Thomas Evans

Thomas Evans was found dead in the cellar of the Stirk House Hotel in Gisburn shortly after midday on 13 March 1958.

The cause of his death was not determined and an open verdict was returned at his inquest in Barnoldswick on Friday 25 April 1958.

Several theories were put forward concerning his cause of death but the Coroner said that there was no substantiated evidence.

The pathologist that carried out the post mortem said that he had found no poisonous substances in Thomas Evans's body. He said that he found 11% content of carbon dioxide, but noted that 55% was the lethal dose for a normally healthy person. He noted that he could not be sure that his cause of death was due to carbon dioxide poisoning as to measure it properly samples of his blood would have had to have been taken immediately in containers covered with oil.

He noted that more than 5% of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere would tend to paralyse the lungs and that since carbon dioxide was heavier than air that it would concentrate near the ground.

The head chef at the hotel said that he had found Thomas Evans lying behind the cellar door. He said that he had had to pull the boards from the door to gain entrance, but that he had not smelt anything unusual and didn't feel faint or dizzy.

The resident manager at the hotel said that the boiler there was only three months old. He added that apart from the door to the cellar that the only ventilation in the cellar was an inlet at the other end, but said that he did not think that it had been open during his time at the hotel.

When the Coroner summed up he said that Thomas Evans might have been chopping sticks in the cellar with his head close to the floor and that he might have become overcome by fumes and might have been trying to reach the door. He said that it the door, which was normally open, had been closed that the flow of air would have been reduced which might have increased the concentration of carbon dioxide in the room sufficiently to have caused his death.

The Coroner then said that proprietors or resident occupants of the hotel would be well advised to eliminate any possibility of a future death by such circumstances, but stressed, however, that he was not finding as a fact that either the boiler or the condition of the cellar did, in fact, cause his death.

Thomas Evans had lived in Back Lane, Gisburn.