FEARFUL CATASTROPHE.

Wairarapa Standard, Volume I, Issue 14, 6 April 1867, Page 3

FEARFUL CATASTROPHE.

We take the following from the “ Horae News—Again I have to chronicle a fearful accident, or rather disaster, and one which has caused more sensation in the metropolis than anything which I can remember. Those who know the Regent's park are aware that it is adorned by a very fine piece of water, in one part very broad, in other parts narrow, and which has very picturesque islands, and is altogether an exceedingly beautiful thing. This water is partly enclosed for the benefit of the inhabitants of the terraces, but it is also open to the public, and is much used in the summer for boating; in the winter it is a capital skating ground. We have had a very severe frost, and all London has been skating. Though the ice in the early part of last week was bad, and known to be unsafe, it was crowded on the afternoon of Jan. 15. Just before the Iron Men, once of St. Dunstan’s, but now the timists for the Regent’s Park, struck four on their bells, the ice parted in all directions, and when the hour was struck some 200 persons were screaming and floundering in the benumbing waters of the lake. Many were fortunate enough to be in the shallows, and to scramble to shore, many were rescued by the icemen and by volunteers, some of whom displayed noble courage; but many went down and rose no more. The number who have perished is not yet known, but we fear that it will be made up to 50 at least. Forty-one bodies have been carried away and identified, but among these are not included several persons who were at once taken home and have died, and there are a few missing persons yet to be accounted for. It is the saddest disaster which has occured in London for many years, and the agitation which it caused all over the metropolis on that night will not be forgotten. Various attempts are made to fasten .blame on anybody but the blameworthy; but the feet is that the people of London caused the accident. Safe or unsafe ice will be rushed upon, and we have no authority possessing the legal right to prevent

' t : il Soi " e ,f a y 1 perhaps, wc shall have one. kittle children, valuable men, blight lads, are among the dead. Phe lake was dragged for several days, and has been searched by a diver but as the still missing bodies have not been found (there arc many feet of mud in the place), Lord John Maimers has ordered the water to be drawn off, and it is being now done. A small incident of the catastrophe shows that there must always be in London a number of persons of the most uncertain habits. At least a dozen persons were missed from their homes about the time of the accident, and their friends naturally supposed them to have gone in the ice, and advertised their names. Thev gradually turned up, and appear to have gone away without any definite intentions. One man was actually saved from the ice, yet he stayed away for two or three days, giving his friends n ° j 8 of his whereabouts. The frost has ended, but it went away in the most hidous manner, the streets at night being suddenly glazed with hail, rain, and snow, and thousands ot persons came to grief that night. The hospitals are full of people dangerously hurt and one hears of a dozen casualties in every domestic circle. I had my own share, and write at this moment in extreme pain, a fact which I should not, of course, intrude, but I am disabled, in a great measure, from work and am obliged to re-arrange for this letter some paragraphs I have written elsewhere during the month.