The insanity of George Victor Townley / by C. Black.

  • Black, Cornelius, 1822-1887.
Date:
1865
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The insanity of George Victor Townley / by C. Black. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    - monize; and I adduced reasons which justified the belief that, at the time of the alleged murder of Miss Goodwin, Townley suffered from that particular form of insanity which the laws ought to recognise, but which it as yet entirely ignores. On these grounds, and on the oath of Dr. Winslow, that on the 18th of November, and at the time of his trial, the prisoner suffered from moral insanity, I declared that the execution of Townley without a further investigation of his case, would be regarded by medical psychologists as a judicial murder. To avert a great reflection upon the justice of our laws—to discover sane guilt, if it existed in the prisoner—and to give to insanity, if present, the protection which humanity and the common instincts of our nature demanded, I suggested that a judicial commission should be appointed by Government to examine Townley, and to report upon his mental i condition. It has since transpired that the learned Judge who | presided at the trial had already declared to Sir G. Grey, that, j in his opinion, the state of the prisoner^ mind ought to receive | further investigation. This declaration of the learned Judge, showing as it evidently did show, if not the conviction in his j mind of the insanity of the prisoner, a doubt at least of his sanity, I was followed by the appointment of the commission in question. ? In thus yielding to the representations made to him, Sir George \ Grey not only showed a wise appreciation of the duties of his office, but he manifested a high sense of justice and a regard for human life which strikingly contrast to his advantage with the feeling of bitter revenge and the apparently insatiable desire for the blood of Townley, as displayed in the southern division of the county of Derby. If ever a doubt existed in the public mind that, by the appoint- ment of this commission, the case was prejudged, the following statement from The Lancet of the 23rd of January, 1864, will show that the composition of this Commission removes all sus- picion of this nature :—