BOY DEAD

Bay of Plenty Times, Volume LXI, Issue 10923, 24 September 1932, Page 4

BOY DEAD

SHOT IN CHEST. Warialda (N.S.W.), Sept. 10. A shooting fatality occurred at about 5 p.m. yesterday at Trevallyn, a grazing property 14 miles from Warialda, the victim being Robert Blackie Austin, 13, a son of Dr Austin, of Armidale. The loy was spending his week’s holiday at Trevallyn, with Vernon Wiltshire, 13, a son of Mr P. V. Wiltshire. of the Inverell legal firm of Anderson, Wiltshire, and Manning, who own the property. The lads were on the homestead verandah, when Wiltshire picked up a pea-rifle, and was handling h, while the other hoy, a few yards away, was going through the drill exercise he was used to at school. The weapon unexpectedly exploded, and Austin fell to the floor. Wiltshire frantically rushed to the kitchen, and informed the cook what had happened, and several persons were quickly on the scene, but the boy was dead when picked up, having been shot through the chest. The boy’s father, accompanied by friends, arrived three hours later, and, after an inquest had been opened- and adjourned by the Coroner (Mr A. Stewart), was allowed to remove the body to Armidale for burial.