TRAGEDY AT ORMONDVILLE.

Hawke's Bay Herald, Volume XXI, Issue 6780, 12 February 1884, Page 3

TRAGEDY AT ORMONDVILLE.

(FEOM OUR SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT.) February 11. A shocking murder has been committed here, and our usually quiefc townphip has beeu consequently thrown into a state of feverish excitement, tempered with profound gloom, such as no pen can adequately describe. The scene of the terrible tragedy is a small cottage, containing two rooms, Bituated about 100 yardato the left of the railway line between Onnondville and Makatoku. Externally, the cottage and its surroundings look calm and peaceful, the well-tended garden affording evidence that the inmates of the cottage were ; posaessed of taste and energy. In the Bmall dwelling resided a man named Roland Edwards, his wife, and four children whose ages ranged from a few months to ten years. The man Edwards, though sometimes behaving rationally, has at other times acted as no-one but a maniac cculd act, and his neighbors usually regarded him as deranged, and especially to be feared when on a drinking bout. He was an engineer by trade, and was said to have been employed for a long period on one of the coastal steamers trading from the Spit. He lost his employment partly owing to drinking habits, and partly owing to vagaries committed, doubtless the result of an incipient insanity which has now manifested itself under such a virulent form, and with ouch dreadfulcoDsequences. Since Edwards has resided at Ormondville

he lias worked at any employment that offered, and for some time was engaged to do casual work at the railway station when the regular porter waa otherwise employed or needed assistance. He lost that employment in consequence of drinkin" habits, and also because of. a tendency to act strangely. It is a question whether he should not have been safely lodged in a lunatic asylum, as he has more than once been charged with lunacy, but was discharged each time as sauo on the strength of a medical certificate, although lay opinion always ventured to disagree with the doctors by believing Edwards to be dangerously insane. The sad sequel shows that the doctors must have been mistaken. Besides being charged with lunacy, Edwards has before made an attempt to destroy his family, and once also tried to kill his wife only. The struggle between the intending assassin and his wife at that time was very severe, both of the latter's thumbs being dislocated. Assistance came in time, and the attempt to kill was frustrated. On the occasion whe.-i Edwards tried to kill his family, which attempt took place within the last few months, your Waipawa correspondent took the matter up in his accustomed trenchant fashion, and I remember reading bis remarks at the time with great approval. Had his strictures been heeded the present horrible crime might never have been committed. The circumstances were these: — Edwards procured some gunpowder, and, after placing it under the bed, endeavored to bring about an explosion. Something in his manner, while endeavoring to compass his mad and fiendish scheme, led to his wife discovering his intention, which was frustrated after a severe struggle. In consequence of information given to the police by a person to whose knowledge the attempt at wholesale destruction came, Edwards was arrested by the police, and now comes the strange part of the case, and the part that led to the strictures of your Waipawa correspondent. The latter asserted (and his assertion was never denied) that the policeman who arrested Edwards did not bring him before a Magistrate, but, after a short detention, allowed him to go free on his promising to be of better behaviour. Leaving this part of the story, however, which will doubtleßS now come out fully, I must come to an account of the dreadful occurrence which has so terribly affected the whole district. To convey to your readers my knowledge of the murders, I shall give (he circumstances in connection with the tragedy in the order in which I became acquainted with them, beginning with my visit to the cottage shortly after the discovery of the crime, and what I heard and saw afterwards. Upon entering the cottage the bedroom is on the right side of the front door, the living room being on the left. In the latter room, besides the ordinary furniture, there was a small iron bedBtead. It does not appear that anyone Blept on that bedstead, although one or two articles of clothing were upon it. In the bedroom were tyro bedsteads, one a small iron one, capable of holding three children, and an ordinary double bedstead. The sight that met my horrified eyes when I entered the bedroom made my blood run cold. As near as I can I will give the details. On the small bedstead were laid three children - naked. One of them (I think the eldest) waa lying nearest the side of the bed. On her temple waß a large bruise, as if she had been struck with some heavy blunt instrument. After enquiries fully established this fact in my mind, and led me to believe that the proximate cause of death — a gash across the throat from ear to ear — had been inflicted after the victim was stunned. Lying next to the poor murdered girl was a boy, apparently about three years of age. His arm was thrown around the neck of his dead sister, as if embracing her, a position that had evidently been arranged after death by their father and their murderer. On the boy's temple was a bruise similar to that described as on the girl's temple, and his throat was also cut right across. The third child, a boy of apparently ten years of age, was lying next to the two victims already referred to. He was partly on his back. His temple bore a similar bruise to the others I have spoken of, except that it was a little further back on the skull. His fingers and arm were also bruised, as if he had been attempting to defend himself when struck at, and had partially warded off the blow intended to stun him. He had probably been awakened by the attack on his brother and sister, but not quickly enough to escape. His throat was cut also. On the large bed was lying the corse of the murdered children's mother. The body was dressed, the dress being open in such a manner as to suggest that the poor creature had fallen asleep while lying dressed on the bed, and in the act of suckling her youngest child. On the murdered woman's forehead were two bruises, one on each side, the one on the left side being the mark caused by a very severe blow. Her throat was cut across from ear to ear. Beside her, to complete the chapter of horrors, lay the body of her infant, its throat cut also. The scene was ghastly in the extreme. On the two beds, as described, were the five corpses. The room itself was like a slaughterhouse. In the centre of the floor was a huge pool of blood, and the same sanguinary flood was visible on both beds, and clots of gore were scattered all around. The blood on the floor conveyed the idea that the murderer, after stunning the younger of his victims, had taken them across his knees and gashed them, to death, afterwards placing them upon the bad as found. The appearance of the j | five bodies betokened that none of the victims had struggled after being stunned, and that their murderer had adopted his fiendish method of killing them with only too devilish an ingenuity. Ho had evidently prepared carefully for the crime. In the other room, near the fireplace, was found a chair, and round it some chips and shavings of wood. A weapon found explained the reason of the shavings. This was a billet of wood about two feet long and two inches square. It was charred at one end, as if it had been taken out of afire when. partially consumed. The end not charred was trimmed up and rounded, as if with a knife, so as to form a handle that could be firmly gripped in the act of striking a blow. Edwards must have set down calmly by the fireplace to fashion the weapon with which his victims had been stunned. The evidences of its use were too plainly visible. The charred end had left a black mark whereever it had touched. The most prominent of theße were on the curtains round the bed on which the murdered mother and her infant were lying, as if, in raising the weapon above his head to strike, the murderer had been compelled to leave imprinted upon the curtains a record of each blow struck. The black marks were also visible about the bed on which the three children were lying, and it appears but. too plainly evident that each victim was struck by the charred end of the stick, grasped by its shaped handle in the grip of a maniac murderer. But the most sickening evidence of the deliberation with which the crime had been committed was a sharpening stone found in the room, upon which had been sharpened the knife used to kill the five murdered persons. The knife, a common table-knife, was found in the room encrusted with blood. It was very sharp. It had been sharpened more than once during the time occupied by the committal of the terrible crime. Marks of bloody fingers could be seen, where the stone had been held by the murderer after he had commenced his fiendish work and had his hands imbrued in the blood of his wife and children. The stone aleo showed, by the bloody streaks upon its edge, and one or two hairs sticking to it, that a bloody knife had been sharpened upon it. It is not known at what time the terrible

crime was committed. The three elder chiliren went to church in the evening, and a light was seen in the bedroom by a passer by at about eleven o'clock on Sunday night. I will now come to tho murderer's arrest. About 3 o'clock on Monday morning, Edwards called at the house of a man named Plank,- a railway employe, who lives this side of the railway bridge. Edwards asked for a drink, which was not given to him because of his reputation as a cranky man, and Plank did not care to open his door. Edwards went away, and then a presentiment that all was not right seized Plank, and ho cot up and went out, and followed Edwards so as not to be observed. Plank watched Edwards some distance, and then lost sight of him. The latter then appears to have gone to the house of another railway employe named Pike, who lives just over the Makatoku bridge. He asked for water, and was supplied, and went away. Pike also had a presentiment that something was wrong, and he, too, followed Edwards unknown to the latter, who walked back in the direction ®f tho bridge. He was lost sight of while crossing the bridge, and Pike thought he had fallen through. Pike then informed the policeman stationed at Makatoku, who resolved to go down to Edwards' house. After telling Pike and Plank, who by this time had met, to stay on or near the bridge, to watch for Edwards, Constable Shulz went to Edwards' house. The door was partly open, but the constable could make no one hear when ha called out, and bo went into the house. What he saw I have endeavored to describe above. He then called Pike and Plank, who went down and saw the bodies. The men were frightened lest Edwards should have gone elsewhere on a murderous mission, and they and the constable went back to Pike's house. They there learned that Edwards had been back some time before, but had gone away. Constable Scbulz instructed the two men to watch for Edwards while he went to rouse up the people at Makatoku. Shortly after the constable started, Pike and Plank, in patrolling the bridge, looked down among the tressle work, and saw Edwards lying in concealment. He threatened to throw himself down on to the river bed, but was at last persuaded to come up. When he did ao he was at once collared, and a message was sent off to Constable Schulz to the effect that Edwards was arrested. His throat was bleeding from a wound when arrested, but the injuries he had inflicted upon himself were not of a eerious nature. He was sent down by the first train to Waipnkurau Hospital for medical treatment. The first train up from Waipawa brought back Drs Reed and Mirbacb, Sergeant O'Malley, a number of persons attracted by the news of the tragedy, and Edwards himself. A jury was impannelled, Dr Heed acting as coroner, and an inquest is now (1.50 p.m.) proceeding. After the bodies were seen by the jury, and medically examined to ascertain the nature of the injuries which had caused death, they were washed and prepared for burial. I will send you the result of the inquest by to-morrow's mail. I should like to add that great praise is due to the Makatoku people for the way in which they turned out to search for Edwards when they were alarmed by Constable Shulz. Messrs Pike and Plank also deserve great credit. In conclusion (hurriedly, to catch the train), I must add that no words of mine can convey an idea of the shock to the feelings of all in the district when the ghastly tragedy became known.