DRAMATIC RACE FAILS

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XXII, Issue 256, 12 October 1932, Page 8

DRAMATIC RACE FAILS

TRAGEDY OF THE OCEAN

MULTI-MILLIONAIRE'S DEATH. DESIRE TO DIE AT HOME. A wireless message from the White Etar liner Majestic in mid-Atlantic on September 2 revealed the news of an ocean tragedy and the failure of a dramatic race for home. Mr J. Wood Johnson, multi-millionaire and America’s “baby powder king,” had died at sea. His death was hastened by his own fear that he might die far from his native land. Mr Johnson, who was 77, went to Ecotland recently with his wife, formerly Miss Norah Mcßain, a Scottish Burse. He became ill at Strathpeffer and decided against the advice of doctors and the persuasion of his friends, that he would return immediately to America and his own home in New Jersey. He was told that he would probably live if he waited quietly in Ecotland. “I must and will go back,’’ Mr Johuaon said, and then demanded to know Which was the first ship sailing. It was found that he could catch the Majestic, which was leaving Southampton within a day. “I shall go by that whip,-’’ said Mr Johnson. A special train was ordered—an engine, sleeping car and brake van—and in that Mr Johnson, his wife, his valet and a Strathpeffer doctor travelled the |6uo miles to Southampton, stopping only on the way for a change of engine and train staff. The special train arrived at the quay a few minutes before the liner was due to sail and Mr Johnson Was carried 1 aboard on a stretcher. “Now that wo are going back home,’’ ho said, as he was taken to his »uite, “I am happy.” Twelve hours later he was dead. The drama of his end whs described*by Mr Lancaster, the purser of the Majestic, speaking by wireless telephone to the “Daily Express” office in London. “Mrs Johnson wa s at his bedside,” he said, “with Miss Johnson, the millionaire 's daughter, who had hurried .to catch the ship at Southampton at |the same time as her father. “It was a great shock, for Mr Johnson was a .very old friend of mine; he had crossed the ocean many times. “Only three people aboard, outside the millionaire’s suite, know of the ideath —the captain, Dr. Wood the surgeon, and myself. It has been kept secret from the other passengers because deaths at sea depress passengers. It was revealed last year that Mr Johncon, at the age of 73, had married his 32-year-old Scottish nurse, Miss McBain.” For more than two and a-half years the marriage romance -was kept secret, even from the couple’s most intimate friends, who never suspected that the quiet nurse who attended so assiduously the aged millionaire was his wife. Mrs Johnson, who was born in the hilly Belnagarrow district, the daughter of a farm grieve, met her future husband for the first time when he was on his annual visit to the Highlands several years ago. Later she went to America and eventually became the piillionaire’s nurse. The secret marriage followed.