A TRAGEDY IN A PHOTOGRAPHIC STUDIO.

Thames Star, Volume X, Issue 3116, 12 February 1879, Page 2

A TRAGEDY IN A PHOTOGRAPHIC STUDIO.

"Considerable excitement/ states the Darling Downs Gazette, " was caused in Towoomba, Queensland, on Dec. 28, by the report that a young woman had been poisoned at Mr Minogue'9 photographic studio in Ruthven street, and on making inquiries we discovered that the rumour was only too true. It appears that on the evening,in question the deceased, Mary O'Brien, in company with a girl named Gerahty, both servants at the Queen's Arms Hotel, went to Minogue's at about half-past 8 o'clock for the purpose of inquiring about some photographs he was doing. They met a girl named Bridget Frawley, and the three of them went into his studio,to find however that the photographs were not completed. Minogue told them the photos were in the bith, and the youug woman insisted on seeing them, and went into his workroom for »he purpose. Bridget Frawley nsked him for a drink, and he gave her one. The drink was a cooling one, mixed with tartaric acid, which was iua pickle bottle similar to the one that contained the acid. The second pickle bottle contained cyanide of potassium, a chemical used by photographers, and a deadly poison. The girl Gerathy had a drink also', and ail with the exception of deceased were turning to leave, when she helped herself to a drink, and, it is presumed mistook the bottle with the poison for that containing the tartaric acid. However, the three had their attention suddenly called to the girl O'Brien by hearing a heary fall, and Minogue, at, once suspecting the cause, and finding her to be in an apparently dying state, rushed off for medical aid, re^ turning with Dr Howling. The doctor administered the usual remedies in such cases, but without avail, as the unfortunate young woman died in about twentyfive minutes after swallowing the poison.