On Tuesday Whitaker Wright sentenced to 7 years penal servitude + died suddenly, immediately after having taken Potassium cyanide.1
Strong Sou’ Wester + heavy blasts of rain in forenoon but it moderated + cleared in afternoon. Drove round town + to Bridgelands + Firs in forenoon + after lunch to Newtown2 + Almshouses.
1 James Whitaker Wright (1846-1904), company promoter and fraudster. He lived at Witley, Surrey, not far from Dr Muir’s Surrey relations. His (largely fraudulent) financial empire collapsed in 1900, causing mayhem in the London Stock Exchange. On 26 January 1904 he was convicted of fraud and given a seven year prison sentence. Shortly after the sentence was pronounced, Whitaker swallowed cyanide and died. [‘Whitaker Wright (1845-1904), Company promoter’ at https://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/person/mp04941/whitaker-wright%5D.
2 Newtown was the seat of county government and administration in Roxburghshire, as it is now.
[Source: Scottish Borders Archives & Local History Service SBA/657/7, Dr J S Muir of Selkirk, medical practitioner, journal for 1904]
Rumbling Clint's Scottish Notes 