ALEXANDRA.

Dunstan Times, Issue 536, 26 July 1872, Page 2

ALEXANDRA.

(from our correspondent.) July 24, What with the Municipal Elections, the flood, and the untimely death of one of our notorieties, the past term has been rather an eventful one. The Municipal elections being the first on the list shall take precedence. The election of Mayor was a very tame affair, Mr. William Beresford, timber merchant, being the only gentleman nominated, was duly elected. The nomination for Councillors takes place on Friday next, ns yet I don’t hear of any opposition. Now for the flood—On Saturday last the water of the Molyneux shewed Symplons of a flood by its thick and unsettled state, and by Sunday the volume of wa;er had increased most wonderfully, and had commenced its work of devastation. The Hit and Miss Company’s claim on Frenchman’s Point was the first to succumb, the water rising completely over their extensive workings ; the next party down the river, was Kett and Go’s at the Half-mile Beach, over whose claim the river quickly rose, de. stroying in a few short minutes the work and labor of months of a large body of men; the next loss that I heard of, was that of the Ovens Company, up the Manuherikia, whose claim and workings, over width they have been engaged working continuously for the past nine months was entinly silted up with gravel and slum. So quick was the rise here that before the party had time to draw out their lung and expensive Californian'pump the greater portion of it was irretrievably buried. The loss to the whole of these three parties must he something enormous, and it will take some considerable time, even supposing the riverjto fall, before they will again/each the position they were before the flood. In these dull times any loss to a parly is felt by the whole community, and so it can well he imagined that as three companies, employing in the aggregate thirty men, have simultaneously met with a loss and are all thrown out of gear, the business men will feel it. Now to the tale of death, 'the victim being a miner named John Brown, one of our oldest residents, and well known to all as a jovial hearty follow. He was one of the proprietors of the Alabama dredge. The circumstances of his death, as far as I can learn, are : he was engaged with others in floating down the river a large waterwheel and mining plant as a raft, and that when nearingAlexandraFerry he attempted to leap on shore, but in so doing bis foot got entangled in a rope attached to the raft, and was [dragged! into the stream. .The ferryman, who wituesse 1 the accident, called to Brown to swim for the boat. This he did, and managed to get hold of it ; but before assistance could be rendered he re • laxeil bis hold, and was hurled into tbs seething current never more to rise again. The se sudden a severing of the thread of humnnlife cast quite a gloom over the place, and the loss is the more felt as his friends are unable to perform the last rights of Christian burial overbids remains.