THE ATTORNEY-GENERAL. Don't you know that what he got was a bill for £200?
SMITH. Yes; and had a house furnished for him.
THE ATTORNEY-GENERAL. Don't you know that the bill was never
paid?
SMITH. No, I do not.
THE ATTORNEY-GENERAL. NOW, I'll refresh your memory a little with regard to those proposals (handing witness a document). Look at that, and tell me whether it is in your handwriting.
SMITH. It is.
THE ATTORNEY-GENERAL. NOW, I ask you, were you not applied to by William Palmer in December, 1854, to attest a proposal on the life of his brother Walter for £13,000 in The Solicitors' and General Insurance Office?
SMITH. I might have been.
THE ATTORNEY-GENERAL. Were you, or were you not, Sir? Look at that document, and say have you any doubt upon the subject?
SMITH. I have no doubt that I might have been applied to.
THE ATTORNEY-GENERAL. Do not trifle, Sir, with the Court, and with the jury and myself! Have you any doubt whatever that in January, 1855, you were called on by William Palmer to attest a further proposal for £13,000 on his brother's life in another office? Look at the document and tell me.
SMITH. I see the paper, but I don't recall the circumstances.
THE ATTORNEY-GENERAL. That piece of paper seems to burn your fingers?
SMITH. No, upon my honour, it does not. I might have signed it in blank.
THE ATTORNEY-GENERAL. DO you usually sign attestations of this
nature in blank?
SMITH. I have some doubt whether I did not sign several blanks.
THE ATTORNEY-GENERAL. On your oath, looking at that document,
don't you know that William Palmer asked you to attest that
proposal upon his brother's life for £13,000?
SMITH. He did apply to me to attest proposals in some office. THE ATTORNEY-GENERAL. Were they for large amounts ?
SMITH. One was for £13,000.
THE ATTORNEY-GENERAL. NOW the truth is coming out! Were you asked to attest another proposal for a like sum in The Universal Assurance Office?
SMITH. I might have been.
THE ATTORNEY-GENERAL. They were made much about the same time, were they not? You did not wait for the answers to the first application before you made the second?
SMITH. I don't know that any answers came back at all.
THE ATTORNEY-GENERAL. Will you swear that you were not present when Walter Palmer executed the deed assigning the policy upon his life to the prisoner, William Palmer? Now, be careful, Mr Smith, because, depend upon it, you shall hear of this again if you are not!
SMITH. I will not swear that I was; I think I was not. I am not quite positive.
The Attorney-General's questioning of Jeremiah Smith's relations with old Mrs Palmer, and his previous questioning of George Myatt, the saddler, as to whether he ever slept in the same hotel bed as Dr Palmer, were both by way of revenge. Serjeant Shee, to throw discredit on Elizabeth Mills's testimony, had suggested that she was a woman of loose morals. Elizabeth Mills, however, answered with jaunty and mocking defiance, whereas Jeremiah Smith vacillated—torn between the fear of losing his character if he owned to being the bedfellow of a rich woman over twenty years his senior, and fear of offending her if he denied the imputation too indignantly. Very few of his answers were given without hesitance and a decided embarrassment, which left its imprint on the jury's mind.
Serjeant Shee tried to make good the damage when he reexamined Smith.
SERJEANT SHEE. How long have you known Mrs Palmer?
SMITH. For twenty years. [In answer to further questions:] I should think she must now be about sixty years of age. "William Palmer is not her eldest son. Joseph, the eldest, resides at Liverpool, and is a timber merchant. He must be forty-five or forty-six years of age. George, the next eldest son, resides at Rugeley and was frequently at his mother's house. John, the youngest, a clergyman of the Church of England, lived there until two years ago, except when he was away at college. There is also a daughter, who lives constantly with her mother; and three servants are kept. The house is a large one, and contains many spare bedrooms. I slept in the room nearest the old church.
SERJEANT SHEE. Is there any pretence for saying that you have ever been accused of improper intimacy with Mrs Palmer?
SMITH. I hope not.
SERJEANT SHEE. I repeat: is there any pretence for saying so ? SMITH. There ought not to be.
SERJEANT SHEE. Pray answer me directly! Is there any truth in the suggestion ?
SMITH. People may have made it, but they had no reason for doing so. SERJEANT SHEE. But was there any truth in such a statement if made?
SMITH. I should say not. There ought not to be any pretence for
anything of the kind. [Laughter.]
MR BARON ALDERSON. NO, Brother Shee. It was only two or three
times a week he slept there! [Loud laughter.]
The Attorney-General thereupon made a telling speech for the Crown, the ablest in his career, speaking without notes in a firm and resonant voice for eight hours or longer. He was secure in the knowledge that he had the last word, and need fear no rebuttal— though why the Prosecution always should have the last word in murder trials, we have been unable to fathom, unless the theory may be that the Judge in his summing-up will speak in the prisoner's defence, pointing out any false logic or distortion of facts contained in this final oration. Well aware, however, that the Lord Chief Justice could not be counted upon to do anything of the kind, Sergeant Shee boldly contended that since the Attorney-General had raised the new matter of Walter Palmer's life insurance, and the proposals for it made to various offices, the Defence was entitled to reply. But the Lord Chief Justice ruled: 'We are of opinion that you have no right to reply,' and Mr Baron Alderson supported him in this.
Dr Palmer, while in the dock, wrote a facetious note to his Counseclass="underline"
I wish there was two and a half grains of strychnia in old Campbell's acidulated draught—solely because I think he acts unfairly.
The Lord Chief Justice summed up in a sense which left the jury no choice but to find a verdict or Guilty'; yet Serjeant Shee courageously ventured on a final protest:
SERJEANT SHEE. The question which your Lordship has submitted to the jury is whether Cook's symptoms were consistent with death by strychnia. I beg leave . ..
THE LORD CHIEF JUSTICE (in a tone of vexation). That is not the question which I have submitted to the jury; it is a question! I have told them that unless they consider the symptoms consistent with death by strychnia they ought to acquit the prisoner.
SERJEANT SHEE. It is my duty not to be deterred by any expression of displeasure; I stand before a much higher tribunal than even your Lordships', and must therefore submit what I believe to be the proper question. I submit to your Lordships that the question whether Cook's symptoms are consistent with death by strychnia is a wrong question, unless followed by the phrase:'. . . and inconsistent with death from other and natural causes.' I submit that the question should be whether the medical evidence has established, beyond all reasonable doubt, that Cook died by strychnia. It is my duty to make this submission, as it is your Lordships', if I am wrong, to overrule it.
MR BARON ALDERSON. It is done already. You did so in your speech.
THE LORD CHIEF JUSTICE (addressing the jury). Gentlemen, I did not submit to you that the question upon which alone your verdict should turn is whether the symptoms of Cook were those of strychnia. I said that this is a most material question, and I desired you to consider it. I said: if you think that he died from natural disease—and not from poisoning by strychnia—you should acquit the prisoner. Then I went on to say that if you believed that the symptoms were consistent with death from strychnia, you should consider the other evidence given in the case to sec whether strychnia had been administered to Cook and, if so, whether it had been administered by the prisoner at the bar. These are the questions which I now again put to you. You must not find a verdict of 'guilty' unless you believe that strychnia was administered to the deceased by the prisoner at the bar; but, if you do believe that, it is your duty towards God and man to find the prisoner guilty.