From the Worthing Gazette August 14th 1918:
“A West Worthing Mystery
Medical Evidence fails to reveal the cause
The inquiry, which was held at the Central Fire Station, in High-Street, was concerned with the death of Olive Gertrude Standing, aged 8 years and Marguerite Doris Lilian Standing, aged four years, the children of a cab driver and his wife, living at 38 The Drive, which occurred within six hours of each other on Sunday morning.
Four witnesses were called, the first being Mrs Rose Standing, the mother, who deposed that the younger child died at a quarter to seven and Olive at 12 o’clock on Sunday. They were quite alright on Friday when they went down the beach together. At tea time on Saturday Marguerite complained of not feeling very well, and was sick. She did not complain of any pain, except in the head. Neither of the children had had any dinner on Saturday, and the younger one did not go out in the afternoon on that day. Thinking that the sun had probably got hold of her, witness gave the child some castor oil. She was sick 2 or 3 times during the evening, but dropped off to sleep about 8 o’clock and, except for diarrhoea, slept through the night until 5 o’clock the next morning. They had had a pennyworth of apples which they took down to the beach and ate on Friday afternoon. Witness gave Olive some castor oil on Saturday evening and she complained of her head; but she was not taken with sickness until after the Doctor came on Sunday morning. She also had diarrhoea. The children had a meat pudding and some boiled flaked rice for dinner on Friday. Witness had her own five children and eight London children staying with her, and some of them complained of sickness or diarrhoea. There were also 2 young lady friends of witness staying in the house on Saturday, but they only stayed one night. There were 4 bedrooms in the house – 3 upstairs and 1 downstairs, which was the front room turned into a bedroom; and a kitchen and scullery.
Mr William Stephen Nokalds, a registered medical practitioner at West Worthing, said he first saw the child Olive about 8 o’clock on Sunday morning. She was then insensible, and appeared to be under the influence of poison of some description, the symptoms being heavy breathing, a slow and feeble heart, a temperature of 102, vomiting and diarrhoea. The younger child, Marguerite, was dead before he arrived. The case was so urgent that witness called in Dr Wilshaw, and also a nurse, but the child died about noon. Witness added that since then 2 other children in the family had shown the same symptoms. One was taken the previous night with a temperature of 104, but he called in a nurse, and that child now seemed much better. That day he had been called to the 4th child, who had a temperature of 103, but he did not know how he was progressing. Both of these children complained of a severe headache and had vomiting.”
There was a post-mortem, which proved inconclusive, so the inquiry was adjourned for 6 weeks, for further investigation.
Both attending Doctors felt it was something the girls had swallowed.
Adjournment of the Inquiry.
In the subsequent Inquiry, it was disclosed that there was evidence of glucoside solanin in the girls’ stomachs. Almost every plant in the deadly nightshade family contains solanin, so the Inquest returned a verdict of ‘death by misadventure’, caused by the children probably eating some berries containing solanin.