STRICKEN CROWD

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXXI, 13 January 1938, Page 4

STRICKEN CROWD

AMAZING PICNIC SCENE 150 PEOPLE POISONED WRITHING ON GRASS P Id C HOSPITAL OVERTAXED ii i tl l\ SYDNEY, 3rd January. s Beef boiled in a copper for sand- \. wiches is believed to have been the j, cause of nearly all the 150 Major’s ! Creek residents being stricken with f | ptomaine poisoning at a New Year’s ’ Day picnic. Everyone who ate the sandi wiches was affected. Altogether 107 people had to have hospital treatment. About 70 were still in hospital last night but all were out of danger (re- j ports the “N.Z. Herald” correspondent, j The sufferers were taken to Braid- j wood, which is 12 miles from Major’s Creek, but the township’s hospital j could take only a small proportion of p | them. When temporary wards set up y lin the hospital grounds proved in.adequate, the sisters of the Braidwood Convert converted their school hall into a hospital. Local residents rushed beds and bedding to the hall. Dr Harris, the only doctor in Braid wod. was absent in Goulburn. 52 miles away, when the people fell ill, but he ‘ returned with all speed and worked on ' j the patients until he was on the point 1 1 of collapse from exhaustion. Ambulance ! 1 came from Goulburn, Yass and Quean- j beyan, and nurses from the Goulburn! f Hospital and V.A.D. sisters were sent ' out to assist. 1 A large quantity of corned meat for ! the picnic was cooked in a laundry I i copper and afterwards it was put through' a mincer and then kept in aluminium containers until those in charge of the foodstuffs for the picnic were able to make the thousands of sandwiches required. MOTOR VEHICLES COMANDEERED . • The sandwiches and other foods were served to the 150 picnickers about noon. Less than an hour afterwards I many of them were seized with abdominal pain. The first to collapse was j Constable Burr, and within a few minutes scores of picnickers, adults and ' childrne, were rolling about the grass j writhing in agony. Mr S. Turnbull, licensee of the hotel, 1 drove his car into Braidwood for help. Sergeant White and Constable Snow motored out to the picnic ground, and an urgent call to Dr Harris brought | him back immediately to Braidwood. Sergeant White took a sister from the I Braidwood Hospital to the picnic ground and she, with the aid of the police, gave most of thd sufferers an emetic. Sergeant White mustered ; every car and lorry avaible to convey , the sufferers into Braidwood. OTHER DOCTORS STAND BY The position looked very serious when many of the victims showed signs of internal haemorrhage, and the situa- j tion was alarming when no more pati- I | ents could be taken at the Braidwood ' j Hospital. Dr Harris and the nurses from Goul- : burn arrived at this* juncture. Although doctors at Goulburn and other centres j were standing by ready to rush to Braidwood Dr Harris assured Sergeant White that he could handle the situa- | tion without help from other doctors. All night the patients were under the | constant care of the nurses. ■ . .