MISSING MAN

Hokitika Guardian, 13 July 1932, Page 5

MISSING MAN

REEFTON ARREST AFTER TWO YEARS, GREYMOUTH; > July 13. A- solution, of a niysterj? that started two years ago was made yesterday when Samuel .Rothera was brought to Greymouth under arrest. It will be remembered that on August 2nd, 193 U, a man named Samuel Rotiieia-was reported as having disappeared. He was last seen at - the Doctor’s. sui geiy at; Dobson, and it was concluded lie had been drowned in the Grey river. It lias come, therefore, as a revelation thf t he is net only alive and well but has been residing in Inangahua district since. He was. a married man with five children.

As a result of suspicions aroused inquiries have been made in the past few- days, and as the outcome, Samuel Rothera was arrested at Three Channel Flat, and arrived at Greymouth last evening in custody and will on Monday next make his appe>rance iii. the Afagistrate’s Court oii,. the charge:—'‘That he has, without reasonable cause, failed to provide , his wife, or children with adequate maintenance, and, therefore, has been guilty of an offence punishable by imprisonment for six months, under the Destitute Persons Act, 1910,” ‘ : :

Since his reported discppo;; retire no trace had been found' of tiie missing ma nuntil a few weeks ago. Sergeant Smytjie of Reefton became suspicious of a person residing in the Tnangahua Valley, and observation 'was kept on him, with the result that the man was arrested at Three Channel Flat this morning by Constable Horn and brought to Reefton. He was later brought up before the Court at Reefton, before Air W. J. Morris, J.P., a nd remanded to appear at Grevm-uth on Alonday next. Rothera. is a young man, apparently in tlie 30’s and looks in the pink of condition, and evidently his stay in the Inangahua Valley bas-cbm-pletely restored his health, which was stated at the time of his disappearance not to be satisfactory, he at that time, being advised by his medical man, to give up heavy work at the Dabs:n mine.

The feature of tlie case, of course, .that excites tlie greatest speculation is the fact that for such a long period any, West Coast resident could have "emained ‘‘missing” on the West Coast, and in that respect the man has doubtless set something of a record.

His relatives, have been residents of this - district in the meantime, without being aware of his whereabouts, and his wife, had hiee* the most confident of all that lie had lost his life when he vanished in 1930. No doubt when the full facts are recorded next Monday, the story will prove quite a proof of the. saying that “truth is stranger than fiction.” As Sam Taylor, the Tnangahua Valley - residents knew Rothera who worked at different times for fanners at Tiroroa on the relief works, where as a married man lie got in comparatively good time. Last year, Mrs Rothera. who deeply mourned her late husband, to whom she had been married for 13 years, inserted an “In Alemoriam” notice in the local press. " Since her husband’s mysterious and dramatic disappearance Air's Rothera has had a hard sti aggie to support herself and her . five children, the youngest of whom was only five weeks old when Air Rothera vanished—as it - was thought at the time, into the Grey river. She worked for 23 weeks after he was reported missing, and t/hen received - , . received the Widow’s Tension but despite that she had a ...severe struggle to keep‘going onbthe £2 14s ■per week. Besides, Air Rothera left £6O of debts, and she paid these debts out of honour, as she thought, to her “dead” husband, and because she thought he was worth it. She had supplemented her income by going out washing and doing knitting. She had contemplated going Home to her people in England, but it. was a. difficult matter to arrange, and had not been final- ‘ ised.

It has transpired that Rothera has been living with a young woman who had previously been in -his employ when he carried on a laundry in Greymouth some years before his disappearance.