CHRISTCHURCH.

Thames Star, Volume XVI, Issue 5092, 13 May 1885, Page 2

CHRISTCHURCH.

Yesterday. Child Buined to Death.

A sad occurrence happened at Sterling, three and a half miles from Christchurcb, this afternoon. The information to hand is to the effect that the parents, a laborer named Briggs, and his wife, left the two^ roometl cottage they occupied about 10 a.m.; their three children, the eldest a boy aged four years and three months, remained behind; the door was latched, but not locked, and a coal fire left burning in the grate, Mr 3 Brings returned at 1 p.m., and on entering the house found it full of smoke. On the floor lav the

eldest child dead, his body charred almost to a cinder; while beside him lay the youngest child, a boy of 11 months, burnt severely about the lower part of the body. The third child, two years old, was standing in a corner of the room. Mrs Briggs screamed for assistance, and^Mr R. P. Hale, who lives close by, came, and after rendering what help he could, rode off and fetched Dr Townsend, by whose advice the infant was removed to the Hospital, where be lies in a precarious state. A hole a foot in diameter was burnt in the floor where the body of the dead child was lying, and a smaller hole near. It is supposed that his clothes caught fire at the grate and he roiled about the room till he died. Deceased was named James Joel Briggs. '