A NELSON SENSATION.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXVI, Issue 2377, 18 December 1908, Page 5

A NELSON SENSATION.

WOMAN POISONS HERSELF

[Piiess Association'.]

NELSON. Dec. 17

An inquest on the body of Gertrude Agnes Good, wife of Robert Good, a pork butcher, who committed suicide yesterday by taking strychnine, was opened to-day. The medical evidence showed that the deceased was so far advanced in pregnacy that confinement might be expected at any moment, and death, had heen caused by strychnine poisoning. Good said his' wife was 23 years old and had previously bad one child, now fourteen months old. iSlie dreaded the prospects of a second confinement. She assisted him in his shop and went there before eight o’clock on the morning of her death. Tie'left her on charge while lie vent out, and when he returned lie complained about her losing a bill and they had some words. Deceased left the shop and went home. Witness caught her np on the road' and asked her to return. She refused, and they went home together. He asked her to get something for him to eat, »,nd ho left the home for a few minutes. On returning he found licr sitting on tho bed. She said she had taken something in a bottle, pointino- to a bottle of strychnine, and asked him not to, leave- her. He weiit to get a neighbor, and' afterwards for a. doctor. She died a few minutes lifter the Hatter’s arrival. Further examined, Good said that they often had rows, but denied that he threw tho scales at his wife 'in the shop on Wednesday morning, and that she said she would do something on the way home. -He had often sworn at deceased, but had never handled her roughly. , Evidence was also _ given by the shop assistant, who said he had heard no swearing between Good and tlie deceased oil Wednesday morning, although they sometimes liad •, words. The inry asked for an adjournment to enable”further evidence to be taken, and the inquest was adjourned accordingly 'until Monday,