promise of disrupt-
ing the poisoner's insidious designs.
Through his conjuring of the equivalent
of the bloodied dagger in bis tubes and
retorts, the toxicologist promised to
translate this most ephemeral of crimes
into a more conventional form of violence.
His capacity to summon evidence of
this nature was the cornerstone of the toxi-
cologist's claim to a privileged place in the
courtroom. Yet this view of toxicology,
according to leading medico-legal com-
mentators, could also result in confusion of- S T R Y C H N I N E !

40 MARCH 2008 HISTORY TODAY


evidence generated: it is not Cook's
recalcitrant body tbat docs [lie speaking,
but the more cooperati\e one of
I'aiiner's wife (wbose dealb Taylor had
LlckTrniiifd was a straightforward
case of antimony pi)isoning, imcom-
jilicaied by the subtleties of strych-
nine). And despite its celebratory
appearances, tbe Examiner's imagina-
live evocation of bodi-
ly communication
liighlights the
ambiguous powers
altributed to mod-
ern toxicological
demonstration. On
ibe one hand, the
Examiner's 'speak-
ing body' provided an opportunity for
showcasing toxicologiciil progress. Sci-
ence, in putting an end to tbe evil doer's
"okl comfort, "dead men tell no tales",'had
in sonic sense confirmed a 'primitive'dis-
course of proof - tbe ancient practice of
placing ibe corpse before tbe suspected
nuirderer, in the belief tbat it would bleed
ill the presence ol its assailant:
How vaguely was tbis foreshad-
owed in tbe superstition of our
foreflbers. whose notion ol the
best evidence of foul play was to
bring a suspected murderer into
the presence of tbe corpse! Pre-
cisely tbe same notion we now
carry into effect; but for tbe super-
naliira! tbere is put a natural lan-
guage, wbicb science bas acquired
tbe power of interpreting.
Tbe Examiner tbus insisted tbat bod-
ies could be made to testify, not as a
matter of superstition, but as a matter
of science. Toxicology had successkilly
translated primitive desire into modern
fact. Yet in anotber sense, the imagina-
ti\e excesses of the Examiner's celebra-
linn, replete witb speaking corpses and
testifying test-tubes, tbreatened to
destabilize tbe system of meaning
ubicb the editorial sought to upbold,
in\ iting L|ucstlons about bow secure tbe
opposition between science and fantasy
actually was.
This tension was seized upon in critical
[)re-trial comment - nowhere more so
than in The Doctor in tbe Witness-Box',
an article that appeared in the Februar\'
issue of tbe Dublin University Magazine.
I h i s article featured an extensive
denunciation of wbat it saw as the
newly inflated ambitions of medical
witnesses, who were 'abandoning
their position as indifferent auxil-
iaries of iisticc and advancing
pretensions to direct and ad-
minister it.'These ambitions,
moreover, were built on suspect
grounds. Tbe "mysteries of
chemistry', it insisted, 'resem-
ble tbose of religion: faitb
Above and left ,, j^^.,^ ,^^^^^ ^^ ^.^^j^^. ,.
something for n - i
the mantelpiece: ^'"'<J i^t ^be toxieologist
Staffordshire enjoyed an advantage
figures of Palmer. ^^^^^ ^^^ .^^_ -^ ^j^^j ^^^
the poisoner and
his house. could cbange at w i l l tbe
language of bis oracle':
Every day new names, sometimes
conventional, sometimes express-
ing a new, often a false theory, are
applied to common things, only to
be altered upon tbe day tbat fol-
lows, ... It tbus becomes absolute-
ly impossible for the ordinary
administrators of tbe law to test a
skilled medical witness, who
becomes, in tact, bimself, a jury
sole, wbose verdict is tbe more
fatal, inasmucb as, bowever he
may be led astray by the fantasies
of science, the instinct of tbe
chase, or tbe inlluence of popular
prejudice, be is commonly a man
of unquestionable respectability.
and often of considerable talents
and learning.
In tbis view, tbe declarative powers of
toxicology represented a new form of
faitb rendered credible by public blini!-
ness. Stimulated by fantasy yet clotbed
in tbe garb ol modern science, tbe toxi-
eologist bad added a layer of imaginati\e
mystification onto tbe mysteries of the
modern poisoner.
Criminal poisoning in tbe Victorian
period was construed as a form of \ io-
lence that operated beneath tbe thresh-
old of perceptible experience: As one
judge observed in bis jury instructions,
"You are not to ex[>ect visible proofs in a
work of darkness\ 1 be toxieologist acted
as mediator between the insensible and
tbe sensible, bis task to demonstrate the
presence of things not evident to otbers.
This was tbe source of bis cbarisma,
causing, as one medico-legal author
THE VICTORIAN POISONER
observed, 'the vulgar to marvel at the
mysterious power by wbicb an atom ot
ipoison] mingled amidst a mass of con-
fused ingesta can still be detected.'
Poison spoke essentially to imagina-
tions, anchored in public and scientific
conceptions of bistory, crime and the
hody. Toxieology was embedded in tbis
network, and poison trials wore occa-
sions for participants to tap into tbis
deep imaginative seam. It was tbis cbar-
acteristic tbat lent poison trials tbeir
extraordinary resonance, and it was tbis
that made William Palmer - gambler.
speculator, manipulator of appearances,
scientific criminal - tbe epitome of tbe
'modern' Victorian poisoner.
F LI r t h c r H e a d i n g
Ian Burney. Poison, Deiecion and the
Victorian Imagination (Manchester
tJniversity Press, 2006): Katherine
Watson, Poisoned Lives: Englisl^ Poisoners
ond their Victims (Hambledon Continuum.
2004); Jos Ramn Bercomeu-Snchez
and Agusti Nieto-Galan (eds). Chemistry,
Mediane, and Crime: Mateu j.R. Orfila
(787-1853) ondHisT/mes (Science
History Publications, 2006);AngiJs
McLaren.A Prescription for Miirder:The
Victorian Serial Killings of Dr.Thomas Neitt
Cream (University of Chicago Press.
l995):Tal Golan, tows of Men and Laws of
Naire:The History of Scientific Expert
Testimony in England and America
(Harvard University Press, 2004).
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HisioHV TODAY MARCH 2(K)8 41
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