Person Page - 23

SUICIDE BY DROWNING - At an early hour on Friday morning the wife of Joseph Pask, who resides Out Northgate, went downstairs and committed suicide by drowing [sic] herself in a water butt. The deceased has been unwell for some time past, and had been placed under restraint.^17,18

SAD SUICIDE AT BURY
On Friday afternoon Mr. C. J. E. Sparke, coroner for the borough, held an inquest at the Railway Hotel Bury St. Edmund's, touching the death of Kate Eliza Pask, 37 years of age, wife of Mr. Wm. Pask, Out Northgate, who commited suicide the same morning under most painful circumstances. Mr. A. Andrews was chosen foreman of the jury.
The jury then proceeded to view the body, after which Joseph William Pask was called, and deposed that the deceased was his wife, and they were living together on the Northgate-road. He last saw deceased alive between four and five o'clock that morning. She was then in the bedroom. His wife has been ill since her confinement in November last, and she had been in rather low spirits the last three or four days, but she did not seem any worse on Thursday night when they went to bed. She said nothing to lead witness to think that she would destroy herself. As she was in a low state they had watched her since Sunday morning when she attempted to poison herself. Mr. Lucas had been attending her. About half-past six that morning witness was awoke by a man coming into the kitchen, and calling out. He then missed his wife, and he called to her sister to see if she had gone into the other room. Finding she had not done so, he went downstairs and searched about, both inside and outside the house, but he could not find her. His little boy then noticed a chair standing near the water-butt, and asked witness what it meant. Witness went to the water butt and saw deceased was in it. He tried to get her out, and a man name Brewster came and assisted him. The deceased was got out and carried into the kitchen, and witness sent for Mr. Lucas. The deceased had not been in a low way until last week.
The foreman : She never said anything which would lead ou to support she would commit suicide?-Witness: No.
In reply to one of the jurors, witness said when he saw his wife at half-past five she was feeding the baby. He did not know whether she got into bed again. The poison which she took they had had in the house for some time.
Mr. Lucas, surgeon, said he had been attending the deceased since her confinement, but he had ceased to do for six weeks until last Sunday. He was summoned last Saturday morning, as her friends imagined the deceased was not so well. He visited her and found her suffering from symptoms of belladonna poisoning. He took the usual means to restore her, and she recovered consciousness about five o'clock in the afternoon. He found a bottle about one-third full of belladonna liniment standing by her bedside. Once or twice after her confinement he noticed that she was in rather low spirits-she was a little upset by a lunatic in an adjoining house. She had recovered from the effects of the poison, with the exception that she was weak. He gave instructions that she was not to be left. He had visited her several times since, and noticed that she was always in a very depressed condition, and refused to answer many of his questions. He was called to see her that (Friday) morning about half-past seven, and he found her dead. Her lips were black, and all her things were saturated with water. He did not think she had been dead very long. The symptoms were such as would be caused by suffocation by drowning.
The coroner having summed up, the jury returned a verdict "That deceased committed suicide whilst suffering from temporary insanity".^19,18