ELECTRICITY'S POWER. Testimony of One Who Received an Apparently Fatal Shock.

Te Aroha News, Volume VI, Issue 314, 7 November 1888, Page 3

ELECTRICITY'S POWER. Testimony of One Who Received an Apparently Fatal Shock.

LH'rjnu a conversation with a prominent New York phw-ician and H. M. Stevens* formerly a piominent electrician of Boston, muny doubts were expressed as to the wisdom of adopting electricity a.s a means of executing criminals under a death penalty, writes a Rhode Island conespondent. The physician strongly expiesscd the opinion that theie might be an element of uncertainty as to the death of the criminal Mr Bte\en- related a personal experience. He was engaged in making some in-Au&r-ig itioiib on an elecliic light circuit in Lowell, Mas--., supplying twenty-five arc hyhtb of 2,000-candle power each, and, his loot slipping on his stepladder, he instinulnely paced one hand on the wire to steady himself. He was unable to recover himself fully, and his forehead touched the wire, thus sending a current thiong') the arm and presumably through one only of the lobes ot the brain. He saib-eqisently remembeied the thought passing thiough his mind that he h<>d le loived Mich a, .shook at to incapacitate him tiom retaining his position, and he Impul&ivi ly caught at the wire with Ins other hand. Had he i bought one i more he would infinitely have preteired falling to receiving the full chaige of electneitj' through his body, but he grasped T/tie wiie wuh his other hand, receiving the full power of the cuirent and putting out the lights in the entire circuit. His hands, j wheie he gra&ped the wire, were burned to the bone, and he fell, lying unconscious on dry u round lor six hours. When he was found it was discovered tMat the shock had bur.st blood vc&sols in the head, and that blood had gushed from h s nose, mouth and ears.. * He was taken io a hotel and subsequently to the hospital, where no signs of lite weie visible ev^n to experts. The same treatment; was zesurted to, however, as it is customary to use Avith persons apparently drowned, and after a long time some slight evidenccoi resuming consciousness lewarded^the efforts^ of tjhe attendants. The tongue was then drawn forward and whisky poured mt) his mouth, I where it remained for a long time, not a bubble appearing. ' 'j.\ I :. ,ld s ■; ' Mr Stevens says when he began to Recover consciousness it seemed to him as if ho had nei her arms nor legs, but simply a trunk and head, and as he remembered nothing of the circumstances, he connected the aroma of the whi&ky with an idea that he must have been in fome way induced to drink to intoxication, and had become the victim of a railroad accident. He could not for a time be persuaded thathehad any extremities until an attendant lifted one of his legs, when it seemed to ! him, he says, as it it was stretched out to an indefinite distance, the foot being miles away. | The special interest which the case has at the present time is the recent adoption of the method of electrical executions by the State oi New X ol 'k» and the .suggestion is offered by Mr Stevens bhat if criminals are to be executed by electricity, cremation rather than burial had better fojlow, thufa avoiding the possible occurrence of a horrible return to consciousness in the tomb.