Baby

The body of a newly-born child was found in a wood on the Prior Park Estate.

It was noted as having been found a short distance from the tram terminus at Combe Down, in the wood on the left hand leading down into the Monument field.

It was said that the child seemed to have received little or no attention at birth.

The body was found by a 12-year-old schoolgirl who had lived in Bee Cottage, Combe Down. She said that on the Saturday about 12 o'clock, she had been out picking up wood, and near the side of the wall that divided the public walk from the plantation she saw a brown paper parcel by a tree, just under the wall, about a yard from it.

She said that she then picked up the parcel, without opening it, and carried it home.

The girls uncle, a gardener who also lived at Bee Cottage, said that he opened that parcel and found the foot of a little child, but didn't open the parcel further, but put it in a basket and took it to the sergeant of police at Combe Down.

A doctor that examined the body said that it was that of a newly-born female child, weight 5lbs 10oz, an average weight, and that decomposition had set in, with the face very much discoloured.

He said there were no broken bones and no marks of strangulation round the neck and the throat was empty. He said the umbilical cord was shrunken and seven inches long and that the free end of the cord was flattened as if it had been pinched through.

He said there was no rigor mortis and that the stomach and bladder both absolutely empty, noting that the latter fact suggested a separate existence.

He said the lungs contained plenty of air, which proved to him a separate existence.

He estimated that the child had been born about 72 hours before the discovery.

He added that judging by the state of the cord that he didn't think it had lived for long.

He added:

The inquest had been adjourned for a week after a name was found on a portion of the brown paper wrapping that it was found in. It was the name of a woman in Bristol but the clue did not lead to any result and an open verdict was returned.