Madeleine Smith
Madeleine Smith was a 19th-century Scottish woman known primarily for her controversial legal case surrounding the death of her lover, Émile L'Angelier. Raised in a prominent Glasgow family of architects, she was expected to marry well and manage her family's household from a young age. Smith's relationship with L'Angelier, a working-class gardener's son, was scandalous for the time, particularly given the societal norms of upper-class women. Following L'Angelier's suspicious death, believed by many to be a poisoning incident involving arsenic, Smith became the focus of a sensational trial.
The evidence against her included letters exchanged between the couple, although the defense argued that the circumstances surrounding L'Angelier's death were not definitively linked to Smith. Ultimately, the jury returned a "not proven" verdict, a unique outcome in Scottish law that left the question of her guilt ambiguous. Following the trial, Smith married George Wardle and later emigrated to the United States. Her case garnered public fascination and has been the subject of debate regarding gender and justice in the Victorian era, with opinions divided on her culpability.
Subject Terms
Madeleine Smith
Accused Scottish murderer
- Born: March 29, 1835
- Birthplace: Glasgow, Scotland
- Died: April 12, 1928
- Place of death: New York, New York
Cause of notoriety: Smith allegedly murdered her lover Pierre L’Angelier, who had refused to return the letters she wrote him.
Active: March 23, 1857
Locale: West End, Glasgow, Scotland
Sentence: Found “not proven” (Scotland’s so-called third verdict)
Early Life
Madeleine Smith was the eldest daughter and granddaughter of well-respected and admired architects in Glasgow. After returning from finishing school in London, she was given responsibility for the management of her family’s household at the age of eighteen. She was described by contemporaries as being very attractive and confident, with dark hair and gray eyes.
As was customary among upper-class Glaswegians, Smith was expected to make a good marriage. The period between school and marriage could, on occasion, be a time for daring acts that one would never think of doing later. For Smith, such an act was her dalliance with a gardener’s son who was working as a warehouse clerk, Émile L’Angelier. Even if L’Angelier’s death had not occurred, the revelation of such a relationship between a well-brought-up young woman and a foreign working-class man would have created a scandal throughout Scotland.
The date of Smith and L’Angelier’s first meeting and who introduced them is unknown. From the beginning, however, notes passed between them. He ordered her to destroy his letters, he said, so they would not be found by a member of her family. Her letters to him are a major part of the murder case.
The Smiths had searched for and found a suitable husband for Madeleine, one William Minnoch. Madeleine accepted Minnoch’s marriage proposal in January of 1857. Knowing that her letters to L’Angelier would not find favor with her fiancé if found, she asked L’Angelier for their return. He refused.
As someone familiar with the gardening business, L’Angelier was well accustomed to the use of arsenic in killing pests. He was known also to use it as a drug. A not-uncommon substance at the time, arsenic was used by women as a form of face powder. To buy it, one had only to sign the “Poison Book” in the apothecary shop.
Criminal Career
After the death of L’Angelier, it was assumed by many that Smith poisoned him with arsenic in cocoa. The quantity of arsenic found in the dead man’s body, however, was much greater than that which could have been hidden in a simple cup of cocoa. At least one-half ounce of arsenic remained in the deceased after an entire night of stomach upset and diarrhea. Such an amount had never been used to cause the death of a human, except in suicide.
In the weeks preceding his death, L’Angelier stated to his friends and employers that he had been sick very often and that Smith was trying to poison him. He mentioned this to friends so often that after a while they paid no attention to such statements. During this period, L’Angelier continued to see Smith and to take cocoa from her on a regular basis.
L’Angelier had also stated to a friend that he would not allow Smith to marry another man as long as he himself lived. He threatened Smith that he would show all her letters to her father. Smith begged him not to do so, as she could be disowned. She took a great chance and wrote to L’Angelier on Tuesday, February 10, 1857, in an attempt to end their relationship once and for all. L’Angelier’s diary, the first entry of which is dated Wednesday, February 11, 1857, is very casual in its recording of his seeing Smith as well as other friends. His regular mentions of illness are virtually afterthoughts in the notations made almost every day.
Smith stated in two of her letters to L’Angelier that she was taking arsenic for her complexion; however she did not make a purchase of arsenic until two days after his first reported illness. Whether Smith committed murder or whether L’Angelier, intentionally or accidentally, committed suicide in such a way as could send his lover to the gallows remains unknown.
Legal Action and Outcome
Before Smith’s trial, at the request of her lead attorney, John Inglis, L’Angelier’s diary was not admitted into evidence; however Smith’s letters to L’Angelier were. Her fiancé had quickly withdrawn his marriage proposal after she was arrested. During the nine-day trial, many witnesses recalled that L’Angelier had mentioned previous suicide attempts after being jilted by at least one other wealthy woman.
If the jury had found Smith guilty of his death, the sentence would have been death by hanging. Scotland has a distinctive verdict aside from the well-known ones of guilty or innocent: the verdict of “not proven.” This is not a statement of innocence, but it is not a statement of guilt, either. The third verdict states that the prosecution has not proven its case, and the individual on trial may go free. In Smith’s case, the jury only deliberated thirty minutes before reaching the “not proven” verdict.
Smith went to London and, in 1861, married George Wardle, a draftsman. She and Wardle remained married for many years and had two children. Their marriage ultimately ended in divorce. Smith emigrated to the United States at the age of seventy-one and married again. She died in were chosen on April 12, 1928.
Impact
Madeleine Smith’s audience—the public—applauded her “not proven” verdict, although Inglis, her attorney, considered her to be guilty. So, too, did such observers as Henry James, Jane Carlyle, and George Eliot. Another writer, Belfort Bax, believed that Smith had not received a conviction because of the fact that she was a woman.
Bibliography
MacGowan, Douglas. Murder in Victorian Scotland: The Trial of Madeleine Smith. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1999. A history of young women’s waiting years before marriage and the resulting boredom dispelled by affairs with those not of their class.
Morehead, Nigel. That Nice Miss Smith. London: F. Muellar, 1957. Smith is given as an example of a woman from a respectable background who became involved with a man far below her social station.
Roughead, William. Classic Crimes: A Selection from the Works of William Roughead. New York: Vintage Books, 1976. A humorous account of the Glasgow, Scotland, that produced Madeleine Smith and Émile L’Angelier; an abridgment of the account written by Roughead in 1922.
Trestrail, John H. Criminal Poisoning. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Spectrum Health, 2000. A survey of poison as a weapon in cases of murder.