ACCIDENTS OFFENCES, ETC.

Temuka Leader, Issue 2748, 8 December 1894, Page 3

ACCIDENTS OFFENCES, ETC.

News is received from Bealey that a musterer named Thomas Parker, aged 54, was thrown from a horse about twentyfive miles from Mount White, and died from his injuries. At Christchurch on Thursday night a man named McGurr, over 50 years of ago, a„widower, was burned to death in a two ' roomed cottage at rear of Robinson's blacksmith’s shop in Asaph Street. The fire was confined to the interior of the building. The body of McGurr was found in an upright position sitting near a bunk. He was a farmer at Wakanui. A man named C. Taylor was also badly burned about the hands, back and neck. Upton, the real occupier of the house, escaped unhurt. The men had been smoking and drinking. At Ashburton on Thursday Aaron Withell, of Rakaia, was charged with assaulting his daughter Jane wdth a broom stick, and ordered to find two sureties of £lO each and bind himself over in the sum of £2O to keep' the peace for twelve months. Withell refused to find the sureties and said lie would go to gaol. At Oamaru James May, failing to obey an order of the court to provide for the maintenance of an. illegitimate child, was sentenced to three months’ hard labor. Mary Booth, alias Caroline Rout, alias, Frances Barrett, was arrested at Oamarh on a charge of vagrancy. She is wanted in Victoria and New South Wal6s for extensive forgeries. Constable Leahy, stationed at Stratford, died in the train on Tuesday night on the way to Wellington. He had been in New Plymouth hospital for some lime, and latterly his brain gave way and he was committed to the Wellington Asjlum on a doctor’s certificate, and was being brought down by ponstable Roche. He was very violent, !on the way, and near Otaki he died, the inquest the evidence showed that at* times on the journey he was very violent, but every care was taken not,!;to hurt him. It was shown that the deceased bad complained of overwork in to take charge of several Goverhinent offices, besides that of a constable. The medical evidence attributed death to syncope from failure of heart’s action, accelerated by softening of the brain and violent struggling.,; ft was shown that the man could not have lived long. . ; ! At Auckland a man named James Giant was killed by a fall from a trap at Papakura, caused by the wheel breaking. , A young woman named Tyne, wife of a carter at the Spit, Napier, died suddenly after an operation under chloroform. George Vanstein, formerly a resident of Clinton, has been arrested on a charge o maliciously setting fire to the premises of which he was the lessee.

Robert J. S. Todd, accountant in the Government Insurance Department, committed suicide at Wellington on Thursday. He was to leave for Sydney in the afternoon on six weeks’ leave. The news caused some sensation, Todd was the officer selected, with Mr Kember, to enquire into the public system of bookkeeping during the session. Enquiries were being made for him to sign some papers before his departure, when it was ascertained that about 1 p.m. he had blown his brains out at his lodgings at Thorndon. It is believed that he was going to Sydney to get married. It was his brother who shot himself in Dunedin in March last, and inexplicable as that suicide was, the present is still more startling. So far as is known at present, no reason can be assigned for the rash act. Todd was a jingle man, about 30 years of age. Shortly before 1 o’clock he went into his bedroom, undressed himself, and then retired to his bed. About 1 o’clock a report of a shot was heard, and on a fellow-lodger proceeding to Todd’s room he found him lying on his back on the bed, with all his clothes off, but with n towel round his waist. At his aide was a double-barrelled (run, one barrel of which had been discharged. The left side of his head and face were blown clean away, but Todd was still breathing, and he did not expire until 25 minutes after the shot had been fired. Deceased was well known and highly respected. The express train from Napier to Wellington on Thursday was stuck up in the Manawatu Gorge on the Woodville side of the tunnel. It is reported that the tender left the rails in crossing one of the iron viaducts, and that fifteen sleepers over the viaduct are smashed to pieces. The tender having been kept up by the girder prevented a more serious accident.