TERRIBLE TRAGEDY

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLIII, Issue 2250, 12 March 1921, Page 2

TERRIBLE TRAGEDY

THREE CHILDREN BURNED TO DEATH TX WANGANUI.

Wanganui, March 10. A terrible tragedy occurred tonight, three children losing their lives as the result of a fire in a dwelling house in Niblett Street. ■Their names are Frederick Arthur Bishop, aged 61 years, Lloyd Bishop, four years, and Gordon Harold Bishop, aged two years. Eight children were in Hie house in charge of Miss Gray, the .mother having gone to a neighbour’s. The brigade were on the scene in good time, hut the flames had a good hold. On learning that' the children were iti the house, the brigade men searched in the smoke-filled room, and found the bodies of the children named. Evidently they, wore dead long before the alarm had been given. For some time consternation was caused by the report that five more children were in the building, hut later it was discovered that a neighbour had rescued them, though one was so badly burned that she had to be sent to the hospital. The origin of the fire is not known.

Senior-Sergeant Bourlcc stated that in 40 years’ experience in the police force lie had had many pathetic duties to perform, hut nothing moved him so deeply as the sight of the bodies of three sturdy little chaps lying cold and still on the slab in the .morgue. The youngest hoy was badly burned, pieces of blackened kapoc adhering to the skin, hut the scars of the others were not so severe, and possibly they may have been mercifully suffocated without suffering greatly. Mrs Bishop states that she left her house to go to a neighbour’s at 8.15, the children being asleep. Miss Grey, an elderly lady who occupied the front room, took the hahv to bed with her, and live children were in a hack room and two iti another. Mrs McKenzie, the next door neighbour, and daughter saw flames issuing from the back portion of the house, and rushed for assistance, meeting Miss Gray and the baby coming out from the front room. After assisting these two to safely, Mrs McKenzie and her daughter rescued two others, including one from the hack bedroom, hut the flames prevented them re-entering by the door. They ran round to the back and tried to get in the window, hut a bed and elitist of drawers blocked ingress. The brigade then arrived and took over the rescue work.

Apparently the children were all asleep at the time of the outbreak. A young man named Henry Luke rescued a girl from the front room. She was burned about the hands, and died in the hospital later. One hoy escaped through a window.