The Poisoning Case at Napier.

Thames Star, Volume X, Issue 3204, 27 May 1879, Page 2

The Poisoning Case at Napier.

5 • ; [By Tklegkaph.] 1 In the case of'the suspected murder of Mrs McLennan, the coroner's jury brought in a verdict to the effect that the deceased died from poison, administered by some person or persons unknown, but that the conduct'of the husband, Roderick Hugh McLennan, was highly suspicious. The following is the most suggestive portion of the evidence:— -, Mrs Scott; late landlady of the Masonic Hotel, 1 stated that at seven o'clock of the morning of Mrs McLennan s death, she (Mrs Scott) was informed of it.; She went up to the room and saw McLennan and Dr Caro at the door. McLennan remarked that his'wifel had 1 died-at five-o'clock. Witness asked him why.' he did not call some one,-as there were three women-— herself, her mother, and her sister in the house, besides'the servants. •' To this he replied that she begged him not to leave her, and he could not do so against her wish. He added that she went into a~fit of hysterics just.before her death, ?that the threw'the 'bedclothes over her head, and tried to smother herself* .'.,,■/,

Mr Elliott, book-keeper at the Masonic ' Hotel, who slept in "a room - underneath those occnpied by McLennan and his wjK said that on the morning of the 2WR April he heard some cries proceeding from McLennan's room. They were six or seven distinct cries, loud at first, but gradually growing weaker, as if they were smothered. ~ .',■ • Mrs Beale, mother of Mrs , Scott, who laid the body out/ said it omitted a most peculiar and overpowering-odour, which made' witness and Mrs' Fraser, who assisted her, ill for two days. On going down stairs witness remarked "I don't like the look of things upstairs. There is something very peculiar about, that death." She could not say whether the smell was that of chloroform. It appeared to act on both head and stomach. She had laid out many bodies, but never found the same smell before. v There was a large purple black place orer the heart, as if from a bruise. —Star.