STRUCK BY FALLING TREE.

Press, Volume LIV, Issue 16309, 5 September 1918, Page 9

STRUCK BY FALLING TREE.

♦ A FARMER KILLED. A strange fatality occurred at Irwell yesterday morning. George McClure, a well-known farmer of Killinchy, was sitting in a motor-car driven by his son, Koberfc McClure. and accompanied by his married daughter, Mrs Lemon, of Killinchy, and* her daughter, aged eight years, on his way to Christchurch from Leeston. As the car, with its hood up, was nearing the Irwell mill bridge, a poplar tree, which was being felled by Arthur King, an employee of the Southbridge Timber Company, crashed down on top of vehicle, smashing the hood, and striking the occupants of the front seat, George and Robert McClure. The driver was stunned, and the car ran on for a chain or so under no control, until it capsized into the Irwell creek. _ The occupants were thrown out, and it "was found that George McClure was dead, while his son had suffered cuts on the face and head. Mrs Lemon fell into the creek, from which King rescued her, but her daughter was thrown | clear. They were uninjured, except for bruises and shock. Dr. B. Volckman', of Leeston, was promptly summoned. and after' rendering aid to Robert McClure, brought him to the Christchttrch Hospital* There is some doubt as to whether Mr McClure's death was caused by the blow from the tree of by his fall from the car. The man who was falling the tree, King, calculated that it would fall on the land on which he was working, a part of Mr James Mawson s property, but it is stated that a gust of wind upset his calculations, and _it fell in a slanting direction across the road. An inquest will be held this morning at Leeston. , The tot© Mr McCluro was boni at Killinchy, County Down, Ireland in 1840, and arrived in l*iew Zealand m 1860 by the Mataoka. He was successively in the employ of Mr George Weston, of Kaiapoi, and of Mr Bealey, at the River Styx, and later near Leeston. He subsequently stated farmthe KilUnchy Domain Board' and EHesmere I Agricultural aid SStnn and Mr William McClure, who <u>rgii»'afe the front, are bia .on*.