TRAGEDY IN KITCHEN

Manawatu Standard, Volume LVIII, Issue 43, 19 January 1938, Page 12

TRAGEDY IN KITCHEN

FATHER’S FATAL BURNS

WAIHT, Jab. 17. The evidence of Douglas Herbert Cartman, aged 20, was taken in hospital at the adjourned inquest concerning the deatli of his father, Frederick Augustus Cartman, who was fatally burnt at his homo by the explosion of benzine.

Witness said his father, after filling a cigarette lighter from a full bottle of benzine, was passing between the table and the stove in his kitchen when he accidentally dropped the bottle on the floor. The benzine caught fire, and an explosion followed, both his father and witness being enveloped in flames.

Witness managed to crawl under, the bedclothes in an adjoining bedroom and put out the flames in bis clothing. Meanwhile his father rushed outside, and witness procured a couple of sheets and wrapped them around his father, who was screaming in agony. Soon afterwards both were taken to hosiptal. Witness said the heat of the fire had caused the explosion. His father had two fingers missing from one hand as a result of a mine accident, and would not be able to hold the bottle finnlv. Flames had started on the mantelpiece, but witness had managed to extinguish them.

Dr A. Jenkins said death had resulted from toxaemia, the result of extensive burns.

The Coroner returned a verdict of accidental death.

The gold badge of the Lifeboat Institution has been given to Mrs Manby, a Staffordshire ladv of Codsail. who with her helpers has knitted 1525 woollen scarves for lifeboatmen.