Democratic Sentinel, Volume 13, Number 24, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 July 1889 — POISONED AT A PICNIC. [ARTICLE]

POISONED AT A PICNIC.

Fifty Prostrated, Fourteen Beyond Recovery. Toronto, Ont., June 26.—Through the parsimony of a Woodstock druggist, who is now hiding in the woods in fear of his life, fifty people were noisoned at a picnic near there and it is thought that fourteen of them may die. Woodstock is a small village in the township of Zorra. On Saturday the farmers of that county gave it monster picnic in Wi litt’s grove, about two miles fi-oin the town. All was jollity until the picnickers were about to start for [home, when suddenly a Mis 9 Shaw, who was dancing on one of the platforms, fell in a fit. Friends had hardly started to apply restoratives when two other young ladies were similiarly seized. The sudden interruption of the festivities caused very general alarm, which was intensified to horror when almost immediately others of the gathering to the number of fifty were stricken. Several doctors were with the plcknickers, and these, with others who was hastily summoned from the town, attended the sufferers. Noting the symptoms, the doctors at once pronounced it a case of poisoning. An investigation proved that only those who had partaken froely of the lemonade had been attacked, and the poisoning was readily traced to this source. It was discovered that the confectioner who had furnished the drink, in order to save lemons, had used in its concoction what he believed to be tartaric acid. Some of the powder which he had purchased from the new druggist remained, and on examination it was found to be sugar of lead, which had been sold in mistake for the harmless ingredient. The rage of the people almost amounted to madness, which they determined to vent upon Druggist Alexander, who was a stranger. A crowd qnick’v gathered and marched to his store. The shop was locked. A plank was torn from the sidewalk aud used as a battering ram. The door was quickly broken down and the maddened men entered. There was no one in the store, but this did not decrease their rage, and in a few minutes the stock in trade of the druggist was scattered all over the street. Although tho majority of those poisoned are slowly recovering from the effects of the deadly mineral, fourteen of tho number are reported to be dying, all being in a state of collapse, from which efforts of the physicians have so far failed tc re vivo them.