The trial of William Palmer for the Rugeley poisonings / [William Palmer].

  • Palmer, William, 1824-1856.
Date:
[1856]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The trial of William Palmer for the Rugeley poisonings / [William Palmer]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    10/200 (page 6)
    5 the o-reater will be the probability that he committed the crime ; but if we find the absence of any motive, the probability lies the other way. In this case the motive will be a matter of serious consideration, and as the circumstances which gave rise to that motive came first in the order of time, I will deal with them before I touch the more immediate matter of bur inquiry. It seems to me more convenient to follow the chronological order of events.. It appears, then, that as early as the year 1853 Palmer had got into accumulated pecuniary difficulties. He began to raise money upon bills. In the year 1854 his circum- stances became worse. At that time he was indebted to different persons in large sums of money, and he had then recourse to an expedient to which it will be necessary for me to advert. But, here, gentlemen, I am anxious to make a preliminary observation. It will become necessary for me to detail to you transactions involving fraud, and casting the greatest discredit on the prisoner. I am anxious, however, that you should not attribute to the circum- stances which will be brought before you more weight than they are fairly entitled to. You must not allow them to prejudice your minds with reference to that which is the real matter of inquiry. I canrjot avoid the detailing of these circumstances, and I hope that the history of these transactions will not create any prejudice in your minds against Palmer. A man might be guilty of fraud or forgery, who w°ould shrink with horror from the crime of murder. Amongst the bills by which Palmer obtained money, in the course of the year 1852, was a bill for £2,000, which was discounted by a person named Pad- wick. That bill bore on it the acceptance of Palmer's mother, Sarah Palmer, who was a woman of considerable wealth, and whose accept- ance, if believed to be genuine, was a security by which money could be readily obtained. He forged her name, and that was the first, or, at least, one of the early transactions of that nature in which Palmer obtained money by means of bills professing to have his mother's ac- ceptance. I will show you, by-and-by, when those transactions reached their climax, that he had recourse to a desperate scheme, with respect to which you will form your own conclusions, in order to avoid exposure and to deliver him from his pecuniary difficulties. He owed in 1854 a very large sum of money. In the September of that year his wife died. He had insured her life for 13,000/. The pro- ceeds of that insurance were realised. With the 13,000/, he paid off some of the most pressing of his liabilities. He employed, for the purpose of enabling him to meet those liabilities, a gentleman named Pratt, a solicitor in London, who was in the habit of discounting bills for him, and whose name will be largly mixed up with the subsequent transactions to which I shall refer. Pratt received 7,000/. or 8,000/., part of the 13,000/., for the purpose of discharging the various liabili- ties of Palmer to his clients. Mr. Wright, a solicitor of Birmingham, who had also advanced money belonging, to his clients to Palmer, received 5,000/., and thus the 13,000/. was disposed of. But Palmer was still left in great pecuniary difficulties. Amongst various bills which he had to meet was one for 2,000/., which had been dis- counted by Mr. Padwick. This brings us to the close of the y£ar 1854.