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Arsenic in the Dumplings: A Casebook of Historic Poisonings in Suffolk
96 pages, Paperback
First published May 1, 2010
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
March 4, 2024
A short read with a few interesting cases from Suffolk. Fascinating to see the difference in men and women when it comes to poisoning.
December 19, 2014
Sheila Hardy has clearly done her research. It looks to me that she's had a good ol' rummage through old newspapers (where the inquests and trials would have been reported) as well as censuses and parish registers.
It's tough reading at times, when we watch people slowly dying from what we, at our distance of over 150 years know to be (or at least, suspect to be) arsenic poison. But Sheila's writing is quite engaging - she puts these stories into context, explaining what rural Suffolk was like at this time: the kind of lives our protagonists would have led, the houses they lived in, the jobs they worked and the household chores they laboured over. This helps to explain the desperation which in many cases led to someone taking another person's life, as well as the tragic accidents caused by having lethal poison lying about the house.
This book will appeal to people interested in the lives of ordinary people, especially when extraordinary events occur, and it will also interest family historians who want to get a handle on what life was like for their Suffolk ancestors. In fact, my own interest was piqued by the coverage of 17 year old Catharine Foster, who was hanged for murdering her husband by putting arsenic in the dumplings. She was living next to door to some of my relatives at the time, and it was the fact that their chickens dyed after eating the left-over dumplings that led to Foster being found out. That said, Sheila suggests an alternative to what happened with Catharine, a theory that is well worth reading about.
I didn't give this 5 stars because although the book is about Suffolk poisonings, a bit more context talking even briefly about the general "poison panic" going on in the country at the time would've been good. But other than that, do give this a read!
It's tough reading at times, when we watch people slowly dying from what we, at our distance of over 150 years know to be (or at least, suspect to be) arsenic poison. But Sheila's writing is quite engaging - she puts these stories into context, explaining what rural Suffolk was like at this time: the kind of lives our protagonists would have led, the houses they lived in, the jobs they worked and the household chores they laboured over. This helps to explain the desperation which in many cases led to someone taking another person's life, as well as the tragic accidents caused by having lethal poison lying about the house.
This book will appeal to people interested in the lives of ordinary people, especially when extraordinary events occur, and it will also interest family historians who want to get a handle on what life was like for their Suffolk ancestors. In fact, my own interest was piqued by the coverage of 17 year old Catharine Foster, who was hanged for murdering her husband by putting arsenic in the dumplings. She was living next to door to some of my relatives at the time, and it was the fact that their chickens dyed after eating the left-over dumplings that led to Foster being found out. That said, Sheila suggests an alternative to what happened with Catharine, a theory that is well worth reading about.
I didn't give this 5 stars because although the book is about Suffolk poisonings, a bit more context talking even briefly about the general "poison panic" going on in the country at the time would've been good. But other than that, do give this a read!
February 4, 2012
And the moral of the story is: people in the 1800s tried to blame everything on their kids ;) Interesting and shocking case studies, though.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews