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Hawke's Bay Times, Volume 13, Issue 663, 11 March 1869, Page 2

Death by Lightwing.— During the storm on the 30th January (says the Western Post) the house of William Rayn*r, who resides at Sawpit Flat, near Bocoble, was struck by lightning, and Mrs Rayner •was killed on the spot. We regret to learn that seven children are left motherless by this melancholy catastrophe. Mrs Rayner was much respected, and a considerable number of persons followed her remains to the grave at her funeral yesterday. Dr. Ramsay gives us the following notes of the erratic nature of the course of the electric fluid, which he made when examining the building:—The lightning entered the bark roof in several places, as if it had been fired into with grape shot. The tracing of Mrs Rayuer'a hair net is distinctly to be seen on the wall against which her head was leaning. In the course of the electric fluid through the house it knocked a piece out of the casing of a clock which it stopped. It then struck two knives, and making its way out, ran along a bullock bow, killing two fowls. The death of Mrs Rayner was instantaneous, her head having been set on fire. Rayner is severely burned, the lightning striking him first on the left shoulder, crossing his back, and running along the right side. Two of the children are slightly scorched. At the inquest William Rayner deposed:—l am husband of the deceased. She was on a couch in the sitting-room of my house on Saturday last, at a quarter to 9 p.m., and I was seated in front of her on a chair, when a shock struck me and rendered me insensible, but I soon recovered and heard the children crying. On looking round I observed my wife's neck in flames. I could not move, but called the children to bring some water. They brought it, and I drank a little. They had previously extinguished the fire on my wife's clothes. I was going to lie down, and observed my wife was dead. I was struck on the left shoulder, and the current of electricity crossed my back and ran down my right leg. It also branched to my left leg. My wife was killed instantly. The shock affected some of the children. One of the girls showed a mark where she had been scorched by the lightning, and this peculiarity of scorching the skin Dr. King sajs he never noticed in any cases where he had examined bodies struck by lightning before. A corkscrew was hanging up against the partition, and the tip of the screw is melted off. We may also observe that during the night of the storm a man named Wellington was in a hayloft at Burruudulla, when he saw one trerrendous flash of lightning in the direction of Redbank. It seemed to him » vivid flame burst from the ground, instantaneously accompanied by & loud report and the rising of smoke. Several other persons witnessed the phenomenon, and there seems to be no doubt that it was what is ordinarily termed a thunderbolt. The spot which was struck could not be accurately distinguished owing to the darkness, of the atmosphere.