TRAPPED IN MINE SHAFT

Evening Post, Volume CXII, Issue 64, 13 September 1926, Page 9

TRAPPED IN MINE SHAFT

PROSPECTOR'S PRIVATION

DRANK HIS OWN BLOOD,

(From Our Own Correspondent.)

SYDNEY, 3rd September

For nearly a week a South Australian mining prospector, William Forth, who is 54 years of age, was trapped in an old mining shaft into which ho had fallen, and to assuage his thirst, he cut one of his arms and drank the blood.

Forth is one of a number of prospectors who camp near abandoned goldfields and fossick among the old shafts in the hope of finding a reef of gold that has been missed when the field was in full swing. Last Sunday week, about midday, he loft his camp to go on one of theso fossicking trips, and when he came upon an open cut, he determined to explore it. In the dim light he failed to notice tho mouth of an open shaft, and in a moment ho was tumbling through inky darkness. When ho recovered consciousness ho w-as lying in ,the accumulated dust of yenrs, 100 feet from tho cut. How he was not killed instantly is impossible of explanation. Forth had a few matches, and by their light he explored the planking of tho shaft. With only a penknife ho began the laborious job of cutting hand and too holes. His sufferings : could have been made tho theme of a ; grim Victor Hugo novel. In darkness, J without food or water, cut and bruised, j with every day seeing fresh cuts and \ splinter wounds on his hands, arms, and ;!egs, Forth worked with his poor imple- ' rnent, scratching his way feebly to safeity. Throughout six days and for portions of some of tho nights, he kept gamely at his task. In a weakened condition, his strength was further depleted by tho moans to which he resorted to keep life in his body, and to ward off the devils of starvation and jthirst which wero attacking him. To do this ho made incisions in his arm with the penknife and drank the blood.

Early on Saturday afternoon, Forth

had climbed .fifty feet up the shaft. Hero ho hung in his perilous situation, half delirious and on tho point of collapse, but working in an automatic frenzy in response to tho instinct of solf-preservation. Suddenly in his dulled mind, Forth heard a shout. It was repeated, and then, summoning up all his remaining strength, he answered.

.The next moment a constable was giv-

ing him promise of speedy Tcliof from - the cut above. Leading a search party tho constable had explored the cut, and it was the scratching of Forth's penknife in the shaft below that gave him the clue to Forth's presence. With a lantern and ropes, tho constable descended the shaft, and in a few minutes tho hardy prospector was hoisted to the surface. Taken to hospital, ho soon regained strength, and in three 'days was almost back in normal health.