SOUTHERN CROSS PETROLEUM COMPANY.

Poverty Bay Standard, Volume XI, Issue 1321, 26 June 1883, Page 2

SOUTHERN CROSS PETROLEUM COMPANY.

A gentleman who has just come down from the Company’s spring has kindly favored us with the following information i -Hearing that the shaft was caving in, he and a friend went to see what was really the matter. They found Mr J. H. Stubbs on the ground making an inspection. On proceeding down the shaft to the depth of 110 feet, Mr Stubbs found the iron curbs which form the wall of the shaft bulged in, and the joints where they are braced together forced aud buckled in to an alarming extent, causing what should have been a circular shaft to assume an oval shape. There is little question but what the shaft would have been utterly lost had it not been for the indefatigable exertions of Mr Stubbs, who, with only the assistance of three men, fixed sets from 10 feet below the dangerous part right up to the top. The gentlemen say that too much praise cannot possibly be awarded to Mr Stubbs, as the shaft must have been lost in the course of a few more days, had not he (Mr Stubbs) hurried to the scene. But it nearly cost ,Mr Stubbs his life. It was thus—Mr Stubbs having placed a stage, consisting of two pieces across the shaft with each end resting on the projecting rim of the curb, and whilst standing on it he gave the signal to draw up the bucket. The engineer above found his engine on the point, and instead of putting his hand to the flywheel and assisting her off the dead point, he reversed her backwards a little, thus causing the large iron bucket to descend and grazing in in its passage downwards against the stage, passed beneath it, where it stopped for an instant, suddenly rising again it caught under the frail stage aud lifting it up threw Mr Stubbs backwards on the remaining half, which, most fortunately was not quite off the curb rim. The one half went thundering down the shaft, smashing and crashing until the fragments reached the bottom. The results had Mr Stubbs gone with it, may be imagined. Mr Fesler expresses himself as highly satisfied with the prospects of the Company.