Inquests Into Deaths In Akaroa Fire Opened

Press, Volume CI, Issue 29713, 5 January 1962, Page 8

Inquests Into Deaths In Akaroa Fire Opened

Inquests into the deaths of the four persons who died in the fire which destroyed the Hotel Metropole at Akaroa between 1 a.m. and 2 a.m. on Wednesday were opened before the Christchurch Coroner (Mr A. T. Bell) at the Christchurch Central Police Station last evening.

Those who died were identified as Thomas James Crotty, aged 23, single, a driver, of Akaroa; Patricia Oreti Knowles, aged 34, a divorced woman, of Christchurch; and Toni Francis Knowles, aged 14, and Allan Kevin Knowles, aged 12, both schoolboys and sons of Patricia Oreti Knowles.

After hearing evidence of identification the Coroner issued burial certificates, and adjourned the inquests sine die.

The funeral of Mr Crotty will take place at Le Bolts Bay today and the funerals of Mrs Knowles and her sons will take place in Christchurch tomorrow.

Detective-Sergeant L. D Harrowfield conducted the proceedings for the police. Colleen Teresa King, wife of the licensee of the Hotel Metropole Bernard Peter King, said that her husband took over the licence of the hotel on November 5, 1961. On Tuesday night she went to bed about 10 o’clock. Her bedroom was at the rear of the hotel. She read for a time, then dozed. She remembered her husband coming to bed about 11.30 p.m. “Some time during the night, I woke and heard someone calling ‘Fire’,” the witness said. “My husband was then pushing me out of bed. I rushed and opened the bedroom door, but was driven back by billowing smoke in the passageway. I also saw flames. ‘‘Bedroom Caught Fire” “My bedroom immediately appeared to catch fire, and I was forced to leave the room by the window to the fire escape. I left in my night attire and nothing else. I was no sooner out the window than

the whole building appeared to be enveloped in flames.” The witness said she was in charge of the guests at the hotel and knew Mrs Knowles. Mrs Knowles booked into the hotel on December 30 with her two sons and her mother, Olive Rita Ennis.

“After the fire, I accounted for all the guests with the ex. ception of four,” the witness said. “I could not account for Patricia Oreti Knowles, and she has not been seen since.” The witness said that Crotty telephoned her on January 2 and said he would be coming to the hotel to stay the night. She told him to occupy room 10, which was vacant. After the Are she could not account for Crotty, and he had not been seen since.

Allan and Toni Knowles occupied room 19 each night after they booked into the hotel with their mother and grandmother, the witness said. “After I escaped through the bedroom window on the night of the fire I heard screaming coming from the room occupied by the boys," the witness said. “I thought I might be able to reach their bedroom bv the window, but as I left the window of another room after assisting a person out, the whole building was enveloped with flames.”

Constable’s Evidence Joseph Rudhall, a police

constable stationed at Akaroa, said that at 1.25 a,tn. be received a message that the Hotel Metropole was on fire. The building was a total loss by 2 am. The witness said that after the fire he recovered the burnt remains of a body, which was unrecognisable.

The body was immediately below room No. 10, where Crotty had been booked in, and was the largest of the four recovered. Crotty was the only adult male in the hotel at the time of the fire not accounted for.

Jeanette Edna Ruth Huiston, Crotty’s fiancee, had been staying at Akaroa from Boxing Day, the witness said. She had been to the pictures with Crotty on the night of the fire. Crotty had seen her to the door of where she was staying and had left her at 11 p.m. Crotty had told his fiancee that he was very tired and was going straight to bed. His fiancee knew Crotty was booked in at the Hotel Metropole and when she last saw him be wa® walking along the street in the direction of the hotel. The witness said that he found the remains of two children’s bodies, one slightly larger than the other, both unrecognisable, below room No. 19 where the Knowles boys had been booked in He found burned human remains immediately below room No 8, where Mrs Knowles had been booked in.

Dr. C. T. B. Pearson, a pathologist, said he examined the remain® of four human bodies in the Courthouse at Akaroa on January 3. On January 4, at the Christchurch Public Hospital morgue, he established that the remain® were those of a developed male. a female, and two approximately teenage males.