Couple 'couldn't live without each other'

Ernest and Ivy Lewis, both 82, wrapped a blanket around their legs and feet and sat on a sofa at their detached home in Southampton before they each took an overdose of liquid morphine.

They left a type-written and signed note entitled Dying Request, saying they wanted to die together and had entered into a suicide pact.

They were found by their concerned daughter Hilary Wood on November 17 last year.

She travelled down from her home in Cheshire after getting an answerphone message asking her to come the next day.

The inquest in Southampton heard she had been concerned about the message and came a day earlier. She found her parents alive but unconscious and they were rushed to hospital.

Mrs Lewis, who was suffering from terminal pancreatic cancer, died the next day, and Mr Lewis died on November 27. The cause of death for both was the morphine overdose, the hearing was told.

Recording a verdict that Mr and Mrs Lewis took their own lives, Southampton Coroner Keith Wiseman said:“There is no evidence that this was anything other than a joint decision they made together.”