GLOOM FOR MANY

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 305, 26 December 1928, Page 7

GLOOM FOR MANY

CHRISTMAS TRAGEDY

Boy Shot While Mother Buys

Toys.

PATHETIC STORY

(Received 11 a.m.) MELBOURNE, this day. While his mother was in the city on Monday buying toys for Christmas Jack Pope, aged ten, was shot dead in his home at Moorabbin. Shortly after the tragedy an elder- brother, named Philip, aged fourteen, left the house and has not been seen since. The fatal weapon was a shotgun, which was found with one barrel discharged.

Five other young children were in the house but are unable to say how the shooting occurred. They only knew that Philip had gone, saying he would tell his mother and the police of the shooting.

The father was away at work and the mother returned to find Jack lying in a passage of the house. The gun had been replaced on the nail on which it uslially hung in the father's room. RAILWAY SMASH. 40 Injured In Melbourne Mishap. DISASTER JUST MISSED. (Australian and N.Z. Press Association.) (Received 11 a.m.) MELBOURNE, December 25. A holiday train from Melbourne to Yarram, 136 miles south-cast of Melbourne, was entering Koowerup station at a speed of 25 miles an hour when it fouled the tender of a milk train. The sides of five out of the six coaches that comprised the passenger train were ripped out, the last car being the only one to escape. Forty persons, were injured, and 18 of tliem were taken to hospital. No one, however, was seriously hurt, so far as can be ascertained.

The passengers behaved splendidly, there being no panic. Relief trains were hurried to the scene and took the people to their destinations. It was fortunate that the passenger train whs slowing down, or the disaster would have been appalling. The locomotive of the mill: train was shunting down the yard, and the tender somehow had not quite cleared til*? points. The victims were still in hospital today. Only one, an 11-year-old bov, who has a fractured skull and other injuries, is on the danger list. Many of the 300 holiday-makers, who were bound for (jiippslaml, decided t.o abandon the outing and returned to their homes. FIREWORKS DEATHS. FATALITIES IN AMERICA. (Australian and N.Z. Press Association.) (Keci.'ivpU 11 a.m.) NEW YORK, December -5. Seven children were killed as the result of Accidents arising from the custom in southern States of celebrating Christmas, with fireworks. Four youngsters lost their lives at. Hazard, in Kentucky, when a fireoracker, tossed in fun, landed in a can of blasting powder. There was an explosion, followed by a fire, in which the mother of two of the youngsters was also badly burned. Three children at Carterville, Georgia, earning Christmas money as temporary clerks in a fireworks store were burned to death when a Roman candle, lit by a customer, caused a fire and an explosion. A fourth person, a young woman of eighteen, was also burned and may riot recover. SYDNEY TOLL. THREE DEAD, 21 INJURED. (Received 1 p.m.) SYDNEY, this day. Three dead and 21 injured is the roll of the Christmas Day casualties in Sydney. and suburbs. Two of the deaths are the result of motor accidents, the third being that of a settler, who was run down by a train. One of the injured men had his right eye torn out when a car crashed into a tram. Several others are in a critical condition. Tragedy brought a sad Christmas to the Wright family of Merrickville. Leo, aged eleven, received a cricket ball from his father as a Christmas present. A few hours later, while playing with some other boys, the ball was hit on to the roof of a factory and while endeavouring to recover it young Wright crashed through a glass skylight to a concrete floor 30 feet below. Ambulance officers smashed in a door and found Wright dead.