INQUEST AT GERMAN BAY.

Akaroa Mail and Banks Peninsula Advertiser, Volume 2, Issue 184, 23 April 1878, Page 2

INQUEST AT GERMAN BAY.

An inquest was held yesterday at the residence of Mr Robert Dawber, on the body of Maud Dawber, a child of five years of age, who died very suddenly on the morning of the 19th inst.

Mr Henry Slater was chosen foreman of the jury. Louis Briare, a dairyman in the employment of Mr Dawber, father of the deceased, gave evidence that the deceased was playing round the house on tho afternoon of the 18th inst., when the child seemed to take a kind of fit, and pointed

to her mouth with her finger. He took her on his knee, slapped her on tlie back, and gave her some water. The deceased seemed to get better, and went away again to play. Gertrude Dawber deposed to being at home on Thursday, 18th inst. Deceased was at school with her in the morning, and was playing about the house in the afternoon. Deceased had some beans, a penny, and some pieces of pencil. The beans were French beans. Deceased was laughing a good deal. Robert Dawber said he was the father of the deceased. .He was away from home on the Thursday afternoon. Deceased was quite well when he left home. When he returned about six o'clock the same evening he saw deceased, who got out of bed, and asked for her supper. It was not usual for her to goto bed so soon. Between nine and ten o'clock on Thursday night, deceased commenced to cry. Took deceased into his bed, where she slept till about twelve o'clock, and seemed to breathe with great difficulty. She got worse, and he putya mustard plaster on, thinking it was a cold, and then sent for Dr Guthrie as she seemed getting worse. Deceased told him she had swallowed a bean. John Guthrie, a duly qualified medical practitioner, residing at Akaroa, deposed— On the morning of the 19th inst., I was called to visit the child, who was_ supposed to be suffering from bronchitis. I found the deceased very ill with symptoms of obstruction to the breathing. I heard from Mrs Dawber that deceased had swallowed a bean, and expected that this bad given rise to irritation of the wind pipe. The deceased got worse, and when on the point of death, I made an opening into the wind pipe, and as low down the neck as I could cut. I examined tbe wind pipe above the wound, and found it clear. The child died soon afterwards, At tbe post mortem examination on the 20th inst., I found a bean firmly fixed in the division of the wind pipe which supplies tbe right lung. The end of the bean projected from this so as to occlude the passage of the left lung. I am of opinion that death resulted from suffocation caused by the presence of a bean in the wind pipe. The jury brought in a verdict of death in accordance with the medical evidence. _______________________-_-_-_-_-_■