DEATH OF PETER WALKER, Esq.

Waikato Times, Volume XIV, Issue 1178, 15 January 1880, Page 2

DEATH OF PETER WALKER, Esq.

It is our melancholy duty to record one of the most distressing accidents which hat fallen upon this community in the death yesterday afternoon of Mr Feter Walker of Kirildriroa. The deceased gentleman was so well-known, was so general a favorite, took so active a part in all public matters, and was a member of so many local institutions, that his decease is felt as a bereavement affecting each of us individually. Mr Walker has not been settled in this district more than, three years, but at the time of his decease occupied the position of member of the Waikato County Council, Junior Warden of the Lodge Beta, a member of the Oddfellows' Lodge, of the Cambridge Farmer's Club, and Troop Sergt.Major of the Hamilton Contingent Te Awamutu Cavalry. It appears that yesterday afternoon a servant drew Mr Walker's attention to a piece of fallen fencing, and whilst looking at it he heard the voices of dogs among his sheep in a paddock hard by, and saving that he would kill the animal this time, ran for his car- . bine and started in pursuit. Shortly afterwards the report of the piece was heaxd, and as Mr Walker did not return to the house, Mrs Walker went down to meet him, and was shocked at beholding her husband's body stretched across the lower middle wire of a fence. She ran soreaming back to the house, and her gestures attracted the attention of Mr Kelly then riding by upon the road. He rode up and asked what was the matter, and being told started at once for the spot, where he found the deceased lying across the wire of the fence, as though in the act of passing through, and the gun resting, as it had fallen from his hand, upon the wire. The ball had entered the lower part of the head below the jaw, passing completety through the skull,and death must have been instantaneous. The body -was removed to the house, and intelligence forwarded to Captain Steele, a near neighbour, who set out for the scene of the accident at onoe, accompanied by his daughter, and brought Mrs Walker over to his ow n place. An inquest will be held on the body this morning. The funeral will take place to-morrow afternoon. The members of the Masonic and Oddfellows Lodges, the Hamilton Light Infantry Band, and the Volunteers hare been summonsed to attend at 1 p.m. tomorrow, to take part in the last tribute of respect to the memory of the deoeased.