LONELIEST MAN.

Auckland Star, Volume LVIII, Issue 89, 16 April 1927, Page 23

LONELIEST MAN.

VIGIL WITH RATS AND OWLS

EERIE JOB AT WEMBLEY

'"The loneliest man in London" is a description which might well be applied to Mr. George Beckwith, watchman at the derelict British Empire Exhibition at Wembley.

There are three watchmen now left, but Mr. Beckwith is the only one who lires and sleeps in the exhibition grounds. He occupies, with bis wife, a small hut. All about

them is the desolate, deserted, half-ruined waste which was once the exhibition.

I take my turn at night," Mr. Beckwith said, "the onlv sounds to be heard are the hoots of the owls aDd the scurrying of rats."

'"The rats and the stray cat* which prey on them, are the chief inhabitants of the exhibition now. There arj also some 20 or 30 pigeons left, and twice a week or so a lady comes to feed them. She has come regularly for the purpose ever since the exhibition closed. The birds are getting fewer now, and 1 think the cats have been getting at them.

"It takes me over two hours to make my round, and on a foggy night it is no joke, I can assure you. I have to feel my way and

be particularly careful I don't waik :r.to the lake.

*'I carry a hurricane lamp on my round. but that doesn't penetrate far in a fop. Our object in patrolling the place i« to see that no unauthorised person is wandering about.

"No. I can't say I have had any adveaturcs in the grounds beyond nearly falling down some of the big hole?, of which they are full.

"I walk round Africa. Awtrtlu. and Canada every night, but I doa't go inside unless I find the door open. I have to be very careful as I go past Canada just now. aa a lot of wood baa been stacked against the wall, and it make* the goins very awkward. It I should slip, nobody would find me until the morning.''