A TERRIBLE EXPERIENCE

Ashburton Guardian, Volume VII, Issue 1807, 5 April 1888, Page 3

A TERRIBLE EXPERIENCE

At Lincoln, Nebraska, a ahort time •go, » workingman named Smith was horribly mutilated m a remarkable manner. On O street, at the oorner of Ninth, hanging from a telegraph pole and lying along the gronnd for a distance was A broken telephone wire, which bad m tome manner become crossed, or m connection with one of the electric light wires. As Smith was passing along the Street he saw the wire burning, and attracted by the strange appearance, and not realising what it was, evidently took bold of it to ascartaln what it meant. The ■hock he received was terrific, and his shrieks brought crowds to the street. He coald not loosen his hold on the wire, and it burned hie hands to the bone. In his writhlngs and contortions the charged wire came m contract with his head, burning oat one of his eyes and laying the side of his face open. Wherever it etrack bis body it oat like a knife. A bystander^ realising the peril of the man, ran to htm, grabbing him to pall him from the wire, bnt by the shock he received when he came m contract with the body of the man he was knocked ten feet Into the street and utterly prostated, ■o that it waa feared he was also killed. By this time the electricity had either burned the man Smith loose from the wire or be had succeeded m his struggles In breaking away. He was ploked up and carried into an adjoining restaurant, and ahalf dczan physicians were summoned. The man presented a horrible appearance, and despite the physicianB 1 efforts to pat him noder the influence of morphine he shrieked and writhed m the agony he suffered until taken to the hospital-