OCEAN DRAMA

Wairarapa Times-Age, 20 July 1938, Page 5

OCEAN DRAMA

MURDER, SUICIDE AND ACCIDENT. FIVE SUDDEN DEATHS. A story of five sudden deaths at sea —a murder, the suicide of the alleged murderer, and the drowning of three men of a boat’s crew who tried to rescue the murderer, was told when the steamer City of Norfolk, 8424 tons, tied up in London’s Royal Albert Docks. . ■ Passengers, who ran from the dining saloon when the ship suddenly stopped about 100 miles from the Cornish coast, crowded the rails and saw the second part of the drama. Priests gave conditional absolution to the men fighting for life in the Atlantic. The five men who died were Americans. Ernest H. Tropp, aged about 60, was stabbed tb death through the heart as he was cleaning celery in the ship’s galley. The man who is alleged to have killed him was a kitchen hand, Chris Magurio, aged about 21. He jumped overboard. A ship's motor-boat with 12 men on board was lowered into a heavy sea. The boat capsized as it hit the water, and the three men lost were Charles W. Kendall, carpenter, Bowie De Vries, baker, and William Buddenbohn, utility man. Nine men struggling in, the sea were picked up by the crew of another boat. Among the 65 passengers aboard were three priests on their way from America to attend the Eucharistic Congress in Budapest. Grey-haired Father Heubert, , of Chicago, and two younger men, Father, Antonious Bearsdon, of Tennessee, and Father Kostor, of Wyoming, saw the boat capsize and stood praying at the ship’s side. “I shall never forget that scene in the fast-fading light as those brave men went down,” Father Heubert said. The City of Norfolk’s searchlights were switched on to guide the rescue party in the second boat, and the steamer circled round and round as the rescuers searched for the drowning men for nearly five hours.

It was after midnight when the City of Norfolk began again her journey to London after picking up the capsized motor boat.

When the ship docked, Superintendent Frederick Bennett, of Scotland Yard, went on bejard to inquire about the murder.

Many stories of bravery were told. The ship’s linen-keeper, Yewis Miller, swam to one drowning man with an oar and gave it to him. Then Miller swam about for an hour until he found a lifebelt for himself.