David Sidney Pratt

David Sidney Pratt died from corrosive poisoning.

An open verdict was returned.

He had lived in Fairfield Road, Montpelier, Bristol.

He died on 13 May 1954, his cause of death being given as acute general peritonitis due to a perforated stomach which could have been caused by swallowing a corrosive substance. However, the director of the Home Office Forensic Science Laboratory in Bristol said that no irritant or corrosive substance could be found in his organs.

His father said that David Pratt had said nothing to him about having eaten anything that disagreed with him.

His inquest on Wednesday 28 July 1954 stated that police and Home Office inquiries had lasted ten weeks and had failed to solve the mystery and it was concluded that the mystery might never be cleared up.

When the Coroner returned the open verdict he said, 'All inquiries have come to a dead end. It may well be that the mystery will never be cleared up'.