The mysterious death of Oscar Wilde’s wife has been solved

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The mystery surrounding the death of Oscar Wilde’s wife has finally been unravelled by the poet’s grandson.

The Irish writer’s spouse, Constance Lloyd, died just a few years after Wilde was jailed for “gross indecency” in 1895, over his numerous sexual encounters with men.

Mrs Lloyd died after of a mysterious illness in 1898 – and there has long been speculation of a conspiracy or cover-up.

However, the couple’s grandson Merlin Holland believes he has finally cracked the 117-year old mystery.

Mr Holland – whose family took the name ‘Holland’ at the time to disassociate itself from the Wilde controversy – believes his grandmother in fact died of undiagnosed multiple sclerosis.

Leading medical journal The Lancet published a paper this week on the claims, written by Mr Holland and Ashley H Robins, a medical specialist at the University of Cape Town.

Mr Holland has searched through the trove of more than 130 unreleased old family letters – and found the symptoms of the mysterious ailment – which eventually left her with excruciating head pain and unable to walk – closely match what is now known to be MS.

A combination of the MS and botched surgeries for other misdiagnosed ailments were responsible for the death – and not syphilis, or a mysterious poison, as has been speculated previously.

The pair wrote: “According to the unpublished correspondence of Constance and her brother, her 9-year illness was characterised by widespread pains, right leg weakness, tremor of the right arm, profound fatigue, and a left facial paralysis.

“For the first 7 years the clinical picture was dominated by intermittent acute episodes followed by extended periods of recovery; in the last 2 years her disability became permanent with gradual deterioration.

“A likely diagnosis is multiple sclerosis of the relapsing-remitting type that subsequently developed into secondary progressive multiple sclerosis.”
Mr Holland explained he wanted the paper to put an end to speculation, saying: “While my mother was alive, she didn’t particularly want anyone to have access to letters.

“She [was] frightened of what, in an age of sensationalising everything, someone might do with them.

“I rather feel it will put Constance to rest, poor thing.”

 

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