Most mothers are loving and kind, but some like the one in the story below are coercive Mrs Bates figures of reality and not fiction who fear their offspring leaving them behind and not having any part in their adult lives.
One such example is given from the Aberdeen Evening Express of 16th October 1957 and involves our favourite notorious chemical lovingly served up in sandwiches.
Mad Martha from Whitwick attempted to “frighten” her daughter with whom she lived at the age of 76 by putting p4 containing rat poison into corned beef sandwiches. Her daughter was estranged from her husband (I wonder why), but was seeing another bloke to her controlling parent’s annoyance.
This was a “small amount” of phosphorus to use a phrase off trotted out by the scum at Trinity Street, and this would be in the era of the notorious Louisa Merryfield and Mary Wilson. It would be just six years before this type of poison was banned in Britain under The Animal Cruel poisons regulations.
As for the final sentence in this sorry story, I wonder how her son reacted to the condition of now having to live with someone who might “frighten” him if he had a lady friend?
