TERRIBLE EXPERIENCE.

Waikato Times, Volume XXX, Issue 2465, 28 April 1888, Page 2 (Supplement)

TERRIBLE EXPERIENCE.

At Lincoln, Nebraska, a short time ago a working man named Smith way horribly mutilated in a remarkable manner, (hi 0, street, at the corner of Ninth, hanging from a telegraph pole and lying along the ground tor a distance was a broken telephone wire, which had in some manner become crossed, or in connection with one of the electric light wires. As Smith was passing along th-j street he saw the wire burning, and attracted by the strange appearance, and not realising what it was, evidently took hold of it to ascertain what it meant. The shock he received was terrific, and his shrieks brought crowds to the street. He was unable to loosen his hold on the wire, and it burned his hands to the very bone. In the man's writhing* and contortion] the charged wire came in contact with his head, burning out one of his eye 3 and laying the sule of his face open. Wherever it struck hit body it cut like a knife. A bystander, realising tho peril of tile man, ran to him, grabbing him to pull him from the wire, but by the shock he received when he came into contact with the hotly of the man he was knocked ton feet into tho street and utterly prostrate.! so that it was feared ho was aho, kilUs.l, By this tine the electricity had either burned the ;r.an Smith loose from the wire or he had succeeded in his struggles in breaking away. He was picked up and carried into an adjoining restaurant, and half a dozen physicians summoned. The man represented a horrible appearance, and ;los[jito the physician's efforts to, put him under the influence of morphine he shrieked and writhed in the agony he sulj'ered nqtil tal>en, to. the hospital.