BROKEN ROMANCE.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 253, 24 October 1936, Page 4 (Supplement)

BROKEN ROMANCE.

FIANCE FOUND 'DEAD,

Torn between love for one man and pity and affection for. another, a girl heeded the call of her heart and told her fiance their engagement must be broken. Tragedy swiftly followed. The discarded fiance was found dead from gas-poisoning, with a . picture of his sweetheart not far from his side. The girl who changed her mind is Miss Doris Florence Greep, of Bulkeley Road, Norbury, S.W., and the man to whom she had been engaged for six months was- Eric Douglas Gammon (23), telephonist, of London Road, Norbury, S.W.

With tear-stained eyes, Miss Greep related how she thought she had loved Erifc Gammon for two years, but all the wliile Mr. "Bill" Rutland, an electrician, of Broadstairs, had held a big place in her mind. "Eric and Bill knew each other," she went on, "and I never made any secret of-my friendship with Bill, though Eric and I had arranged to be married in August.

"I liked him and was sorry for him, but it was pity, not love, I had for him. Some weeks ago we agreed to put off our wedding until Christinas, and subsequently I decided to spend a holiday a-t Broadstairs. We had a bit of a quarrel about this. Mr. Gammon didn't like the idea; he knew, of Course I should be meeting Bill. "When he made some remark about 'There is nothing much to live for now' after I had told him it must be all over between us, I never dreamed he meant to take his life. I just thought it was a figure of speech. "I was broken-hearted when I heard of his death the next day, but I know in my heart I did what any sensible woman would have done; when love changed I obeyed its call. You cannot control love," added Miss Greep. "It controls you. Knowing I cared for someone else, I simply had to break off my engagement." At the inquest, held at Croydon, the verdict was that Gammon had committed suicide while of unsound mind.