AN EXTRAORDINARY FIRE.

Te Aroha News, Volume VI, Issue 297, 8 September 1888, Page 6

AN EXTRAORDINARY FIRE.

; ' .f , _ Blenheim, Sept. 5. A firk broke out about midnight yesterday in Corbett's Temperance Board ing-house in Maxwell Road.' The proprietor and family and most of his 1 eight boarders were asleep, but : providentially one boarder named Walker/ a billiardist, returned late. On entering, he found a strange man 01: the' - sofa, and the sitting - room was full i 'of smoke. Walker roused the landlord, but in the confusion and smoke the -strange man ■ went away. In a minute the house was in flames, and the boarders lost everything but their lives. The^ family only just got out in time, and the "house and nearly all its contents were quite destroyed. The adjoining house (Rayner's) and the opposite one (Dr. Cleghorn's) were saved with difficulty. At -teu o'clock this morning Constable franklin arrested a man at the Commercial Hotel charged with being illegally on Gorbett's premises. He proved to be Dan Peter Jacobsen. He said he went in for a bed," but could not make anybody hear, so lay down. No connecting evidence was adduced. He was sent to gaol for fourteen days.

AMOUNT OF DAMAGES. The insurances on the properties aftected by the fire afc Corbctt's boarding-house are as follows ;— = Corbet's furniture, £85, in the Norwich Union ' Office; house, £400 in the Liverpool, London and Globe Office ; M. Rayner's house, £30 in the Royal ; T. Rayner's, only about £4 damage done.