Bell's Weekly Messenger, No.1829, Sunday, April 17, 1831.
An inquest was held on Thursday, at the House of Correction, Coldbath fields, on the body of William Webb, a youth aged eighteen, who had died in that prison. He had been committed on the 23d ult. for wilfully breaking a pane of glass. He acknowledged that he had done the act intentionally, in order that he might, by being sent to prison, be prevented from dying of starvation in the streets. The body, on being viewed by the jury, presented a frightful appearance, it being reduced by previous want and subsequent disease to a mere skeleton. On being received into the prison, it was found that he was ill of fever, and he was sent to the infirmary, where every attention was paid to him; but, such was the extreme state of weakness to which the body had been reduced, that, notwithstanding the most nourishing food and powerful restoratives were administered to him, he lingered only until Tuesday last. Verdict, Natural Death.