REVELATIONS ABOUT THE HOKITIKA MURDER.
Mrs McGahey, wife of the man who lies in the Hokitika Gaol charged with the murder of Bell, arrived in Hokitika, by coach from Christchurch on Saturday, and soon after her arrival went to the police station and confessed that she had wilfully set fire to her husband’s house at Larry’s Creek in the month of December last. It appears from her story that funds were subscribed to enable her to leave Reefton, and that she went to Westport, and from that port to Lyttelton, She obtained employment as a servant to a family in Amberley. She was, however, constantly disturbed by apparitions of her husband and the murdered man Bell. These ghostly visitors urged upon her to make atonement, and as she could not bear their continued reproaches determined to come back to the Coast by the first opportunity to deliver herself up to justice. Sergeant Moller arrested her upon the charge of arson. She also informed the sergeant that she asked the spirit of the murdered man whether she should take her own life, but was advised to come over here and confess what she had done. Her statement was minute, she said she had walked twelve miles in order to burn down her house, which she resolved should never become the property of the mortgagee, after all her hard work to make a home for herself.
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Patea Mail, 19 May 1881, Page 3
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234REVELATIONS ABOUT THE HOKITIKA MURDER. Patea Mail, 19 May 1881, Page 3
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