THE AVONDALE TRAGEDY.

Auckland Star, Volume XXIX, Issue 303, 23 December 1898, Page 2

THE AVONDALE TRAGEDY.

(To the Editor.)

Sir.—-I was surprised beyond measure on perusal Of the 'Star' last night to find, that Mr Bollard in his capacity of coroner had travelled out of the'way to/ criticise my evidence herein in "the following terms:—'Mr Abbott said the bill was found to be a forgery, but there was no evidence before them that such was the case. The bill was simply marked in the corner "signature unlike.' The coroner thought that when a man came to .that inquiry and made the statement that a document of that sort was pronounced a forgery, he was straining a point to make the memory of the deceased look as black as possible. There was nothing in the evidence to show that the signature was a forgery. He mentioned that fact in justice to the deceased.' My evidence before the jury was made under oath, and it was my bounden duty to state what transpired on the occasion of my interview with the deceased and the purport of my con^ versation with him. However much I was disposed to soften its effect, so that his representatives might not be pained, I had no alternative but to speak of things as they were. How such transparent and considerate remarks, supported by the facts, can be construed into 'the straining of a point to make the memory of the deceased look as black as possible,' must to the ordinary mind be inexplicable. The tribunal presided over by Mr Bollard was not the one to determine whether the instrument referred^ to was a forgery or not, and that point only came out incidentally in the narration of the conversation with the deceased. The coroner's grievance appeared to be that T did not suppress the truth, or that I expressed it in terms too strong, and therefore painful to his ears, but none the less carrying the facts, from which I cannot retract — I am, etc., JOHN ABBOTT.