RAILWAY FATALITY

Evening Post, Volume XCII, Issue 74, 25 September 1916, Page 8

RAILWAY FATALITY

MAN RUN OVER ON HUTT LINE.

On Saturday night Engine-driver Parkes, who was with the train leaving Lambton Station for Upper Hutt at 10.35 p.m., noticed something lying at the side of the line a short distance north of Kaiwarra station. On making a closer examination he found the object to be the body of a man, terribly mangled in the lower extremities and with a slight cut on the head. By ths papers found on the body it was ascertained that the deceased was John William Wilkins, who resided with his wife and two children at 95, Richmond-street, Petone. He was 34 years of age and had been employed in the railway timber yard at Kaiwarra.

Enquires made to-day show that the affair is somewhat cloaked in mystery. It appears that the deceased came to the city on Saturday afternoon to see the parade of .-the 17th Reinforcements, and informed his wife that he would not be home to dinner. He was not seen by anybody to board a train at Lambton Station, and nothing was noticed by those on board the train which passed through Kaiwarra at 9.30 p.m. The only indication of deceased's movements is furnished by a man who informed the police that he saw Wilkins proceeding in the direction of the Lambton Station at about ten minutes past seven on Saturday evening. As to the accident itself, the police state that they aro so far unable to secure any direct evidence whatever. Deceased was a sober, reliable man, and his tragic death is wholly' unaccountable. The body was removed to the morgue, but the fixing of an inquest has been postponed pending further information.