CHARGES AGAINST A CLERGYMAN.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 9572, 19 August 1909, Page 5

CHARGES AGAINST A CLERGYMAN.

Received August 18, 7.25 p.m. BRISBANE, August H. The Government officials have concluded their enquiry into the grave charges made against Rev. Nicholas Ley, superintendent of the Mapoon Mission, involving alleged cruelty to natives. The charges were made by Michael Baltzer, and were circulated in Germany last year by a sister of Baltzer's, and communicated officially by Bishop Latrobe, of the Moravian Board of Missions to the Australian Freabytarian Board of Missions, who controlled the Mapoon settlement. Baltzer alleged that a half caste girl named Ellen had been unmercifully beaten with stingaree tails and whips for striking Mrs Hey. Baltz?r, in evidence before the enquiry, stated that the flogging was carried out by Hey and himself at the former's instigation.

Ellen, in her evidence, admitted being flogged and that a dinghy chain had been put round her neck after it, b::t with the exception of that one beating she had been kindly treated at the mission.

Hey, in his evidence, stated that Ellen was whipped for assaulting his wife. He explained to the children who witnessed the punishment why it was given, and how serious the offance was. The girl received 25 cuts, not 100, as alleged by Baltzer. He asked the latter to carry out the puhishment, as he did not like to inflict corporal punishment on anyone. He considered it a severe whipping. He would have administered the same punishment to one of his own children under f he same circumstances.

It appears that Baltzer, it; August last year, wrote to the Moravian Mission Board, volun^aril; - retracting the chargeb made against Hey. Other charges were preferred by Baltzer, but a? he could only offer hearsay evidence they were strutk out, and the Bench, after a full inquiry, dismissed the charge against Hey.