Citation

Miron J. Histoire Soc. 2014; 47(95): 577-699.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2014, University of Ottawa Press)

DOI

10.1353/his.2014.0072

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

Although some legal commentators bemoaned the trend, suicide was increasingly interpreted by nineteenth-century Ontario society as the result of mental illness, rather than a criminal or immoral act. In particular, coroner's inquest juries involving suicide from eastern Ontario tended to conclude the deceased was non compos mentis, mentally ill, and thus not criminally responsible. Nevertheless, while the enforcement of financial and spectacular punishments for suicide or felo de se was uncommon and the secularization of suicide might suggest increasing empathy for the deceased and his or her family, responses to self-destruction remained contingent, uneven, and imbued with cultural mores. Not only did attitudes towards gender influence the findings of inquests and permeate popular understandings, but, as the treatment of those who attempted but failed to take their own lives suggests, voluntary death remained a complicated matter that defied simple acceptance or complete decriminalization. © 2014, University of Toronto Press. All rights reserved.

Language: en