The Damnation of John Donellan (14 page)

What was Anna Maria's state of mind in drawing up such a document? Did she feel so threatened by Theodosius's behaviour that she thought the Boughton estate was at risk? Did she not trust Theodosia and John to handle their financial affairs?

Whatever her reasons in September 1778, the will was not acted upon. (Anna Maria was to draw up another will after Theodosius's death, however, which points to a definite lack of confidence in Theodosia.)

Meanwhile, little record remains of Theodosius's feelings and actions. Only one of his letters survives, dated 9 March 1780, some eighteen months later, in which he writes to George Harris, the solicitor:

Sir –

In answer to yours of 28 February last wrote to me by the desire of Mr Lister. I must beg you to inform him that I will discharge the small debt at the time promised and not before. Had he wrote to me since the death of my grandmother he would have had no occasion to have troubled you upon this Business, which was not according to promise, to have settled prior to my coming of age.

I am Sir, your most obedient, T. Boughton
⁴

The Listers were still about. The parents had spent a great deal of time and money pursuing Theodosius's father for rights to land taken from Grace Shukburgh by Theodosius's grandfather
Edward; now evidently one of their numerous children was trying to settle another debt.

Theodosius's tone is rather petulant. ‘Had he wrote to me since the death of my grandmother … ' Mr Lister had not. Grace Shukburgh Lister, Theodosius's grandmother, had died in February 1779, a year before, and so twelve months had passed without any communication between the two families except for this attempt to reclaim money through the lawyers. Theodosius is brief: Mr Lister can have the money once Theodosius turns twenty-one, and not before.

The only other surviving document of Theodosius's is a small calfskin-covered notebook. An inscription on the cover reads: ‘Sir Theodosius Boughton: His Account Book 1777.'
⁶
This would have been given to him to record his outgoings, expenses and income once he had returned from Eton; but apparently Theodosius had little use for it. Inside, half a dozen pages have been torn out; the rest of the book is completely empty.

However, there was another notebook belonging to Theodosius which would have proved useful after his death. The
Northampton Mercury
of 23 April 1781 records a ‘written paper in the handwriting of Sir Theodosius found in his Bedroom after his death' which lists the time and place where he believed he had contracted his last infection, together with a list of the medicines that Mr Powell had give him and their effects. This list never came to light at the trial: the newspaper states that it was ‘in Lady Boughton's custody'.

By August 1780, Lawford Hall was home to four adults and two children. Anna Maria was fifty-two years old and had been a widow for eight years; Theodosia was twenty-three, married for three years and the mother of two young children, one of whom had been born only the month before. John Donellan, transplanted from a lifetime in military service and more latterly the hothouse atmosphere of London society, was forty-three. Sir Theodosius Edward Allesley Boughton was twenty, and within a year of inheriting everything the family owned and becoming lord and master of Lawford Hall.

‘Suspicion is to be distinguished from proof – a thousand suspicions do not form one proof. Suspicion may form a proper ground of accusation, but never of conviction'

S. M. Phillips,
Famous Cases of Circumstantial Evidence
(1873)

A HUNDRED MILES FROM LAWFORD HALL
, the news of Theodosius's death was received not with horror but with elation. Poston Hall, now known as Poston House, is a Palladian mansion set in glorious rural Herefordshire midway between the county town of Hereford and the Welsh border; in 1780 it was the home of Theodosius's second cousin, Edward Boughton, the son of Shukburgh Boughton and the grandson of Catherine Shukburgh.

Edward was the family black sheep, though as the elder boy was fond of giving advice to his vastly more responsible younger brother, Charles. Edward, who was living openly with his serving maid Sally, was a passionate man at odds with his family, who variously described him as ‘an odd animal' and a ‘damned prig'. A portrait of Edward shows a mild-looking, handsome young man who seems wistful rather than disagreeable. He was, however, constantly in debt to Charles, who worked in a government post in which he had rapidly gained promotion. The uncomfortable debt
between the two might explain Edward's excitement as expressed in the following letter.

On 1 September, two days after Theodosius's death, Edward wrote to Charles: ‘I have just received from Caldecott the wonderful news of Sir Theodosius Boughton's death and shall set out immediately for Warwickshire.'
¹

The satisfaction was shared by Edward's mother Mary. On 24 September she also wrote to Charles: ‘I shall sincerely rejoice at any acquisition of Fortune yr Brother may now have gain'd …' – evidently thinking better of Edward now that he seemed to be richer.

In addition to the baronetcy, the Shukburgh descendants were convinced that Theodosius's entire estate, including Lawford Hall, would also become the property of Edward.

It is not known exactly when Edward arrived in Warwickshire. Like Sir William Wheler, Theodosius's guardian, Edward's presence at the funeral is not recorded. Nor is it known if he attended the autopsy in the churchyard on 9 September.

A coroner's inquest was begun on the same day as the autopsy, in the house of the parish clerk of Newbold-on-Avon, John Parker. It was Saturday afternoon when the coroner, Robert Fox, took ten depositions.

The first deposition was from a 23-year-old miller from Rugby called Thomas Hewitt, who swore that he had known Theodosius for ‘upwards 3 months'. A friendship between a tradesman and a baronet was unlikely; the exact nature of the relationship and its origins are unknown. One thing is certain, however: Theodosius gave Thomas Hewitt a task that he did not entrust to any member of his family or servant at Lawford Hall. Hewitt swore on oath that in mid August Theodosius had asked him to buy some ‘
Occuli Indicus
Berries'. And the person who had sold him them was none other than Mr Bucknill, ‘a surgeon from Rugby'. Hewitt had then boiled the berries in water, mixed them with spirits of wine and put them into a small phial and delivered them to Theodosius, who had ‘put them into his pocket, from which time the examinant knows not what is become thereof'.

‘
Occuli Indicus
Berries' are now more commonly known as
Cocculus
indicus
. The fruit of a climbing shrub indigenous to eastern India and the Malay archipelago, if boiled and distilled, the berries produce picrotoxin, a powerful convulsive poison.

Cocculus indicus
is prescribed in homeopathic medicine today as a stimulant and convulsant to help cure motion sickness and general weakness; but in 1780 it was a known remedy for the effects of not only TB but also mercury poisoning – a feeling of stiffness or paralysis in the back and legs; sleeplessness; night sweats; nausea and vomiting. Theodosius did not ask Powell or indeed any medical man to distil the mixture; the logical conclusion to be drawn from this is that he did not want his family or the family apothecary to know how much his self-medicated mercury had affected him.

It was later quoted in the prosecution brief at the trial that the mixture had been ordered by Theodosius to ‘kill fish'. However, quite why a deadly poison like this was necessary in addition to the arsenic that Theodosius already used to lace fish in order to kill rats was not explained. Thomas Hewitt was not called to give evidence at the subsequent trial.

The next coroner's deposition was taken from Anna Maria Boughton. In it she testified that Theodosius had ‘for a considerable time preceding … his death' taken various medicines sent by Powell. She said that she had gone into Theodosius's bedroom at 7 a.m. on 30 August and given him Powell's medicine, which she had, she said, poured into a basin. There had been a large quantity of sediment at the bottom of the phial and the mixture had a ‘very offensive and nauseous smell'. Her son had complained that he would not keep it down, but then he appeared to go back to sleep, and so she went out of the room and left him. Five minutes later she came back to find Theodosius ‘with his eyes fixed, his teeth set, and the froth running out of his mouth … He expired a few minutes afterwards.' She said that she called John Donellan to the room. He asked her for the phial, put some water into it, swilled it and poured the whole lot, including the sediment, into a basin; then he put his finger into the liquid and tasted it, saying that it had a nauseous taste.

Her final remark was that Mr Powell had shown her a bottle
of the same mixture which he had prescribed to Theodosius, but that the smell of the mixture that Theodosius actually took that morning was ‘very different'.

The third deposition was from Thomas Powell, the apothecary, who testified that on 29 August he had sent to Theodosius a mixture of fifteen grains of jalop, fifteen grains of rhubarb, twenty drops of spirits of lavender, two drams of simple syrup and two drams of nutmeg water mixed together with an ounce and a half of pump water.

The next deposition was from Sarah Steane of Long Lawford, who simply stated that she had been sent for to lay out Theodosius and that ‘He seem'd and appeared in every respect the same as other corps'; next was William Frost (the coachman), who said that Theodosius appeared to be in good health on the evening preceding his death.

The sixth deposition was by Bradford Wilmer, the surgeon, who gave an account of his and Dr Rattray's visit to Lawford Hall to examine Theodosius's body. He explained that, owing to the body's putrid state, they had decided that no cause of death would be ascertained by opening it up. Wilmer testified that he had also attended the open-air autopsy, and gave a detailed account of the appearance of the internal organs. The stomach contained less than an ounce of a thick brown fluid which they had taken out and put into a basin, but this fluid contained ‘no grittiness or any metallic particles'. The lungs were very inflamed and putrid and in some parts black; and on each side of the lungs there was ‘about a pint of extravasated blood in a fluid state'. Wilmer concluded his deposition by saying that Powell's mixture would not have caused Theodosius's death, and that, significantly, ‘it was impossible to tell what occasioned the deceased's death.'

The seventh deposition was by David Rattray, a ‘doctor in physic' from Coventry who concurred with Wilmer, saying that they had decided on 4 September that ‘nothing conclusive could be acquired from the dissection of the body, being so putrefied.' He agreed with Wilmer's account of the open-air autopsy, but added that ‘the stomach a good deal inflamed, but the bowels
immediately surrounding, more particularly to the kidneys, black, full of blood, and in a soft state'. His deposition differed from Wilmer's in one crucial respect. He testified that Powell's prescribed medicine could not have caused death but that, having heard Lady Boughton's account, ‘it seemed to him that from such account and the symptoms of the deceased after taking the medicine, that the same was probably the cause of his death' – meaning, presumably, that poison had been substituted for Powell's draught.

Bernard Geary Snow, a ‘surgeon of Southam, Warwick', made the eighth deposition, in which he said that he had been present at the autopsy and agreed with Rattray and Wilmer's accounts. He gave no opinion as to whether the mixture in the phial was the cause of Theodosius's death. The ninth deposition was by Samuel Bucknill, ‘surgeon'. As the depositions were drawn up following a series of questions posed by the coroner, it is extraordinary that Bucknill was not questioned about Hewitt's account that he had prescribed a substance that could be distilled into a powerful poison. Consequently, there is no record of why Bucknill gave the berries to Hewitt; why he thought such a substance appropriate; nor whether a distillation of the berries could produce the effects described on Theodosius on the morning of his death. Bucknill said that he had opened the body that day, and that he agreed with the description of the body provided by Wilmer, Rattray and Snow. He went on to say that the deposition of Lady Boughton had been read to him and that the medicine prescribed by Powell could not have caused the death, but he agreed with Rattray that ‘the medicine administered by [Lady Boughton] to the deceased was the probable cause of his death'.

Of the four doctors and surgeons who gave evidence to the coroner, therefore, Bucknill and Rattray agreed that whatever had been given to Theodosius by Anna Maria had
probably
caused his death; Snow did not comment; and Wilmer – by far the most experienced of them – stated that it was
impossible
to say what had caused the death.

The tenth deposition was by Samuel Frost, ‘late servant to the
deceased', who testified that on the morning of 30 August Theodosius had given him directions for the day, and that at that time ‘the deceased seemed in his usual state of health and in perfect good spirits'. There is, of course, a difference between ‘his usual state of health' and ‘good health'.

Donellan did not give a deposition on 9 September, but he did write to the Reverend Newsam, whom he knew would be attending both the autopsy and the inquest afterwards with Lord Denbigh. The prosecution brief kept a copy of his letter, which was not referred to in court or in Donellan's own
Defence
.

Saturday 9 September, Lawford Hall.

As I hold myself duty bound before God and the world to vindicate the reputation of my family and self in particular respecting the death of Sir Theodosius … I confess I am anxiety itself … therefore I beg you will request of Lord Denbigh with the friends of his Lordship that I understand are to be with you today, to be as near the corpse as safety will permit at Newbold … we are perfectly innocent of any unfair intentions towards him … my wife and self very rarely visited Sir Theodosius's side of the house and were as strangers to his proceedings as the Pope was. When Sir Theodosius took his physic I was at Newnham Wells; Lady Boughton and myself were to ride out early but she told me from her window it would be some time before she could be ready to ride out … upon my coming back the coachman told me he was going to the Doctors and I gave him the mare I had … when I entered the house Lady Boughton told me Sir Theodosius had been extremely ill since she gave him the physic that morning … I found Sir Theodosius in bed very ill; I called to him but he made no answer to me (my wife all this time was in bed) …