MURDERED CHILDREN.

Auckland Star, Volume XLIV, Issue 184, 4 August 1913, Page 5

MURDERED CHILDREN.

THEIR FATHEB'S CRTTEIiTY. ("Sydney Snn" Special Service.) LOKDON, August 3. . At the inquest on the Uirco children who went found iniindered at Hackney, and whoM father, Frederick Rohcrtson, is changed with the crime, evidence was givr.n by Phoelo Smitli, ivlio iived at Babertiion's house. On June 23 he informed her when r.he a/;l:cfl about the children that it «a.'i all rigt, a man liad taken the cliildrcn nivay that morning. In the

afternoon Robortron finid that they had gone to the .Salvation Army, and declared that they wen not stopping in tlio house because the landlord had not repaired it. Ttobertenn v/nn cruel in the children, .rml rjn.irrelled with hia wife. He paid he would not tolerato tlio cblldrtfl frying. 'Jim wUiiwh identified the bUnket in wliifh thfi rhildrnn worn found wrapped an rtobcrtfion'n properly, Ihc. inquiry OT# ndjoiirned. A fortnight URO, an n. rranlfc of complaint:! nlwnt an olmoxiouu nnifll, a rr.ircli wnn made in a TTfickncj , nnd under a looot board the dead body nf n nine-months-old infant wan found. Then Home lirlekd were removed from n wall in Hie mllar, nnd the bodies of two more children, twinn, 24 you™ old, were discovered. An a'result of their inquiries the police found that the rooms in the house were occupied Fix fvcekH ngo by Frederick RolwtHo.i, o yonnß man wfth a wooden leg, and his wife and children. It was further ascertained that the wife had recently lieen admitted to an infirmary Mifferinß from nervous breakdown, and that ihe husband had pone away, after having told a neighbour that the children had been handed over to the care of some friends.