A Masterton Sensation.

Manawatu Herald, 28 February 1899, Page 2

A Masterton Sensation.

HUMAN BODY EXHUMED. An event unprecedented in the history of Masterton took place in the local cemetery on Saturday morning, says the " Daily Times," when the body of the late Mrs Susannah Pain was exhumed for further examination. | Since the conviction of Robert : Douglas for criminal assault at the re- ! cent criminal sessions of the Supreme | Court, various rumours have been afloat regarding the manner in which Mrs Susannah Pain met her death, she having been last seen alive in convict Douglas's company on the 22nd of October .last. Finally, it was deemed advisable by the Department of Justice, in order to allay popular excitement, which had been growing in intensity since the commission of the Opaki outrage, to exhume the body of the deceased woman, who, according to the verdict at an inquest held on her body, met her death by drowning while in a lit, and hold a further examination on the remains. - Accordingly the coffin was removed 'to the Masterton morgue early on I Saturday, pending the arrival of Dr Teare, Police Surgeon of Wellington, by the morning train. Dr Butement, who gave evidence at the inquest to \ the effect that deceased died from as- I phyxia, due to drowning, and further stated that, as she was subject to fits, the fatal accident probably occurred during a seizure, was also present at the second examination, which took place on Dr Teare's arrival. An undertaker present having removed the coffin lid, the doctors proceeded to complete their gruesome task by amputating the skull. Our contemporary is not quite correct in stating that the exhumation was unprecedented in the history of Masterton. As a matter of fact, a corpse was exhumed at that place at the time when " the severed hand mystery " created a sensation throughout the colony, it being erroneously thought at the time that a hand had been removed from a newly-buried jjpdy lying io tfco local cemetery.

We have ascertained that Dr Teare was unable to find any sign of an injury having been inflicted on the head of the corpse. It is understood that it was expected that a shot or bullet wound would be found there. A faint * bruise was discovered on the front portion of the amputated head — which might have been caused naturally, the deceased having been subject to fits— but nothing more. — N.Z. Times.