MADMAN AMOK

Hawera Star, Volume LIV, 29 March 1935, Page 8

MADMAN AMOK

NIGHTMARE VOYAGE Crazed Leper Attacks Three Other Patients INCIDENTS ON STEAMER DOCTOR SAVES SITUATION ■--c * .. . C3y Takgrajpe—Tresw AawxuaCon.i AUCKLAND, To-day. A tragic combination of insanity and leprosy in two of 35 persons taken from the various islands of the Cook Group jand Samoa to the M-akogai leper station in Fiji by the Matai, which arrived in Auckland yesterday, gave almost a nightmare aspect to parts of the voyage. One madman attacked three of the other lepers with a large file, injuring two of them severely and one slightly. Had it not been for tffe courage and knowledge of natives of Dr. 33. P. Ellison, chief medical officer in the Cook Islands, someone would probably have been killed.

Neither of th© men was known. to he mad when taken on. the Matai, one at Aitutaki and one at Rakahanga. The Aitutaki man, one o»f the first three on hoard, spent the first night singing fondly, and he refused to stop, and Dr Ellison had later to give him an injection to stop him from injuring others when he began to he violent. For two days after that he was much quieter and l appeared' to be returning to a normal state of mind. As a precaution, he was kept lightly tied up for a day or two, hut he soon seemed so well that this was thought unnecessary.

In the early morning of the firth day on the ship, however, the chief officer on watch heard a leper yelling and saw him dancing on top of a temporary building on the well deck, where the lepers were housed. Mr S. J. Smith, secretary of the Cook Islands Department, also heard the shouting and ran to the bridge to see what was •the matter. The madman, who was stark naked, seemed likely to fall into the sea, and Mr Smith and the officer were greatly relieved when he scrambled across to the top of the main leper house amidships. He put an arm through a* ventilator on the roof and called to the other lepers inside. He then jumped to the back of the house and tried to scramble on the bridge. A hose was run out. and when it played on the madman it quietened him down.

Dr Ellison was called and also the superintendent of the other lepers, who tied the Aitutaki man. who recovered and gave no more trouble, behaving quite rationally toward the end, hut his place as a source of anxiety to tho doctor, Captain Burgess and the officers was taken by the Rakahanga man. He appeared, to be sane, although a very advanced case. Dr Ellison rushed to his cabin for a gown and' rubber gloves and then went forward to the leper house. The doorway was small and there was little room inside, and he was faced by tlie madman, who was waving a bloodcovered file with which he had attacked three others. “Put down that iron,” he told the leper. The madman wavered and the doctor repeated the command. This time the file was dropped. Two other men who had beom trying to hold the. madman back with brooms, jumped in and tied him up. The doctor then attended' the injured lepers. One had a deep scalp wound, another facial injuries, while a, third had! a badly gashed leg. "While Mr Smith held a torch the doctor dressed the wounds and saw that all the men were comfortable for the night.