Of pipe bombs and demons - Woogaroo Asylum - 1891

An advertisement for Chinese Crackers from the year 1891,
as it appears in the Australian Town and Country Journal
http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article71250444

In which a Chinese man brings Chinese Crackers to the asylum to exorcise his friend’s demons and ends up killing a bystander with a pipe bomb.  Sounds crazy, but it was the news in Brisbane in 1891. Scaring off demons with loud noises does sound plausible as a cultural practice, but I was a little surprised that the Medical Superintendent allowed it.

This is part of a series publishing source documents relating to the Woogaroo Asylum from 1865 to 1901.

This article appears in five newspapers at the time namely:-

• The Telegraph -- http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article172646689
• Queensland Times, Ipswich Herald and General Advertiser -- http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article123049239
• Toowoomba Chronicle and Darling Downs General Advertiser -- http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article217670748
• The Week -- http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article184247058
• Darling Downs Gazette -- http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article171031464 

The text below is from Queensland Times.

A WOOGAROO PATIENT KILLED.  

A curious accident, which terminated fatally, occurred at the Lunatic Asylum at Goodna, on February 9 last (says the Telegraph). It appears that a Chinaman named Ming Foo on that date came to visit a fellow countryman named Ah Chick, who was a patient at the institution. He asked the permission of the medical superintendent to let off some fireworks, which he assured the medical superintendent would drive the devil, who was troubling his friend, away. The permission to let off the fireworks, which apparently consisted of only the usual crackers, was given. However, it afterwards appeared that among these crackers were some made especially by Ming Foo, and which in his belief were of greater efficacy in the devil-scaring process than the ordinary fireworks. Ming Foo, having taken his friend out into the recreation reserve, began to set the fireworks going, and all appeared to be going well until towards the end. It appeared that a patient named Joseph Styche had been employed in a shed near the reserve in mending some beds. He stood for some time watching the display, but when nearly all the crackers had been shot off he was seen to fall to the ground. The medical superintendent, Dr. Scholes, who saw the man fall, at once rushed to the spot, and a brief examination revealed to him the fact that the man had a nasty wound on the right side of the abdomen, from which he was bleeding freely. The wounded man was at once removed to the hospital, where another examination took place. It was then found that the wound extended to the liver, and that it communicated with two fractured ribs. The liver was ruptured, and the cavities of the chest and abdomen were penetrated. A piece of iron piping, 3in. long and 1½in. in diameter, was found in the wound. Styche died of his injuries on the 15th instant, six days after he had received the wound. It seems that Ming Foo had amongst his fireworks several pieces of iron tubing filled with gun-powder, which he intended to explode. A magisterial inquiry was held into the cause of Styche's death, and the evidence taken in connection therewith has been forwarded to the Colonial Secretary.

Styche’s death notice, if it can be called that, appears amid the asylums statistics for the week ending 21 February 1891.

Died on the 15th instant, Joseph Styche, late of Ipswich, aged 51 years, of rupture of liver, &c., result of accidental explosion …