Baby

The body of a newly-born child was found tied up in a parcel in the drive leading to Poltesco in Truro on Tuesday 3 January 1922.

The body was found by a gardener when he was going to work. The body was wrapped up in paper, the cover with a double thickness of blue paper and tied up tightly with string. The gardener said that as there was blood on the parcel that he thought that it was something for the dog and gave the parcel to the servant.

The man that lived at Poltesco said that his maid brought the child's body to him and said that after he partially untied the parcel he saw some sacking and then what appeared to be the body of the child and he called the police.

There was a cloth around the child's neck and indications that it had been suffocated. The pathologist said that there was a piece of cloth, like the corner of a sheet tied tightly round the lower part of the child's face that had covered its mouth and nose and also been tied tightly round its neck. The child's nose had been squashed flat.

The body was found to be that of a fine male child that had weighed 8 1/2lbs.

The pathologist that carried out the post mortem said that the child had died very shortly after birth, but that in his opinion had had a separate existence with the outside limit that the child had lived being three days.

He said that the child had certainly died before the previous night to which it was found, noting that whilst he could not definitely say how long the child had been dead, that he thought that that it was between 24 hours and three days.

The coroner said that the only verdict was that the child had been suffocated by some person or persons unknown, and the jury returned a verdict of wilful murder against some person or persons unknown.