Suicide. Or not?
Between 1963 and 1975 the annual number of suicides in the UK showed a sudden, unexpected decline from 5,714 to 3,693 at a time when suicide continued to increase in most other countries. This appears to be the result of the progressive removal of carbon monoxide from the public gas supply. Accounting for more than 40 percent of suicides in 1963, suicide by domestic gas was all but eliminated by 1975. Few of those prevented from using gas appear to have found some other way of killing themselves. These findings suggest that suicide is an intentional act designed to bring an end to deep despair, chosen when moral restraints against the behaviour are weakened and when the person has ready access to a means of death that is neither too difficult nor repugnant.
When using the gas method to commit suicide one would kill oneself by turning on the gas without igniting it, producing no heat but filling the oven with carbon monoxide, which would make one extremely drowsy, pass out, and then suffocate painlessly.
Ok, that's the scene been set, now let's start at the very beginning.
1928 truly was a year of change in the United Kingdom. The fifth Reform Act brought in by the Conservative government altered the 1918 Representation of the People Act, which had only allowed women over 30 who owned property to be enfranchised. The new act gave women the vote on the same terms as men. All women over 21 could now vote! It was in this year of change that Mary (Heaney) Strachan (my great grandmother) gave birth to her eleventh child Margaret Strachan. Margaret was born at 2am on Monday, 5 November 1928 at 63 Beckford Street, Hamilton. Her father registered her birth and that of her twin brother, Archie, on 16 November 1928.
We don't actually know that much about Margaret. My Grandmother never spoke of her. I've no idea what she was like as a child. Quiet, I suspect. I wonder if the untimely death of her twin brother affected her ? (Archie died of pneumonia - On a side note Doctor Archibald McEwan delivered the twins and signed the death certificate for Archie in April 1929, when he died aged 5 months .The baby was named after the doctor). Certainly living in such a busy house would have been a curse as well as a blessing. Big brothers to look after her, sisters to look up to, a hard working mother who could be distant at times and suffered from spats of poor health and a father who pretty much did his own thing - checking in on the family when necessary. I don't doubt Margaret was loved but did she feel the warm compassionate love that only parents can provide ? It's doubtful.
It was her desire to find a husband and quickly settle down and that husband came in the form of Andrew Downie Black. Andrew was born in Blantyre, Lanarkshire on the 23rd of September 1924. His mother was Joan Black, a native of Edinburgh and the daughter of a steel worker. No father was listed on the birth certificate. She married Andrews step-father when he was five.
Andrew and Margaret were married at St Ann's Catholic Church, Hamilton, Lanarkshire on the 27th of December 1947. Andrew was 23 years old and Margaret was 19. They hadn't been seeing each other for very long however she was 3 months pregnant with his child. Margaret felt getting married was the 'right thing to do'. 17 Months later she was dead.
The facts are laid out pretty bare. He was a violent and controlling man. She was quiet and loyal, yet feared for her safety. She confided in family members and a plan was hatched for her to leave with her baby daughter and go and live with her brother and his wife in Edinburgh. She never made it.
What really happened at 89 Logan Street, Blantyre on the evening of Sunday the 1st of May 1949 ? Was it a tragic accident? What chain of events led to Margaret being found dead from coal gas poisoning on her kitchen floor ? A devoted unhappy young mother desperate for a new life away from her brutal husband was suddenly dead. Was this death suspicious ? Local doctor Adam Stewart examined the body and he didn't think so. The death was ruled a suicide. Margaret was buried aged 20 in the Bent Cemetery in Hamilton, Lanarkshire. Her husband Andrew Downie Black lived to be 68 and died in Cowdenbeath in 1993. The truth about the events leading up to Margaret's death would be taken to the grave with him.