Murders and homicides have not been common in Wellington County’s history. Many years may pass between homicides in Wellington, and some communities have not had one for generations.
A notable exception is a cluster of cases in the north of Wellington in 1868.
Liquor was the significant factor in the first of those 1868 homicides, which took place on the main street of Mount Forest. On the evening of Thursday, April 16, Dr. Samuel Dunbar, Sam Wilson, a former farmer from Maryborough who had moved to Mount Forest, and Leo Chaloner were loafing in Sharwood’s General Store, socializing and exchanging ribald stories.
From time to time they passed around a bottle of sherry.
They hung around the store for over three hours, leaving only when the proprietor decided to close up shop about 11pm. Wilson, the most sober of the three, quickly outpaced his companions as they left. As well as a snoot full of liquor, Dr. Dunbar had suffered the misfortune of a broken leg about six weeks earlier, and had to use crutches to move about.
After a couple of moments Wilson heard a noise behind him. Either Chaloner or the Doctor had stumbled, taking the other with him to the ground. Wilson went back and helped the Doctor to his feet and assisted him to a nearby fence, which happened to contain a gate to Dr. Dunbar’s own yard.
Chaloner slowly regained his feet on his own, and stumbled forward, apologizing to the Doctor for letting him fall. Dr. Dunbar, enraged at the incident, raised a crutch, and swung it solidly at Chaloner, striking him on the side of the head below the ear. Without another sound, Chaloner staggered for a couple of paces and slumped to the ground.
Wilson admonished the Doctor for his deed, but Dr. Dunbar, still fuming, swung around and shuffled off to his own house. Wilson then stooped to help Chaloner to his feet. Unable to rouse the man, he came to the conclusion that the man was dead. Shouting at the top of his lungs, he managed to retrieve Dr. Dunbar. The shouting noise brought out a number of neighbours, roused from their beds.
Several volunteers carried the corpse to the Anderson House hotel. The next morning Dr. H.P. Yeomans conducted a post mortem examination, and then convened a coroner’s inquest. It was a brief session. Dr. Yeomans testified that death had been caused by a blow to the side of the head, and that death resulted from a broken blood vessel, and the consequent pressure on the base of the brain. The jury took only a few minutes to reach their verdict, “that Samuel Dunbar did feloniously kill and slay Leonidas Chaloner.”
The Mount Forest constable placed Dr. Dunbar under arrest, and the next morning escorted him to Guelph for a vacation in the county jail while he awaited trial.
The case was heard at the Fall Assizes on October 30. As usual, crown attorney Henry Peterson conducted the prosecution. Dr. Dunbar hired a team of three lawyers, including one from Toronto. Peterson opened the case by stating that the charge would be manslaughter, as he did not believe that the accused had premeditated in taking Chaloner’s life.
Sam Wilson, the key witness, was the first on the stand. He stated that the three did not drink to excess on the night in question.
After they left the grocery store, he testified, he heard the Doctor say, “You scoundrel. Are you going to deceive me?” Wilson said he went back a short distance and found Dr. Dunbar and Chaloner on the ground. He helped the Doctor to his feet and assisted him to the fence.
A moment later Chaloner was on his feet. He approached the Doctor and began to apologize.
“You scoundrel,” Dr. Dunbar repeated, and swung his crutch at Chaloner, who fell to the ground.
Under cross-examination, Wilson stated that they each had four drinks of sherry that night, and nothing else that he recalled. The night was very dark, he confirmed, making it difficult to see sufficiently to walk. Dr. Dunbar’s lawyers were unable to trip up the witness in any inconsistencies.
Dr. Yeomans, the coroner, was the next witness. He said that he was walking down the main street, and heard Dr. Dunbar’s voice, and noticed a small crowd gathered at the side of the street. He went over and examined Chaloner’s body, and then asked the bystanders to move it to the Anderson Hotel, where he conducted his examination the next morning.
Dr. Yeomans outlined the results of his examination, concluding that a blow to the side of the head was the cause of death. The defence lawyers had many questions, suggesting that death might have come from a stroke as a result of excessive drinking, and pointing out lapses in the post-mortem examination conducted by Dr. Yeomans.
Crown Attorney Peterson had anticipated that the coroner’s testimony would be challenged. His next witness was Dr. Alfred Ecroyd, who confirmed Dr. Yeoman’s testimony and conclusions.
Peterson’s last witness was John Conklin, a contractor and the part-time Mount Forest constable. He testified that after his arrest, Dr. Dunbar admitted striking Chaloner, and believed that he had fallen on purpose in order to cause further damage to the Doctor’s mending leg.
Defence counsel argued that the Crown’s case didn’t prove a case for conviction, and that the coroner’s examination was insufficient. The judge disagreed. The defence lawyers began their parade of witnesses.
First was Richard Lund, a storekeeper. He stated that he had seen Chaloner the day he died, and he had been complaining of a cold in the head. Chaloner had shown him a spot behind the ear where he had applied a blister. It was the same place where Dr. Dunbar’s crutch had struck.
Charles Lemon testified that Chaloner had told him two weeks before his death that he had a bad headache and a pain in the side of the head.
Another witness, Colin Campbell, testified that he had met Chaloner in Guelph a week before his death. After receiving no help from the Mount Forest doctors, he had gone to see Dr. William Clarke, of Guelph, regarding his headache. On the way home, Chaloner had been in such pain that he refused all food, and had to stop for a night in Arthur to rest.
Other witnesses, including Mount Forest pharmacist L.H. Yeomans (brother of Dr. H.P. Yeomans), offered further details of Chaloner’s ongoing problems with headaches and his attempts to provide his patient with relief.
The defence then began a parade of five doctors, beginning with William Clarke. He testified that he had seen many cases of headaches and ear infections, but none had resulted in sudden death. His advice to Chaloner was to take no alcohol and to keep his head erect. Dr. Clarke noted that in the process of conducting a post mortem examination the examiner’s actions can produce effects that can obscure the evidence.
Dr. Shaver, of Stratford, stated that on the evidence he had heard it was impossible to say whether death resulted from the blow. The cause may well have been Chaloner’s fall, he said.
Doctors Perkins, Orton, and Tuck followed. All agreed that it was impossible to state with certainty that death resulted from the blow of the crutch.
Crown Attorney Peterson and the accused’s Toronto lawyer, offered their summaries. The jury returned from their deliberations after a few minutes with a verdict of “Not guilty.” From beginning to end, the trial had lasted five hours.
Reactions to the verdict varied. There was much astonishment and some outrage. Crown Attorney Peterson was livid: the accused admitted striking the blow, and there was a reliable eyewitness.
Mount Forest people tended to side with Dr. Dunbar, but farther away the reaction was not sympathetic. The Berlin Telegraph noted the “misplaced sympathy” of the jury and the bungling of the post mortem examination, but reserved its strongest condemnation to the five doctors who testified to support Dr. Dunbar. Through “some pretty swearing by a few brother medicos he is declared innocent,” lamented the paper.
Dr. Dunbar’s case does not seem to have affected him professionally.
After the trial he continued his practice in Mount Forest for many years.