Victorian Poisons

Victorian Poisons

By Claire Stufflebeam

In Conclusion...

The odds of Dr. Minor being purposefully poisoned are very low. He was more likely to actually kill himself with arsenic, or be accidentally kill himself were much more likely than him being murdered. Of course, he was clinically insane so most of his fears were irrational.

Works Cited

"Arsenic: An Abundant Natural Poison, ProQuest Discovery Guides." Arsenic: An Abundant Natural Poison, ProQuest Discovery Guides. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Mar. 2014.

"Poison: A Dark History." Poison: A Dark History. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Mar. 2014.

"Poison Center." Poison Center. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Mar. 2014.

"POISONINGTHROUGH THE AGES." Index. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Mar. 2014.

"The Truth About Victoriana: Victorian Era: The Golden Age of Poisoning." The Truth About Victoriana: Victorian Era: The Golden Age of Poisoning. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Mar. 2014.

The Odds of Being Poisoned?

According to research done by Dartmouth Undergraduate Journal of Science, "In 1839, the House of Commons issued a summary describing all poison-related deaths in England and Wales that occurred during the years 1837 and 1838... During this period, a total of 555 people were known to be killed by some form of poison. Out of the 445 of these cases for which an immediate cause of death is available, 194 entailed accidental poisonings, 242 involved suicide; only nine concerned murder victims. Murders only account for roughly 2% of all known poison-related deaths..."

Opportunity

This shows how unlikely being poisoned by a murderer would have been at this time. However, if you consider how this data only represents a small area, and one year, the odds that Dr. Minor could have been poisoned on purpose, or accidentally, grow significantly. If the data above can be considered an average, the following math would be accurate.

Since the Victorian Era was 64 years long, approximately 35,520 people in total would have died of being poisoned... just in England and Wales. 12,416 would have been accidental, 15,488 would be suicides, and about 576 would have been murders.

Killing with arsenic was harder than it seems. In order for the poison to kill, the perfect amount had to be used. Use too little and the poison won't kill, but use too much and the victim's body will start to fight the poison off. But, if the perfect amount was used, then the poison could take 1-3 days to actually kill. This was ideal for murderers of the time because this gave them a couple of days to work on a solid alibi.

Motive

Means

At this point in history, life insurance was beginning to be developed. This was an incentive to murder a family member so that you could claim money for their death. Because the system of life insurance was still developing, people exploited the flaws in the system by using poison to kill someone, which was relatively traceless and hard to identify. Also, many law officials wouldn't pursue finding the poisoners unless the victim was richer because these cases were hard to solve and took up lots of time. Basically, murder by poison was practically the perfect crime.

The punishment for being found guilty of poisoning was to be hanged.

Arsenic was the most commonly used poison of the Victorian Era for many reasons. First of all, arsenic was cheaply available. It was found in rat poison and make-up so people could buy it without looking suspicious. Also, poison was the easiest form of murder in this time because it simply had to be put into someone's food. It was so easily done it was referred to as "the coward's murder."