{"id":4817,"date":"2014-03-27T19:50:41","date_gmt":"2014-03-28T00:50:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.decidedlygrim.net\/?p=4817"},"modified":"2014-03-27T19:50:41","modified_gmt":"2014-03-28T00:50:41","slug":"morbid-fact-du-jour-for-march-27-2014","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.decidedlygrim.net\/?p=4817","title":{"rendered":"Morbid Fact Du Jour for March 27, 2014"},"content":{"rendered":"

Today’s Tasteless Yet Truly Morbid Fact!<\/strong><\/p>\n

In Europe, arsenic accounted for the largest percentage of 19th century criminal poisonings. \u00a0In France, for example, between 1835 and 1880, arsenic was used in almost 40 percent of all poison murders. \u00a0Columbia University chemistry professor Rudolph Witthaus wrote, “In the United States, we are under the impression that arsenic still holds the first place in frequency of criminal administration.” \u00a0But at the time of his analysis, the United States lacked the statistical information available in France. \u00a0As a rough measure, Witthaus interviewed New York State attorneys and determined that from 1879 to 1889, there had been 31 indictments for poison murder in twelve countries. \u00a0Half of those were arsenic murders; in every case, white arsenic was specifically to blame.<\/p>\n

A primary reason for arsenic’s popularity was that when mixed into food and drink, it is extremely difficult to taste. \u00a0An over-the-top dose was different. \u00a0If arsenic was swallowed in undiluted form, that was different too. \u00a0Witthaus and other scientists taste-tested small amounts of pure white arsenic and found it to be rather nasty. \u00a0It was hot, tasters said; it was acrid, sweetish, metallic, and rough. \u00a0But when the poison was added to soup, liquor, or a cup of hot coffee, the other flavorings easily masked it. \u00a0Arsenic was “under the most favorable circumstances faint” in taste, Witthaus noted. \u00a0In interviews with 822 people who had survived arsenic poisoning, he reported that only fifteen thought that the food had tasted in any way strange. \u00a0Six talked of a bitter taste, eight complained of a metallic feeling in the mouth, and one woman said she was aware of a “nauseous” taste. \u00a0Witthaus doubted the latter, noting that as the unpleasant taste “escaped the notice of the 14 other persons who ate of the same poisoned pudding, it was probably more imaginary than real.”<\/p>\n

Culled from:\u00a0The Poisoner\u2019s Handbook<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Today’s Tasteless Yet Truly Morbid Fact! In Europe, arsenic accounted for the largest percentage of 19th century criminal poisonings. \u00a0In France, for example, between 1835 and 1880, arsenic was used in almost 40 percent of all poison murders. \u00a0Columbia University chemistry professor Rudolph Witthaus wrote, “In the United States, we are under the impression that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4817","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-facts"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.decidedlygrim.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4817","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.decidedlygrim.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.decidedlygrim.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.decidedlygrim.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.decidedlygrim.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4817"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.decidedlygrim.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4817\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4818,"href":"https:\/\/www.decidedlygrim.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4817\/revisions\/4818"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.decidedlygrim.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4817"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.decidedlygrim.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4817"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.decidedlygrim.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4817"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}