ON THIS DAY IN MUSIC

1974 - Pamela Courson

Pamela Courson the long-term companion and lover of the late Jim Morrison died of a drugs overdose. She was 27. It was Courson who found The Doors singer dead on July 3, 1971 in the bathtub of their apartment in Paris, France. Pamela had been a long term heroin user and though Jim was notably anti-heroin, it is understood he may have confused her stash when they were in Paris and snorted a whole lot believing it to be cocaine. As many colleagues know as well as I, heroin and alcohol do not mix and have caused many such similar deaths and continue to do so. Jim was essentially a 'juicer' although partial to an occasional line of coke to maintain the creative flow as it were, as many artists have done before and since. Cocaine and alcohol produce a secondary substance of addiction called cocaethylene which increases the affects of both substances. Heroin and alcohol when used together  can act in opposition as central nervous system depressants. When taken together, their sedative properties only increase. This effect can suppress the lungs function and even stop breathing all together. 
A treatment for finding you have had too much 'gear' at the time was believed to be taking a bath to revive you and this is where Pam found Jim's body in the morning after an evening out on the town. As to the myths surrounding Morrison's death, and his still being alive, the Doors drummer John Densmore has always said after he saw Pamela upon returning to America he 'looked in her eyes and knew Jim was dead'

In their prime . . . . 

Jim and Pamela in France