The Poisoner's Handbook

by Deborah Blum

  29: “famed, sardonic, goat-bearded. . . ”: Time, September 23, 1935 p. 27.

  30: Everyone knew that Norris didn’t have to work. . . : For Charles Norris biographic information, see “Resolutions Passed by the Faculty of Medicine of Columbia University on the Death of Dr. Charles Norris,” filed October 25, 1935, Columbia University archive; unpublished historical summary of Charles Norris’s family history and life, including a list of scientific publications from the files of the medical examiner’s office for 1918, New York City Municipal Archive; Frank J. Jirka, “A Great Scientific Detective,” American Doctors of Destiny (Chicago: Normandie House, 1940), pp. 216–29; William G. Eckert, “Charles Norris (1868–1935) and Thomas A. Gonzales (1878–1956): New York’s Forensic Pioneers,” American Journal of Forensic Medicine and Pathology 8, no. 4 (1987), pp. 350–53.

  31: “A much neglected field of medical endeavor. . . ”: Draft editorial written for the Journal of Forensic Medicine, 1918, city examiner’s file, New York City Municipal Archive.

  31: “We call this the Country Club”: Milton Helpern and Bernard Knight, Autopsy: The Memoirs of Milton Helpern, the World’s Greatest Medical Detective (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1977), p. 47.

  31: Norris had saved, with some enjoyment, the old coroner’s. . . : Riordan’s inventory of possessions, January 8, 1918, medical examiner’s files, New York City Municipal Archive.

  32: Norris at least had a new home. . . : On Norris organizing the department, see S. K. Niyogi, “Historic Development of Forensic Toxicology in America up to 1978,” American Journal of Forensic Medicine and Pathology 1, no. 3 (September 1980), pp. 249–64; W. G. Eckert, “Medicolegal Investigation in New York City: History and Activities, 1918–1978,” American Journal of Forensic Medicine and Pathology 4, no. 1 (March 1983), pp. 33–54.

  32: “the place for the laboratory force. . . ”: Charles Norris to John F. Hylan, December 18, 1918, medical examiner’s file, New York Municipal Archive.

  33: “useless timber”: Ibid.

  33: “This work, which I may term ‘organization’. . . ”: Ibid.

  33: “I wish to call to your attention. . . ”: Charles Norris to Richard Enright, police commissioner, April 4, 1918, police department, New York City Municipal Archive.

  34: He wrote to the Bronx district attorney. . . : Charles Norris to Seymour Mork, assistant district attorney, Borough of the Bronx, April 17, 1918, New York City Municipal Archives.

  34: He wrote to hospitals. . . : Charles Norris to George D. O’Hanlon, general medical superintendent, Bellevue and Allied Hospitals, April 16, 1918, New York City Municipal Archives.

  34: “Your peremptory order. . . ”: Superintendent of Methodist Episcopal Hospital to Charles Norris, June 7, 1918, New York City Municipal Archive.

  34: He was even tougher, though. . . : Norris to Deputy Police Commissioner Lahey, April 19, 1918, New York City Municipal Archive.

  34: “Did you make any efforts. . . ”: Norris to Dr. George Teng, medical examiner’s office, Brooklyn, June 10, 1918, New York City Municipal Archive.

  34: He chastised ersonnel. . . : Norris to Dr. John Reigelman, medical examiner’s office, Bronx, April 5, 1918, New York City Municipal Archive.

  35: Born in 1883, the son of a Hungarian. . . : Alexander Gettler biographic information is from: Joseph Gettler, unpublished, handwritten tribute, and personal interviews, courtesy of the Gettler family; A. W. Freireich, “In Memoriam: Alexander O. Gettler, 1883–1968,” Journal of Forensic Sciences 14, no. 3 (July 1969), pp. vii–xi; Henry C. Freimuth, “Alexander O. Gettler (1883–1968: ): A Reflection,” American Journal of Forensic Medicine and Pathology 4, no. 4 (December 1983); The Toxicologist: A Modern Detective, November 25, 1933, p. 22; Sunshine, Was It a Poisoning?; Edward D. Radin, “The Professor Looks at Murder,” in 12 Against Crime (New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1950); “The Chemistry of Crime,” Science Illustrated 2, no. 5 (May 1947), pp. 44–47; Eugene Pawley, “Cause of Death: Ask Gettler,” American Mercury, September 1954, pp. 62–66; “Test-tube Sleuth,” Time, May 15, 1933; “The Man Who Reads Corpses,” Harper’s Magazine, February 1955, pp. 62–67.

  37: It would be a challenge. . . : Alexander O. Gettler, The Historical Development of Toxicology, presentation to the annual meeting of the American Academy of Forensic Sciences, Chicago, February 26–28, 1953.

  38: Wood alcohol—technically known as methyl . . . ”: Wood alcohol’s chemical makeup is detailed at Medline Plus, www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/002827.htm. For alcohol history, see http://science.jrank.org/pages/186/Alcohol-History.html. A historical review more contemporary to my story is “Wood Alcohol’s Trail: Many Deaths Before Prohibition Throw Light on Methods Needed to Combat Evil,” New York Times, January 15, 1922, p. 86.

  39: By the end of the nineteenth century. . . : Information on the production and denaturing formulas in the early twentieth century can be found in Rufus Herrick, Denatured or Industrial Alcohol (New York: J. Wiley and Sons, 1907); H.W. Wiley, Industrial Alcohol: Sources and Manufacture (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Agriculture, 1911).

  39: “The prohibition by our government. . . ”: A. O. Gettler and A. V. St. George, “Wood Alcohol Poisoning,” Journal of the American Medical Association, January 19, 1918, pp. 145–49. The uniquely poisonous metabolism of wood alcohol is discussed in this article and in John M. Robinson, “Blindness for Industrial Use of a .4 Per Cent Admixture of Wood Alcohol,” Journal of the American Medical Association, January 19, 1918, pp. 148–49, and Charles Baskerville, “Wood Alcohol: Cooperative Caution,” Journal of Industrial and Engineering Chemistry, January 1920, pp. 81–83.

  41: Poison was already in the air. . . : International Film Service, “Mustard Gas Warfare,” New York Times, July 7, 1918, p. 52; “Vast U. S. Poison Plant Was Working at Full Blast for 1919 Campaign,” New York Times, December 8, 1918, p. 45.

  43: On the home front. . . : See “The Influenza Pandemic of 1918,” http://virus.stanford.edu/uda/;“TheGreatPandemic:StatebyState,”www.pandemicflu.gov/general/greatpandemic2.html; “The Deadly Virus,” www.archives.gov/exhibits/influenza-epidemic/records-list.html. On Bellevue’s role in the influenza fight, see Sandra Opdycke, No One Was Turned Away: The Role of Public Hospitals in New York City Since 1900 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999); Page Cooper, The Bellevue Story (New York: T.Y. Crowell, 1948); and correspondence by Charles Norris.

  44: “Should any of our men. . . ”: Norris to Major General Crowder, provost marshal general, Washington, D.C., September 6, 1918, medical examiner’s files, New York City Municipal Archive.

  46: “During the years 1918 and 1919. . . ”: Alexander O. Gettler, “Critical Study of Methods for the Detection of Methyl Alcohol,” Journal of Biological Chemistry 42, no. 2 (1920), pp. 311–28.

  48: “My attention has been called. . . ”: Hylan to Norris, December 19, 1918, medical examiner’s files, New York City Municipal Archive.

  48: “We have found. . . ”: Norris to S. F. Wynne, Department of Health, medical examiner’s files, New York City Municipal Archive.

  49: In December there had been forty-two. . . : “Poison Drink Killed 51 Here; Blinded 100,” New York Times, December 27, 1919, p. 3.

  49: As the month wound down. . . ”: Ibid.

  3. CYANIDES

  50: Cocktail parties sparkled defiantly. . . : For a good overview of Prohibition culture in New York City, see Michael A. Lerner, Dry Manhattan (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2007).

  50: As soon as legal drinking ended. . . : “Will Try to Indict for Poison Alcohol,” New York Times, January 6, 1920, p. 4; “Four More Deaths from Wood Alcohol,” New York Times, January 12, 1920, p. 10.

  51: “The speakeasies are. . . ”: Stephen Graham, New York Nights (New York: George H. Doran Co., 1927), pp. 60–68.

  51: “Prohibition is a joke. . . ”: “Prohibition a Joke, Dale Says on Bench,” New York Times, August 12, 1920, p. 10.

  51: But for the new speakeasy devotees. . . : Graham,
New York Nights.

  52: They created a new generation of cocktails. . . : Recipes for 1920s cocktails can be found in The Savoy Cocktail Book (London: Constable and Co., 1930, reprinted London: Pavilion Books, 1999), among many other sources.

  52: a cloudy cocktail called Smoke. . . : “Norris Explains Why the Death Rate Mounts,” New York World, November 21, 1920, p. 3.

  53: As demands for chemical analysis intensified. . . : Norris to John F. Hylan, June 12, 1922, medical examiner’s files, New York City Municipal Archive.

  53: The Hotel Margaret glittered. . . : Federal Writers Project, The WPA Guide to New York City (1939).

  55: “Mr. and Mrs. Jackson met their deaths. . . ”: “Autopsy Deepens Jackson Mystery,” New York Times, April 28, 1932, p. 36.

  55: Cyanides possess a uniquely long. . . : On cyanides’ history, chemical composition, and uses, see Witthaus and Becker, Medical Jurisprudence, pp. 4: 602–40; Thompson, Poison Mysteries, pp. 143–76; Alexander O. Gettler and A. V. St. George, “Cyanide Poisoning,” American Journal of Clinical Pathology 4, no. 9 (September 1934) pp. 429–37.

  57: “The symptoms of acute poisoning. . . ”: Gettler and St. George, “Cyanide Poisoning,” p. 430.

  58: In the late 1890s one daring physician . . . : Witthaus and Becker, Medical Jurisprudence, pp. 4: 610–12. The descriptions of internal damage and autopsy findings come from this source as well as Gettler and St. George, “Cyanide Poisoning”; Peterson, Haines, and Webster, Legal Medicine, pp. 674–82, and Gonzales et al., Pathology and Toxicology, pp. 802–804.

  58: In the four years since Gettler had become . . . : Gettler and St. George, “Cyanide Poisoning,” p. 433.

  59: So he set about doing the finer chemical tests . . . : Gettler and St. George, “Cyanide Poisoning,” pp. 435–37; Witthaus and Becker, Medical Jurisprudence, pp. 4: 610–12; Peterson, Haines, and Webster, Legal Medicine, pp. 680–82; Gonzales et al., Legal Medicine, pp. 1050–52.

  61: One of the most famous cyanide-by-mail murder cases . . . : The story of the Molineux murders is beautifully told in Harold Schecter, The Devil’s Gentleman: Privilege, Poison and the Trial That Ushered in the Twentieth Century (New York: Ballantine Books, 2007), and is recounted in numerous law and true crime Web sites. I especially like “Packaged Death,” Legal Studies Forum 12, no. 2. See also http://tarlton.law.utexas.edu/lpop/etext/lsf/29-2/packaged.htmland “The Molineux Case” on Jim Fisher’s forensics Web site, http://jimfisher.edinboro.edu/forensics/mol1.html. Stories from the New York Times coverage of the case include: “Molineux Jury Complete,” November 30, 1900, p. 3; “Molineux Murder Trial,” January 6, 1900, p. 4; “Molineux’s Next Ordeal,” February 15, 1900, p. 12; “Molineux’s Trial Progresses Rapidly,” October 21, 1902, p. 1; “The Influences Acquitting Molineux,” November 16, 1902, p. 11; “Tales From Jail,” February 14, 1903, p. BR12; and the transcript of New York v. Molineux, appellant, Court of Appeals of New York, argued June 17, 1901, decided October 15, 1901, Opinion of the Court.

  64: Gettler had conducted a careful analysis . . . : “Wood Alcohol Clue in Jackson Deaths,” New York Times, April 29, 1922, p. 7.

  64: “the vilest concoctions masquerading . . . ”: “Izzy, the Rum Hound, Tells How It’s Done,” New York Times, January 1, 1922, p. 3.

  66: Had the fumigator used hydrogen cyanide . . . : The New York Times followed the Jackson case through the conclusion of the trial: “Thinks Fumigant Killed Jacksons,” May 3, 1922, p. 10; “Rats in Poison Test May Solve Tragedy,” May 4, 1922, p. 12; “2 Held for Deaths of Jackson Couple,” May 9, 1922, p. 10; “Jury Frees Bradicich,” August 3, 1922, p. 20; “Hotel Manager Cleared,” December 13, 1922, p. 11.

  67: “In recent years, suicidal, accidental . . . ”: Gettler and St. George, “Cyanide Poisoning.”

  69: “should have made such inexcusable . . . ”: Norris to Joseph Gallagher, assistant district attorney, Brooklyn, August 16, 1922; Norris to Gallagher, August 24, 1922, both in medical examiner’s files, New York City Municipal Archive.

  71: Gettler also responded to the Bradicich trial . . . : Alexander O. Gettler and J. Ogden Baine, “The Toxicology of Cyanide,” American Journal of the Medical Sciences 195, no. 2, (February 1938), pp. 182–98.

  74: in 1980 the Hotel Margaret . . . : Richard D. Lyons, “Work Starting on Embattled Site,” New York Times, May 4, 1986.

  4. ARSENIC

  76: By early afternoon sixty people . . . : “ 50 Ill of Poison Pie Eaten on Broadway,” New York Times, August 1, 1922, p. 1; “Six Deaths Result From Arsenic Pie,” New York Times, August 2, 1922, p. 1.

  77: The previous October, in an unnervingly similar incident . . . : See “Poison Pie Clue in Similar Mystery,” New York Times, August 8, 1922, p. 13.

  77: Years earlier Crones had worked . . . : “Six Deaths Result from Poison Pie; Boasts of Poison Plot, Threatens Deaths in Letter,” New York Times, February 17, 1916, p. 1; “Homicide in Chicago,” http://homicide.northwestern.edu/context/timeline/1916/18/.

  78: Pure arsenic is a dark, grayish element . . . : For history and background on arsenic, Witthaus and Becker, Medical Jurisprudence, pp. 4: 325–509, is a wonderfully detailed overview, from ancient history to Witthaus’s experiments with taste, his attempts to gather data, and his amazingly gruesome descriptions of arsenic mummification. Emsley, Elements of Murder, pp. 141–69, offers a great survey of “arsenic murderers down the ages.” Because of arsenic’s prominent role in homicidal poisonings, it is found in every forensic science textbook in my bibliography, including both books produced by the New York City medical examiner’s office.

  82: Charles Norris liked to get his hands bloody . . . : The description of autopsy procedures at the medical examiner’s office comes from Marten and Clarke, Doctor Looks at Murder, pp. 85–120; Milton Helpern, “The Postmortem Examination in Cases of Suspected Homicide,” Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology 36, no. 6 (March–April 1946), pp. 485–522; Charles Norris, “The Medicolegal Necropsy,” in The Medicolegal Necropsy: A Symposium (Baltimore: Williams & Wilkins Co., 1934), pp. 24–33.

  84: They’d interviewed the Shelbourne ’s owner . . . : “Sure Poisoned Piece Was Meant to Kill,” New York Times, August 3, 1922, p. 1.

  85: A major difficulty . . . : W. A. Jackson, “To Die or Not to Dye: Poisoning from Arsenical Pigments in the Nineteenth Century,” Pharmaceutical History, September 3, 1996, pp. 27–31; “Arsenics and Old Places,” Lancet, July 8, 2000, p. 170; “Arsenic and Old Myths,” Rhode Island Medicine, July 1994, p. 234; Witthaus and Becker, Medical Jurisprudence, pp. 350–93.

  87: Racketeers across the United States . . . : “Gunmen Shoot Six in East Side Swarm,” New York Times, August 9, 1922, p. 1; “Nearly Pinch Izzy Chasing Rum Truck,” New York Times, August 9, 1922, p. 13; “Gunman Kills Two,” New York Times, August 12, 1922, p. 20.

  89: Even by federal estimates, two-thirds of the so-called “whiskey” . . . : “Say Red Hook Carried 32 Percent Poison,” New York Times, September 10, 1922, p. 20.

  90: Even in the tidy Brooklyn home . . . : Gettler family interviews.

  91: “nothing of importance has been accomplished . . . ”: A. O. Gettler, “On the Detection of Benzene in Cadavers,” Journal of Pharmacological Experimental Therapy 21 (1923), pp. 161–64.

  92: Mary Frances Creighton, Fanny to her friends . . . : “Creighton’s Life Fight Today,” New York Daily News, June 18, 1923, p. 1; “Death For Creightons Asked,” New York Daily News, June 19, 1923, p. 1; “Dead Boy’s Love Affair Denied,” New York Daily News, June 19, 1923, p. 1; “Mrs. Creighton Faces Jury Calmly,” New York Evening Post, June 19, 1923, p.1; “Women Called in Creighton Poison Case,” June 20, 1923, p. 1; “Try Woman for Killing Brother,” New York Evening Journal, June 18, 1923, p.1; “Boy of 18 Murdered with Slow Poison,” New York Times, May 13, 1923, p. 1; “To Exhume Bodies of the Creightons,” New York Times, May 14, 1923, p. 3; “Dig Open Graves for Poison Clue,” New York Times, May 16, 1923, p. 40; “Powdery Matter in Creighton Body,” New York Ti
mes, May 19, 1923, p. 15; “Hints Young Avery Was a Poison Suicide,” New York Times, May 20, 1923, p. 13; “Testifies to Poison in Body of Youth,” New York Times, June 19, 1923, p. 11; “Creightons Freed of Murder Charge,” New York Times, June 23, 1923, p. 13; “Mrs. Creighton Calm As New Trial Begins,” New York Times, July 10, 1923, p. 40; “Creighton Defense to Rely on Experts,” New York Times, July 13, 1923, p. 8; “Jury Again Acquits Mrs. Creighton of Murder Charge,” New York Times, July 14, 1923, p. 1.

  5. MERCURY

  103: Ten months later his new wife was dead . . . : “Rich Woman Dies in Biltmore Club; Poison Suspected,” New York Times, September 28, 1923, p. 1.

  104: “very much surprised when they heard . . . ”: “Mrs. Webb Murdered With Slow Poison, Her Uncle Declares,” New York Times, September 29, 1923, p. 1.

  104: Bichloride of mercury . . . : Witthaus and Becker, Medical Jurisprudence, pp. 542–72, reviews the history of mercury poisonings, discussing elemental mercury and corrosive sublimate. See also Gonzales et al., Pathology and Toxicology, pp. 749–51; Peterson, Haines, and Webster, Legal Medicine, pp. 184–98; and Emsley, Elements of Murder, pp. 37–50. The Medline Plus online encyclopedia reviews the toxicity difference between elemental mercury and mercury salts: www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/002476.htm.