John Presnell, aged sixty-three, was on November 22 in the
Shoreditch Pauper Infirmary, delirious, and shouting for tobacco. Mrs. Hart, the paid nurse, angry at the noise, held a handkerchief over his mouth for two minutes, and on its removal Presnell shrieked "Murder !" A pauper wardsman named Clarke then put a handkerchief over his mouth, and was going to tie it behind his head, when Mrs. Hart stopped him, and saying, "I'll soon quiet him !" poured some morphia down his throat. The man never spoke or stirred again till, twenty-three hours after, he died. The facts were clearly proved, and, indeed, admitted by the accused ; but the morphia had all been absorbed, and the surgeons thought that, judging from the time that elapsed, it had not caused death. A verdict of death from dropsy was recorded, with a censure against Hart and Clarke. Is the law against aggravated assault suspended in Workhouses as well as the Sixth Commandment? Note that, for the first time we remember, the public in Court hissed and hooted the officials.
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