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Mary Ann Pickersgill

Age: 37

Sex: female

Date: 24 Mar 1914

Place: Wrigley Street, Ardwick

Mary Ann Pickersgill was found dead on her bed on a Monday evening.

She was found lying in a pool of blood and an examination revealed that she had two puncture wounds in her lower abdomen and had bled to death.

She had been drinking during the day and it was considered that she might had fallen on the projecting point of the rim of a bucket although the police didn't find any bloodstains on the bucket or any other instrument that might have caused her wounds.

She had previously lived with a man who was killed 3 years earlier and had 13 children.

Her oldest son was 22 years old and there were quarrels between them during which he had struck her on one occasion.

A man had gone to the house on the Monday afternoon because the son was not at work but the son was not there and so he stayed for about an hour and a half and had 2 pints with Mary Pickersgill who he said was not sober.

One of her daughters said that she arrived home at 7.15pm on the Monday night and said that Mary Pickersgill was drunk and that her eldest brother was asleep in bed. She then went out and came back at 8.40pm and found her mother lying on the bed with her feet hanging over the side and her brother standing over her crying and the floor covered in blood. She then went for her mother's sister but when she returned Mary Pickersgill was dead.

A woman said that as she was passing Mary Pickersgill's house she thought she heard a woman cry 'For God's sake leave me alone'. When she passed the house again shortly after she said she noticed that several window panes were broken.

When the police asked the son if he knew anything about his mother's death he said 'How should I know? I have been asleep'. The police also found a knife, which belonged to the son, under the bed near the wall but there were no blood stains on it.

A doctor said that there were 2 wounds and that death was due to syncope following haemorrhage.

At the coroner's inquest the son said that did not remember going home on the Monday and went to sleep and did not waken until the police arrived. He said that he didn't assault his mother.

The coroner said that the evidence was most unsatisfactory and the only the woman walking by had said that she had thought she had heard an exclamation and the jury returned an open verdict as there was no evidence to show how the wounds were caused.


*map pointers are rough estimates based on known location details as per Place field above.

see www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk

see Manchester Courier and Lancashire General Advertiser - Tuesday 24 March 1914

see Manchester Evening News - Wednesday 18 March 1914