Thomas Wentworth "Tom" Wills

• Reference: Find A Grave Memorial - SmartCopy: Mar 29 2024, 6:00:07 UTC

The Argus of May 4, 1880: INQUEST. SUICIDE OF MR. T. W. WILLS. Dr. Youl held an inquest at Heidelberg yesterday upon the body of Thomas Wentworth Wills, aged 45 years, who committed suicide on the previous day. Sarah Theresa Wills, widow of deceased, deposed that her husband had been drinking for years. She took him to the Melbourne Hospital on Saturday last, and he was admitted, because he could not sleep. At 9 o'clock the same night she was told that her husband was on the verandah, waving his hands at some imaginary object. She got him into the house, and he went to bed, but did not sleep. A constable watched him, until a man named Dunmoody came to watch him. On Sunday, at 1 o'clock, the man went to his dinner, and deceased then went into the kitchen, and stabbed himself with a pair of scissors. David Dunmoody, labourer, who was employed to watch deceased, gave corroborative evidence, and deposed that deceased tried to choke himself by holding his mouth and nose. When witness went to dinner he put away everything he thought deceased could harm himself with. Both deceased and his wife drank to excess. The jury found that deceased committed suicide while of unsound mind from excessive drinking.