The motion, which the Rev. Mr Thomas also supported, was put and carried by a considerable majority.
Mr H. Harris, a surgeon, then moved the appointment of a deputation, consisting of the chairman and several other Gentlemen on the platform, to wait upon Sir George Grey, the Secretary of the Home Department, and lay the resolution on his table.
An amendment moved by Mr Bridd, and seconded by the Rev. Mr Pope, to the effect that the verdict of the jury was perfectly correct according to the evidence given at the trial, was lost on a show of hands, and the original motion reaffirmed by a large majority. The Meeting then dispersed.
'Honest John Smith', Dr Palmer's solicitor, had meanwhile pressed for a further post-mortem examination of Cook's mangled remains, and their analysis by chemists who claimed that, in cases of strychnine poisoning, they could detect the ten-thousandth part of a grain. He was supported in his demand by Professor J. E. D. Rodgers, Lecturer in Chymistry at the St George's School of Medicine. Professor Rodgers wrote to The Times:
To the Editor: Sir,
I cannot conceive an opinion more dangerous to promulgate than that a fatal dose of poison can be so nicely adjusted as to escape detection after death. Yet such has been the tendency of many letters published in the Press for some time past. It was with feelings of deep regret that I noticed in your edition of today a communication from a former colleague of mine, Mr Ancell, who, I am sure, would never have sent it, had he been aware of the nature and results of numerous experiments lately made by myself independently, and in conjunction with Mr Girdwood, Assistant-Surgeon, Grenadier Guards. I have asserted, and do still assert, that strychnia cannot evade discovery if proper processes be employed for its separation.
In this view I am supported by the highest chemical authorities of the day; and now request a space in your valuable columns to give the world a process which will form the conclusion of my letter. It has enabled myself and Mr Girdwood to detect that fearful poison in the blood, liver, tissues, and stomachs of animals poisoned by doses such as those Professor Taylor administered in experiments mentioned at the late trial. It has even enabled us to separate the strychnia from the tissues and organs of a dog after its body had been interred twelve months. The results of these experiments, though not a description of the process employed, were forwarded by myself and Mr Girdwood for the scrutiny of Sir George Grey. We hold that if John Parsons Cook was poisoned by strychnia, no matter how small the fatal dose, its presence could even now be clearly demonstrated should the victim s tissues be subjected to the same analytic process: for of all known poisons, there is not one more readily detected. The process is as follows:
The tissues are rubbed with distilled water in a mortar to a pulp, and then digested, after the addition of a little hydrochloric acid, in an evaporating basin. They are then strained, and evaporated to dryness over a water bath. The residue is digested again in a spirit filter, and once more evaporated to dryness. We next treat it with distilled water, acidulated with a few drops of hydrochloric acid, and filter it. We thereupon add excess of ammonia, and agitate in a tube with chloroform; the strychnia in an impure condition being thereby entirely separated with the chloroform.
This chloroform is to be carefully separated by a pipette, poured into a small dish and evaporated to dryness; the residue being moistened with concentrated sulphuric acid, and heated over a water bath for half an hour. We then add distilled water and excess of ammonia —again agitated with chloroform—and the strychnia will have thus been again separated by the chloroform now in a state of sufficient purity for testing. The test is made by evaporating a few drops on a piece of white porcelain, adding a drop of strong sulphuric acid and a minute crystal of bichromate of potash.
J. E. D. Rodgers, Lecturer in Chymistry, at the St George's School of Medicine
John Smith wrote from London to Sir George Grey at the Home Office, two days before the execution:
To The Right Hon. Sir G. Grey: Sir,
Notwithstanding the unabated anxiety which exists in the public mind relative to the fate of William Palmer, I have hitherto postponed addressing you on this subject. Long since his relations and friends would have rushed, in the intensity of their grief, to the Home Office; but as I have been charged with this matter of life and death, the arduous duty of making an appeal falls upon me.
Let me, then, claim your largest indulgence. I have now, when the sand of William Palmer's life has run until the eleventh hour— when only a few days stand between him and the grave, unless your clemency be exercised on his behalf—to address you as the head of that department which is recognized as the last sanctuary of injured justice. Although since the period of your administration the records of mercy adorn it more than at any other time—notwithstanding murder in its blackest form was committed, its perpetrators, under your merciful and wide dispensation, have been allowed to make atonement in exile or in solitude—still I shall not appeal to your sense of mercy.
I shall merely ask that a respite should take place in the execution of William Palmer until the serious doubts, medical and circumstantial, connected with this case, are laid at rest. No matter how popular passion may have been excited to its late state of madness against my client, your spirit of justice must examine into the obscurities that do exist. Sir, I trust you will not reverse one of the first principles of our criminal code, but allow my client the full benefit or doubt, if doubt be well founded. I therefore ground this application for my client's respite— First: Upon the character of Charles Newton, the principal witness for the Crown; as also upon the character of Elizabeth Mills; both of whose antecedents were unfortunately hidden from me at the time of the trial.
Secondly: Upon the absence of two witnesses who could, as I believe, have given satisfactory proofs as to the disposal of the poisons purchased by the prisoner, as well as to the disposal of Cook's money.
Thirdly: Upon the discrepancy of the medical evidence as to the finding of strychnia.
Lastly: Upon the judge's charge to the jury.
The importance as to Charles Newton's testimony in procuring a conviction for the Crown cannot be over-rated. Newton said he sold strychnia to the prisoner on the Monday night before Cook's death; and upon that night Cook was first seized with symptoms of illness. The medical evidence for the Crown pronounced this illness to have been connected with the administration of strychnia; but there was sufficient in Charles Newton's evidence to render him a witness unworthy of belief. The hour which he fixed for the delivery of the poison was incompatible with the hour when the prisoner was seen at Stafford on the same night. The suppression of this incident (if it took place) before the Coroner; the consultation relative to the effects of strychnia, which he said had occurred between Palmer and himself; and the unfeigned joy with which he represented Palmer to have been seized when he lent him his boyish knowledge of the powers of strychnia—all these circumstances and incidents rendered his evidence at the trial such that even the consummate ability of the Attorney-General could not deal with it as he wished. Yet the jury gave implicit faith to this witness.