FULL TEXT (Article 1 of 2): Perth (Western Australia.) – The adjourned inquest touching the death of the infant Ethel Booth, who died in the Perth Hospital on February 4th, was continued to-day. Mr R. W. Pennefather, K.C., appeared on behalf of the Infants’ Protection Society, and Mr Villeneuve Smith on behalf of the woman, Alice Mitchell, in whose care the infant was placed prior to its removal to the hospital, and who was subsequently arrested in connection with the death of the infant.
Mr. Pennefather, in outlining the evidence to be submitted, said that on February 5th Corporal O’Halloran visited the house of Mrs Mitchell in Edward street, to make inquiries regarding an infant. Mrs Mitchell brought the child to him. The infant was frightfully emaciated, and was not able to keep off flies, which swarmed on its face. Its clothes smelt offensively, and there was an offensive odor coming from its body. During the inquiries the corporal made, he found that another child had died at Mrs Mitchell’s house, and from questions he put to Mrs Mitchell he also found that Mrs Mitchell had not reported the death. The same, afternoon, accompanied by Dr. Davey, he again went to Mrs Mitchell’s house. Dr. Davey found, however, that the child Brown had been given insufficient nourishment necessary for its existence, and was simply dying from starvation. Dr. Davey asked Mrs Mitchell if she had any other children.
She replied “Yes,” and in the room where baby Brown was they saw another child, which, if anything, was in an even worse condition. This was the baby Ethel Booth, whose .death formed the subject of inquiry. There were swarms of flies, and the child was so terribly weak that she was not able to raise her hand to keep them off. There was an awful stench in the room, which was in an untidy and neglected condition. When Dr. Davey saw the child Booth, which was five months old, he expressed the opinion that she could not live ten days. The child did not live anything like that time. The child was brought to the hospital by her mother, and died within 24 hours afterwards.
A post mortem revealed no trace of airy disease, and showed that the child was terribly emaciated, being a mere skeleton, and that death was due to insufficient nourishment. When taken to the hospital the infant Booth, though five months old, weighed only 7 lb. At her birth she weighed 8 1b. The child, when taken to Mrs Mitchell’s house, was in perfect health. It was the duty of persons conducting such establishments as Mrs Mitchell’s to register the deaths of any children, and to keep a register of infants placed in her care. Mrs. Mitchell had produced a register which commenced on December 16th, 1902, and closed December 16th, 1904. Inquiries made by the police into the deaths of children showed that Mrs. Mitchell had frequently changed her address.
When living in Wellington street she reported six deaths, in Beaufort street five deaths, in Cavendish street eight deaths, in Lord street one death, in Edward street nine deaths, or 20 out of a total of 32. One doctor had attended 22 of the cases that had died. The cause of death mentioned in the certificate was in nearly all cases marasmus, or wasting away of the child. The house was kept in a filthy condition, seven children at times sleeping in one bed, the children crawling out into passages, eating dirt from fowls! There was a lady inspector who used to go and have a chat with Mrs Mitchell at the door, hut never went inside and inspected the children. This lady inspector was apparently very friendly with Mrs Mitchell, for, under the nose of the authorities, she had gone early to Mrs Mitchell’s and said. “The police are coming to inspect. Don’t tell anyone you saw me.” One woman living in this establishment, was so abominably filthy that vermin and hair was falling from her head, and this woman, who was suffering from a dreadful disease, was allowed to nurse children.
At the inquest in connection with the death of the infant Ethel Booth, Police Inspector Sellenger declared, from what he could learn, 32 out of 35 children in Mrs Mitchell’s charge, died. A witness said that a lady inspector under the Perth Board of Health visited the house six times to his knowledge, and she always seemed in a hurry to get away again, and only looked through the premises once.
[“Baby-Farming - Infants Death From Starvation. - Some Revolting Statements.” Poverty Bay Herald (Gisborne, New Zealand), Mar. 18, 1907, p. 4]
***
FULL TEXT (Article 2 of 2): The Criminal Court at Perth, West Australia, was crowded on April 16th, when Alice Mitchell, who was recently found guilty of manslaughter of a child, was brought up for sentence. The portion of the Court set apart for women was densely packed, and as the convicted woman, neatly attired in black, with cream lac & collarette, and violet flowers under her hat, stepped into the dock, all necks were craned in her direction. She trembled like a leaf, and started somewhat when Air Justice McMillan called her name. His Honor said: Alice Mitchell, the jury have found you guilty of manslaughter. They have come to the conclusion that you had no criminal intention, but that the death of baby Booth was caused by your criminal negligence.
With that I verdict I entirely agree, but I must say I
have found very great difficulty in coming to a conclusion as to what sentence I
ought to pass on you. I am only sentencing you for the death of this one child
Booth, but in order to see what your conduct has been I am entitled, as the jury
was entitled, to look at the surrounding circumstances, and the way in which you
have conducted the business you have been carrying on. It is very painful to
look at this long death roll of children who died while in your charge, and it
is still more painful to consider what their sufferings must have been while
they were alive. Death to them was a happy release. I am quite satisfied in my
own mind that for years past you have become, as many women who carry on this
kind of business have become absolutely callous to the sufferings of children
entrusted to your care, the only object being to make a living. I am afraid you
have felt safe by reason of neglect on the part of those whose duty it was to
see that you did your duty to the children entrusted to you. You treated with
neglect the law for the protection of infant life, and the neglect of that law
was your protection. I can find very little to justify me in extending to you
the mercy I should like to extend to women of your years. You are a woman
getting up in life, and whatever term of imprisonment I may pass on, you will
affect you more severely than it would a younger woman.
Still, I am going to
sentence you to such a term of imprisonment as will not only punish you tor
your misconduct, but act as a warning to others who may be running the same
risk which you have run. Your
misconduct has been found out and if any other woman appears in a criminal dock,
if she is a younger woman, the will not leave the dock with the specially light
sentence I am going to pass on you – one of imprisonment with hard labor for
five years. Mrs Mitchell nearly collapsed when the sentence was pronounced.
[“The Perth Baby-Farming Case. - Five Years' Hard Labor. -
"Long Death Roll." The Poverty Bay Herald (Gisborne, New Zealand),
Apr. 29, 1907, p. 4]
***
***
***
***
***
***
***
***
For more cases of “Baby Farmers,” professional child care providers who murdered children see The Forgotten Serial Killers.
***
For more cases of “Baby Farmers,” professional child care providers who murdered children see The Forgotten Serial Killers.
***
[3596-2/22/22]
***
It is difficult to see how this desperately sad case has anything to do with misandry, except from the perspective of a misogynist trying to make the point that women can also be serial killers. Difficult also to consider Alice Mitchell as a "professional child care provider".
ReplyDeleteREPLY TO "Boris Badenuff": There is no claim that this individual case represents an instance of misandry. It is but one of 800 or so cases collected here that, in the aggregate, does indeed have a great deal to do with the topic of misandry -- and chivalry -- as werll as academic fraud, censorship and indoctrination of the public with anti-scientific social constructionist ideology. --- See the Page upper right titled: Message to "Gender" Ideologues.
DeleteOK, I'll accept your admission that the Alice Mitchell baby-farming case of 1907 does not actually belong in the website's discussion of Misandry. Thank You. Perhaps you could now remove it, in order to retain your 'credibility' as a source for the serious-minded student of the subject.
DeleteI am fascinated by your verbal juxtaposition of 'misandry' and 'chivalry' and wonder just how women's supposed hatred of men can be compared with men's apparent love of horses? And what relevance that might have in the modern world. Perhaps you could elucidate.
I read the site's message to so-called "gender ideologues" with interest, despite being acutely aware that it was not addressed to me. I, St. Estephe, am no kind of ideologue at all. Rather, I am a person who approaches issues with an open mind, and seeks as much pertinent information as possible from diverse sources, before making my own judgements about them.
I see the issue of misandry -sad as it is- as one of minuscule importance to the planet compared to the plague of misogyny. As this site shows, cases of genuine misandry are rare enough to be "sensational" in the mass media sense. Misogyny, by contrast, is deeply embedded in many diverse cultures throughout the world, and is often hard to recognise by misogynists themselves, even when it is pointed out to them.
But it is, I suppose, an interesting point of view -the tiny minority of men who feel victimised by women- and might even be worthy of a C-grade Post-Graduate thesis.
As a professional writer and researcher, I am apt to wonder how many more of your 800 examples might be discounted, like this tragic story, on the grounds of relevance?. Is it one per cent? Ten per cent? Fifty per cent? One can but guess.
As to your claims of fraud, censorship and indoctrination.... these words are often used by ---ideologues.
Careful, St. Estephe, your hypocritical projections are showing!
On "chivalry," a medieval concept, see the website named Gynocentrism. Also, on this website, see "chivalry Justice" in the sidebar. On removing the Alice Mitchell case: it is but one of many baby farming cases (see "The Forgotten Serial Killers" and the long online article "Death on the Baby Farm"), and thus, if I were to accede to that request, there would still be 80 or so similar posts (baby farmers) on the site, plus several hundred other female serial killer cases (unknown to criminologists) still on the site. I do not want to remove 500 posts. My concern is not about how men "feel," rather in presenting hard-to-find data in a fairly organized manner in a single site. I do indeed address the question of "rarity." The cliche that female serial killers are rare" is a point. It is, of course, a relative term, yet this site displays research that took a list of 140 and expanded it to 800 (the latest total). All readers are welcome to interpret the data as they see fit. But the data will remain available rather than be left "unknown."
DeleteTell us, how many of your former wives have left you?
ReplyDeleteREPLY TO "Boris Badenuff": There is no claim that this individual case represents an instance of misandry. It is but one of 800 or so cases collected here that, in the aggregate, does indeed have a great deal to do with the topic of misandry -- and chivalry -- as werll as academic fraud, censorship and indoctrination of the public with anti-scientific social constructionist ideology. --- See the Page upper right titled: Message to "Gender" Ideologues.
ReplyDeletethats my great grandmother lol hahaah
ReplyDeleteim not a serial killer yet i promise
ReplyDeleteAs the author of "The Edward Street Baby Farm" I hope that people will read the book and discover the full details of the case. But I think you will find it has nothing to say about misandry. Misogyny, maybe.
ReplyDeleteThe posts are not in themselves meant to represent instances of misandry. The issue of misandry as it is dealt with her is broad. The collections are raw material which in aggregate often contradict a number of essentialist myths and "social constructionist" that derive from ideology, resulting in many false beliefs about female criminality in circulation. A well-known example that is based on ideological "theories": "Most serial killers are white males." Since ideologically this "must" be true, academics have done little research on the matter. Same is true with domestic violence. It is notable that data on male suicides is hard to come by, because, as the researchers disclose, grant money on male suicide research is seldom available, as opposed to the female.
DeleteIn any case, this is a collection of information to be put to use by others who, alerted to the availability of collated new information, can use it to dig deeper.