FIVE DAYS AT THE BOTTOM OF A SHAFT.

Globe, Volume VI, Issue 686, 31 August 1876, Page 3

FIVE DAYS AT THE BOTTOM OF A SHAFT.

The Inglewood correspondent of the Bendigo Advertiser gives the following account of the extraordinary sufferings endured by a man named Joseph Walker, who had been missing from Inglewood for several days, but turned up again on Tuesday, the 16th instant:—About midnight on Thursday, the 10th instant, Walker, with J. Deslandes, juo, started out of the farm belonging to the father of the latter, where Walker had been at work. On getting to the corner of Mr Wright's fence at Old Inglewood, Walker, who was drunk, refused to go any further, and, after many efforts on the part of young Deslandes to induce him to proceed, he left him, taking the precaution, however, of getting from Walker a bottle of gin he had with him. This was 3 o'clock on Friday morning. Deslandes reached home at Hope Creek soon after, and by Saturday night all on the farm, not hearing of Walker's arrival became anxious. Sunday, . Monday, and Tuesday morning were spent in seaching for the missing man, but no trace of him could be found. At last, on Tuesday afternoon. Mrs Wright was astonished to see a wildlooking man, without hat, coat, or boots, with glaring eyes and haggard look, all re maining clothes being torn to shreds, m iking towards her house. She did not ktow him at first, but soon found that it was noj othei than the missing man, Walker. He sank down exhausted in the place, and afterwards related to several persons the cause of his unaccountable absence. He stated that being quite drunk at the time Deslandes left him, he must have tried to make his way to the farm, and in doing so crossed the creek in a shallow part, and then continued on until he walked down an old shaft 46ft deep. He does not remember falling, but found himself at the bottom on becoming sober little the worse for his fall, there some mud into which he sank up to his knees. Observing that it was daylight, he commenced shouting and cooeying, and kept it up until darkness set in. When daylight again showed he resumed cooeying, and then tried to climb up, but there beingnofoot holes he soon desisted. Next day (Sunday) he had got too weak to shout, and made another effort to liberate him»elf, trying to dig foot holes with a piece of wood, which soon proved too rotten and being without a pocketknife he gave it up in despair. On Monday the pangs of thirst became unbearable. He says he thinks that evening he must have been getting deliriou?, for he lay down thinking that Mrs Wright, one of the last persons he had seen, wan making tea for him, and he was drinking, enjoying it with all kinds of delicacies in the way of food. That night he had quite made up his mind that he was to di<; there. On Tuesday morning he decided t > make defiperate effortß to get up the shaft, thinkin,-;, as he states, that he might as well be killed in struggling for liberty as to quietly starve to death. He divested him self of coat, hat, and boots, and commenced to wriggle himself up with elbows, shouldern, and feet, chimney sweep fashion, tearing and cutting his flesh at every movement. In this way he climbed to within four feet of the surface, then fell to the bottora, again, cutting and bruising himself. After a short rest he commenced the painful process again, and after much labor got his head level with' the surface. He clutched a twig, which broke, and in order to save himself from another descent, threw himself forward and caught hold of a log. There he hung in frightful agony for a few minutes, and, finding his arms failing, raised himself up a little and partly hung by his chiu, and so, after resting his arms a little, managed, with much difficulty and labor, to drag himself clear, once more standing on the surface, but a terrible object to look at. He went towards Mrs Wright's, half a mile off, and on the way lay down to drink at a pool, of which he says he swallowed about a gallon. He then reached Mrs Wright's. She carefully fed him with light food, such as brandy, eggi, &o, Had poor Walker only shouted out

on Tuesday, instead of climbing, he might have saved himself much intense suffering, as just as he reached the surface a carter passed within fifty yards. The reason the man was not found by those searching for him appears to be owing to his having crossed the creek, the searchers believing that had he reached as far as the creek he had been drowned in it, therefore never troubling about the shafts on the other side, into one of which he had tumbled, after escaping the danger of the creek. It is fortunate, indeed, that Walker saved hiranelf as he did, for the bole being in a lonely part of the bush, h*' would, in all probability, have died there, and in a few months the well-known caving in of old shafts would have covered the body. and all trace been for ever lost. The duration of Walker's imprisonment was five days and tour nights, or about 106 hours, being without food all that time, and nine hours previously. That a man could live for 115 hours without a bite of food, and make such exertions at last, seems almost incredible. Walker is a native of Wapping, London, and was a schoolmate and intimate acquaintance of the real Arthur Orton.