MALVERN was shocked by the death of Elizabeth Joshua on this day 100 years ago.

Mrs Joshua died as a result of burns sustained in a gas explosion at her home, Caragh, in Avenue Road, a newly built home in which she and her husband Dr Francis Joshua had only been living for a fortnight.

A page boy, David Hart, had made a brave attempt to save his mistress by trying to put out her burning clothes.

But Mrs Joshua had sustained serious burns and died three days later.

Mrs Joshua was the daughter of a Cork barrister Robert Murray, descendant of an old Scottish clan.

On leaving Ireland in 1869, the family had gone to Dollarbeg, Clackmananshire, in Scotland, where in 1886 she had married Dr Joshua and shortly afterward the couple had come to Malvern.

The page boy had been the first in the house to rise on that fateful Thursday morning.

He told the subsequent inquest that when he entered the breakfast room at 6.45am he had immediately smelt gas.

The young lad seems to have shown considerable presence of mind in not striking a light, opening all the windows and quickly raising the household.

It was Mrs Joshua who got downstairs first.

The leak had been from the pendant of a gas lamp which Dr Joshua had been in the habit of pulling down to read at night.

Mr Baldwin, an architect, of Church Street, Malvern, said the pendant had come from the couple's former home, Abbotsmead, where the ceilings were nine inches lower.

Pulling down the pendant too far could lead to a gas leak. When Mrs Joshua had tried to adjust the light fitting, this had caused the explosion.

Mrs Joshua had run from the room with her nightdress in flames. The page boy and a servant, Minnie Fisher, had both sustained burns trying to put out the flames.

A telegram was sent summoning Dr Crowe, who arrived on the next train from Worcester.

Mrs Joshua had seemed brighter on the Friday, but died the following evening.