ACCIDENTS AND FATALITIES

Evening Star, Issue 7355, 29 October 1887, Page 2

ACCIDENTS AND FATALITIES

At about half-pasc ten last evening Alfred Reid met with a serious accident in the vicinity of the Rattray street railway station. Reid, who is about twenty-one years of age. and classified as a “ lad porter,” was engaged in his ordinary duty of extinguishing the signal lights around the station, and jumped on to an engine to get a lift on his way to one of the more distant lights in the direction of the goods sheds. The instant Reid alighted he was struck by the tender of an engine which was travelling on a parallel line in the same direction but at a faster rate than the one lie had jumped from, anc( appears to have turned a somersault falling. By good fortune h9 w^ B thrown clear of poui engines,"‘and consequently escaped' putjlation 5 but he nevertheless sustained severe injury to the head, the face, and the hip, and his back also appears to be hurt. Dr de Zouche attended tho sufferer it the railway station j and later in the evening Mr Ashcroft (station-paster) had ¥tn removed to the Hospital, field'd parents reside in- Qpoho. On Inquiry this morning we learnt that Reid was much about the same. He seems to have had a severe shock.

A sad fatality happened this morning to a young man named Robert D. Wilkinson, son of Mr Francis Wilkinson, contractor at Nevada. Jt appears that the deceased left hie hope early th}a morning on a pony to go shooting (a? js his oiistop every morning), aiid not returning within a reasonable time search 1 was made, with’ the result that his body was found. Judging from the appearance of the ground, it (3 assumed that the pony accidentally slipped and threw its rider from the saddle. Deceased, who was twenty-one years of age, was employed in his brother’s office Wilkinson, solicitor), * “ ' W yfoihdn named Roro Kakavyi \ya% burned to death at Te Koro, near Awanui, poverty Eiay, on Tuesday night, during thp absence of‘heir husband. Theiyoman usually kept a light burning, consisting of a fatlamp manufactured out of shell vegetable It is supposed this set fire to the bedclothes, and that she wps suffopated with the smoko, shp did apt" appear tp have made any attempt to escape. CHRISTCHURCH. Octtobee 28. At about 7.30 a.m. to-day a map named Michapl O’Brien, a platelayer, was killed Oft the railway betweep fhp Qhrigtchnrph station and the Gasworks road, ft was, big duty to“ examine the lipe, and while doing So ho was knocked down by the engine of the Southbridge train, which, with four trucks, passed over him, killing him instantly. The driver whistled when starting, but apparently the deceased did not hear it. The body was terribly mangled. Deceased was a married man with six children.