Eva died two hours before the inspector came. She died because she drank a lot of “strong disinfectant” which burnt her “inside out”. Inspector Goole goes to the Birling’s house to confront each one of them and place responsibility on them. Though the inspector does not tell us it, it is quite obvious that he is there not to find the “main culprit” but instead he is there to make the Birling’s see through somebodies eyes of the Lower “class” and feel some “responsibility”. Each and every one of them, Mr Birling, Sheila, Gerald, Mrs Birling and Eric, all played a part in Eva’s death and the inspector wants them to realise this and accept responsibility.
Mr Birling holds the big responsibility of starting the whole thing, and he was the first to turn Eva away. Eva Smith was working at “the Works” which Mr Birling owned. She had been working in one of the “machine shops” for over year and she was a “good worker”. She was about to be promoted to a “leading operator” which was a person who was the “head” of a small group of girls. When Eva and everyone else came back from the August holidays they were all “restless” and asked for a pay rise. However Mr Birling refused their offer saying he couldn’t even “consider” it. Eva and all of the other girls decided to go on strike which didn’t “last long”. The “pitiful affair” was over after a week or two. Mr Birling let everyone back apart from the ring-leaders, who “started all of the “trouble”. Unfortunately Eva was one of the ring-leaders and like the rest, she was fired. This was the start of the snow ball effect of events that drove Eva towards killing herself and her unborn child. However Mr Birling refused to accept responsibility for his actions.
Sheila was next to turn Eva down, all because of her bad temper. After “two months” of barely surviving, after Mr Birling fired her, Eva found a job at a dress shop. This dress store was Millwards, which happened to be one of Sheila’s favourite dress shops and Eva was...