THE ESCAPE OF MRS. WILSON.

Tuapeka Times, Volume 1, Issue 43, 5 December 1868, Page 6

THE ESCAPE OF MRS. WILSON.

. I (From the) k< Hawke's Bay Herald.") ; 1 was greatly astonished this morning between 11 and 12, to hear that poor Mrs. Wilson was still alive, and that her son Jemmy had found his way to Turanganui. Sho is badly wounded, I am afraid, but as she has lived on so long with very little to eat, it does not seem impossible that she may recover. Little Jemmy is a brave little lad. He came towards the Bloomfield's when the Hauhaus were killing his father, and slept in the verandah, possibly before the Bloomfields. left. In the day he wandered about, ?iofc having the least idea that his mother or any one belonging to him was stiU alive ; and, as far as I can make out it must have been Thursday before he found her out. She had been left for dead at the time of the massacre. A Maori came and took away her shawl, which besides her night dress^ was all the covering she had on, poor lady. She lay exposed to the sun and weather a whole night and day ; she then managed to crawl into a small oat building which was left standing, and there Jeoimy found her. She had managed to get herself a little water in a small tea-kettle, and drank out of a broken bottle. When Jemmy found her he got her some eggs and cooked them, I suppose by her direction, in the tea-kettle. He also fetched her a few potatoes and a little bread from Toanga. He tried twice, he said, to make his way Turanganui, but did not succeed. There was a party sent out to-day to look round and see what there might be seen. They met him, and brought him in, and then went out again to look for his mother, and brought her in. [The writer here details the arrangements made for the i,poor lady's comfort by the Yen. Archdeacon Williams and others, including the attentions of Mrs. Jennings, one of the very few females left, the wife of a man formerly with Mr. Dodd.] Mrs. Wilson had written a few lines on a cart, asking for help and Jemmy brought it with him. The following is a copy: — "Could some kind friend come to our help, for Grod's sake. I am very j much wounded, lying in a little shed at our place. My poor son James is with me. Come quick. Alice Wilson. We have little or no clothing, and are in dreadful suffering." Tlie writer of the above letter does not state what injuries Mrs. Wilson had sustained. Our correspondent mentions two bayonot wounds; but the generally received account is that she had two severe injuries — a bayonet thrust through the abdomen and the thigh — and five less serious wounds.