A letter to the reform corporations on the necessity of electing medical coroners / by George Rogerson, surgeon.

  • Rogerson, George.
Date:
1836
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A letter to the reform corporations on the necessity of electing medical coroners / by George Rogerson, surgeon. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    medical topics of the inquiry, and the advice of the Coroner on any doubt ai-ising in their minds on questions connected with death, for it is preposterous to expect that a Coroner can give a true opinion, or state a correct explanation on subjects of which he is ignorant. A most material part of the evidence which relates to death and its cause, I have proved to be exclusively medical, to be appreciated only by practitioners in me- dicine, and explained to a jury, clearly and justly, by a medical Coroner. The remaining part must be derived from oral testimomy, a term which I here use in contra- distinction to that kind of evidence gained by the Coroner and jury themselves, from the view and inspection of the body and other attending circumstances, or, if I may so denominate it, the body evidence. The oral testimony wiU assist and confirm the body evidence, and will dis- cover the offending cause, the guilt and its degree, and the culpable agent or instrument. In the first of these divisions the greater and most in_ teresting portion of the oral evidence relates, if the corpse was accidently discovered, to the state in which the body was found, the appearances, external and internal, and other attending circumstances: and to the symptoms, to the wound, blow, &c. if an injury; to the substances adminis- tered, if poison; and the conduct of those who are present. The striking character of this evidence is medical in what- ever point of view it is regarded; whether it originate from the mere obsei*vers and attendants, or from persons of a scientific character. In order then to pursue this inquiry