SUDDEN DEATH ON SHOW GROUND

Evening Star, Issue 18543, 28 January 1924, Page 6

SUDDEN DEATH ON SHOW GROUND

HEART DISEASE THE CAUSE. An inquest was held at Palmerston on Saturday by the coroner (Mr H. W. Bundle, S.M.) concerning tile death of Henry Francis Wilson, whic hoocurred at the Palmerston Show Ground on Friday last. Grace Ellen Wilson, daughter of deceased, said the latter was a shepherd, forty-nlno years of age. On the previous day he took a dray with stock to the Palmerston Show Grounds. Witness saw him yoking up in the afternoon, and the horses appeared restive. She toldhim to wait till someone came to help him, hut lie said he’d bo all right. She then left. Deceased had suffered from heart trouble during the last few years. A Dunedin doctor h'ad told him two years ago that he had goitre. John Cameron, shepherd, gave evidence concerning what might happen when yoking up fractious horses. Mary Elizabeth Parkhill said that she also saw deceased trying to yoke up.. She passed him, but on looking back sas him lying on the ground, and the near wheel pass between his legs. A man caught hold of the horses, and backed them, preventing it going over deceased’s body. When witness went back deceased was breathing in the ordinary manner. Dr T. Theodore Thomas, who was called to attend deceased, at the show grounds, said that on reaching the spot he found deceased lying on his back. The face was deeply cyanosed, and there was no pulse to be felt. The only-signs of life were a few sighing respirations. Witness concluded he was in a dying condition, and applied restorative methods, but without avail. On superficial examination lie could find no sign of external injury. On January 25, under instructions from the coroner, he made a post-mortem examination. Superficially no signs of injury were revealed, with the exception of a slight depression in the flesh of the left thigh, which might have been caused by a cart wheel passing over it, but there was .no bruising. All the organs were perfectly sound, with the exception of the heart, the valves of which Mere all incompetent. Other signs of weakness of the organ as revealed were explained by witness, who added that in his opinion death was due to natural causes, occasioned by heart failure, which, in his condition, could have been brought on by any extra effort or excitement. Witness was in a dying condition when the wheel passed over him. Ho did not think, in any case, that the wheel went over the body. The coroner’s verdict was that death was due to syncope following’ valvular and muscular disease of the heart.