Elizabeth Markham described Adelaide as being "very excited; her eyes were rolling in her head, and there was something very strange about them" following the incident. She said that Adelaide repeated, "Let me die! Let me die!" and seemed unconscious of her actions. Elizabeth outlined that she was a devoted and affectionate mother who had told her early that the child was "unable to take the breast." In nineteenth-century infanticide trials, a common defense technique was to prove with witness statements that the mother was affectionate and loving before the crime. This demonstrated that there could be n" "logical" reason –such as hatred for the child or inexperience with motherhood– for a mother to kill her child. Once the “logical” reasons were successfully disproved, insanity remained as the only explanation for the mother’s actions.

 

In the case of Adelaide, witnesses outlined that she was a loving mother of a sickly child whose long-absent husband could not support her financially. These social, and economic factors were seen by the medical, legal and general public to be an accepted catalyst for mental instability in mothers. Also, the "inability to take the breast” was linked to the mental disorder of "puerperal insanity." Split into three related disorders connected to childbirth – insanity of pregnancy, puerperal insanity, and insanity of lactation – this disorder was utilized to explain way Victorian women resorted to murdering their infants. Dr. Morrison, a surgeon who attended Adelaide in her confinement, diagnosed her with "puerperal mania." He explained:

 

"puerperal mania, which is a well-recognized of insanity with women about the period of their confinement—it affects them when they are not able to give milk to a child, and is the consequence of it—this form of puerperal mania develops itself sometimes by acts of violence to the nearest and dearest, and to the offspring of the woman—there is no fixed period at which it arrives at intensity, sometimes one and sometimes two weeks after confinement—there are two forms, the acute, wild, raving, and the other is the melancholy sort, with which there are no delusions."

– Dr. Morrison at Adelaide's Trial, Old Bailey Proceedings (1869)

 

Mr. Serjeant Sleigh, Adelaide's defense lawyer, continued to develop the theory that Adelaide was suffering from puerperal mania at the time of the crime. He directly quoted the disorder’s definition from a contemporary book on forensic medicine to further clarify Morrison's testimony to the Jury, as well as validate it further as a prevalent and medically accepted mental disorder. Sleigh also questioned Morrison on the "hereditary family taint of insanity" and its connection to the disorder. Morrison supported these findings and confirmed that those with "a hereditary taint" were more susceptible to developing the puerperal mania. In response to the defense's arguments, Mr. Griffiths did not dispute the diagnosis, but questioned how it exhibited in patients:

 

MR. GRIFFITHS: Where you find melancholy puerperal mania, do you often find acts of violence? 

 

DR. MORRISON: In both sorts of puerperal mania you may have infanticide—more kill their children than kill themselves—I draw a distinction between puerperal mania and homicidal mania—I did not observe these symptoms before she was confined, not till about a fortnight after, and then they did not appear to be at all alarming; there was a peculiar expression of the eyes, but no other symptom—there was only sufficient for me to warn the friends; my assistant warned the sister, and I spoke to her myself—puerperal mania may come on as long as six weeks after a confinement.

 

All of the trial medical testimony – Dr. Richard Grubb, a medical officer at London Hospital, Sarah Smith, a nurse at London Hospital, and Dr. Henry Letheby – supported Morrison’s diagnosis. The prosecution attempted to determine that the insanity that Adelaide suffered from would not cause her to become homicidal but rather solely suicidal; however, the diagnosis of puerperal insanity was "elastic." Alienists' developed the diagnosis throughout the nineteenth century and separated the different ways it could exhibit. However, alienists documented that both mania and melancholia could display violent behaviors despite their dichotomous definitions, which made Mr. Griffiths’ cross-examination unsuccessful. The Jury found the witnesses persuasive and considered Adelaide to be incapable of distinguishing right from wrong due to her mental condition. She was found "not guilty, on the ground of insanity" and detained "during her Majesty's Pleasure."

 

Broadmoor

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Adelaide was transferred to Broadmoor Criminal Lunatic Asylum in 1869. She was confined there until her death at aged 72 in 1912. Her relatives sent her letters throughout her time there.