MENTAL ASYLUM ESCAPEE.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1677, 18 February 1913, Page 4

MENTAL ASYLUM ESCAPEE.

7-» ' ■■' AN EXCITING TIME. (By Tclcgraph.-Prcis Association,) Auckland, February 17. The story of tho escape' of Thomas Henry Johnston, of Waihi, from tho Avondale Mental Hospital and liis subsequent wanderings, in which ho so successfully eluded tho police warders and everyone sent after him, maker interesting rending. On tho Saturday morning after New Year ho was one of a gang of men employed under a warder stocking oats. When'tho attendant was bu6y working, Johnston bolted through a, fence along a swamp', and hid in a clump of j gorsc. "Roiling myself _up into a 1011, with my knees to my chin like a cat, and pulling tho gorse into place again," as he expressed it. ' ■ '•■'■■•.'■. Ho had a most exciting time, aa the search party which at onoo eet out upon, tho alarm being given walked round tho clump rematodly. ...„." "B,y shifting, iny position," said he, I . could have teized tho blue Bcrge of their trousers." . '' - ,'. ~' ■'~' Ho passed a most uncomfortable time • in his cramped position, and it was not until i o'clock that me \yaa able to stretch himself. ' ' ~>.•' He says it was most amusing to near i tho search parties discussing him and his flight while they were standing right alqngsido hits time after tiuio. He did. not venture out Until after dark, and then made off, eventually getting out to Penrose. Thenc© he followed the. line to Wcstfield, ,"where I had a drink Of . water," he remarked. "The porter called . out and asked me where I was going. ,1 ; said home to Otahuhh. He asked mo ; ; where my coat was, I said*' Left bchina— been on the 6hicker.'" ' , , Gradually working down the line, John-' ston made'his way through the Waikato, begging food, and occasionally getting a lift,. Once lie managed'to get a cheap l train ride by lying in an empty truck with ft cover on it. Eventually he worked his way down to To 1 Arc-ha, whence ho . took to the ranges for a straight out to .Waihi. After a bad Hnio in the hills, ho struck' the elcctrio, power line from Horahora to Waihi, and then tho going was bettoTi He rot home on January 7, , three days after his escapo, and says ho : never left tho house, in spite of several searches- that tho police ; made. ,