Page:The Art of Cross-Examination.djvu/218

 hospital he stated that he had seen the Frenchman strangled to death by the nurses in charge of the Pavilion by the use of a sheet tightly twisted around the insane man's neck. The language used in the newspaper articles written by Minnock to describe the occurrences preceding the Frenchman's death was as follows:—

"At supper time on Wednesday evening, when the Frenchman, Mr. Hilliard, refused to eat his supper, the nurse, Davis, started for him. Hilliard ran around the table, and the other two nurses, Dean and Marshall, headed him off and held him; they forced him down on a bench, Davis called for a sheet, one of the other two, I do not remember which, brought it, and Davis drew it around Hilliard's neck like a rope. Dean was behind the bench on which Hilliard had been pulled back; he gathered up the loose ends of the sheet and pulled the linen tight around Hilliard's neck then he began to twist the folds in his hand. I was horrified. I have read of the garrote; I have seen pictures of how persons are executed in Spanish countries; I realized that here, before my eyes, a strangle was going to be performed. Davis twisted the ends of the sheet in his hands, round and round; he placed his knee against Hilliard's back and exercised all his force. The dying man's eyes began to bulge from their sockets; it made me sick, but I looked on as if fascinated. Hilliard's hands clutched frantically at the coils around his neck. 'Keep his hands down, can't you?' shouted Davis in a rage.