BOYS IMAGINE

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 3, Issue 693, 20 November 1933, Page 2

BOYS IMAGINE

THINK^ ftE wk$ SHOt CQLLAPSRS AFTER EXPLOSION OF BLANK CARTRIDGES ON LINE purely excitembnt

London, October 13 An inquest verdict that death was catrsed by a ruptured blood-vessel, brought on aceidentally by exciteanent on John Wiilliam Carter, 12, who collapse4 at Uppingham Station with the cry, "I have been shot." i The incident occurred as a train bearing members of the Oundle School O.T.C. was rqoving off. There was a series of explosioiis caused by blarik cartridges which had been placed on the line. lCarter died several hours after his doll'apse. jEiyidence was g'ivein that there was no sign of ex'ternal injury. One of the dead boy's compianlions, a 12-year-old boy, Joriah Charles William s, said: "I thought Carter had been shot by, the way he fell backwards into my arms. I cannot say where the shot came from. It must haye hit him. It tpre a button off and made a hole in his coat." Mrs. May Elizabeth Baines, the boy's mother, said she took him, home from the station. He said on the way, J "I hav,e been shot in the stomach." She sumimoned Dr. Beaumont, who, she stated, said there was no bruise or anything to show the- cause of any injury which her son might have reeeived. About 4.30 the next morning h'e suddenly threiw up his arms aiid, with a cry of "Oh, Mummy! Mummy." died. Dr. A. R. Beaumont said that when he questioned the boy he implied that he had been shot. "I could find no mark bf his having been injured, and thought that he- would recover after a rest,rt the doetor added. "Later that day I saW him again, and he was fli^hed and very mujch worse. He died a ferw hours afterwards. There was a large clot of blood at the right f the right lung, and any unusual exer.tien would hring on haemorrhiage." After describing the boy's collapse and death, the coroner said: "There has been some suggestion that he was shot in the stomach, but the cartridges that were fired were blank and could do him no harrn. Any statement that the boy was shot is incorrect."