BOY HERO

Gisborne Times, Volume LXXXII, Issue 12536, 24 April 1935, Page 2

BOY HERO

PARENTS FALL DOWN CLIFF. SON’S EFFORTS FRUITLESS. (U.P.A. by Elec. Tel. Copyright) LONDON, April 22. A 15-year-old boy’s heroism when his parents fell down a 400 ft. cliff marked a holiday tragedy at Port Isaac, Cornwall. Major Robert Hemphill, a former Rugby international, with his wife and three children was rambling on the cliffs. Major Hemphill, in attempting to photograph a buzzard’s nest, climbed down , a part o'f the cliff which crumbled, and he fell to the rocky beach. Peter saw his lather fall and shouted to his mother, who approached the edge to search for her husband, and immediately disappeared. Peter ran to a look-out hut, smashed a window, climbed in, and .telephoned coastguards. He then clambered down to the shore and found his father dead, the body being; afloat on the rising tide. The mother was unconscious. Peter cut her dress to enable her to breathe more easily, and then dragged in his Ifather’.s body and climbed the cliff to seek help, for which his sister, Sheila, aged 13, had already gone to a farm two miles distant, leaving a younger sister at the cliff top. G’oateguards raised Mrs Hemphill, hut she died in hospital.