A STRANGE REQUEST.

Poverty Bay Standard, Volume X, Issue 1102, 20 July 1882, Page 4

A STRANGE REQUEST.

Hans Tapsell, Maketu, writing on the 12th June to the AZ Z. Herald, ■ays: —“My father, Hans Foreman Flack, commonly known as Phillip Tapsell, when alive expressed a very strong desire that at his death his body •hould be sewn up in a blanket and cast into the sea, stating that all his brothen in arms had been thus disposed of, and that, os ho had been all his life on tho salt water, ho wished the sea to bo his final resting place, He was formly an officer in the Danish navy, and fought against England at the battle of Copenhagen, when he commanded a privateer, and was severely wounded. My brothers and myself promised that his desire should be fulfilled, but ! was not present at his decease, or I should have insisted on that engagement being carried out. I believe the lato Sir Donald McLean, then Native Minister, was telegraphed to on the subject, but the Government would not sanction that course being adopted, and his body was accordingly buried in the Mnketu church cemetery Now, my conscience is troubling and reaproaching me for not fulfilling our solemn promise to my father, and my sleep is frequently disturbed by dreams having reference thereto. Such being the case, I applied to the Rev. Mr Spencer, the resident Church of England minister, for permission to disinter my father’s bones, with the intention of obeying his dying wish, but that gentleman refuses to sanction such a proceeding. My object m addressing this letter to the public through the columns of your widely circulated newspaper is to ventilate tho matter, and to sec if any European friends can bring foward any tangible objection to my adopting the course proposed.”