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5
The deaths from scrofula, consumption, and other diseases
of degeneration and debility, water in the head, &c., were
heavy, and so were those under the head of accident and
negligence. A carman died of a fractured thigh from being
thrown out of a cart; a labourer through falling from a
scaffold at the International Exhibition, and another in
Warwick-square; a man fractured his skull by falling down
stairs at Chelsea, a lady of 83 died through fracture of the
thigh, and a potman, set. 27, of delirium tremens, after
breaking his leg. A jobmaster, of 60, also died of delirium
tremens. A child of 3 months lost its life through the
bleeding which followed cutting it for "tongue-tie." A barmaid,
aged 50; died through pricking her thumb with holly
on New Year's Day. Three children died of burns: one,
a girl of 8, whose apron caught fire at a grate, two other
children whose clothes caught fire, "no evidence how." A
seamstress, of 24, was found drowned in the Thames.
Three infants were found suffocated in bed in the arms of
their mothers. A woman, æt. 37, wife of a journeyman, a
man, æt. 45, and an infant of 4 months, were registered
with the unsatisfactory account, that the cause of death was
unknown, and that there was no medical attendant: a thing
extraordinary at a time when gratuitous medical services are
not only offered freely, but almost forced upon the poor.
Lastly, five infants were found, in Hyde Park, or in boxes,
or on door steps, which were pronounced by the coroner's
jury to have been stillborn. As a matter of public economy,
it were better for the parish to offer to bury all such bodies
gratuitously, (which would cost about 5s. each,) than to have
the expense of coroner's inquests, post-mortem examinations,
&c., which cost £2 9s. 6d. apiece besides the coroner's
salary.