FIRES.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XVI, Issue 5635, 8 December 1879, Page 2

FIRES.

Very little information can be given relative to the late tire at Mr. J. S. Gibbons, Otaua Sawmills, near Waiuku. Air. Deed, the inau in charge of the stores, informs me that on the lOtli November he left the place as usual '. between 9 and 10 o'clock p.m., looking the doora, and leaviug everything apparently safe. About half-iast 2 a.m. on .November 9, Mr. Deed, feelin? unwell, got out of bed to get tome rnedioiue, aud observing the reflection of some light called a inau who was sleeping in the same room with him and told him that something was on tire. They ran out aud saw that it was the stores. Xo account can be given as to the origin of the lire, unless that, during the eveuiug of the 9th, the bushmen, who are in the habit of coining into the stores for goods, had dropped a match or ashes from a pipe, wbieh might have falleu among the sawdust, aud smouldered until it burst out as stated a:ove. A lire occurred at Hγ. C. A. Harris's upprmill, Whangapoui, on Xovember 23, by which, Mr. Han is informs us, damage in excess of £4000 was su-tained. The polijy of insurance in the Royal covers only £1350. The tire was discovered siumlt insously at three different places, viz., by persona at the boom=, the lower mill, and Mr. Harris, jun.'s, hoiree about 11.30 p.m. Mr. Harris, jnn., states that he hid retiiul to r< st, aud chancing to glauce toward the window he noticed an unusual reflection of li-jlit, aud. ou getting up, at once saw that the mill in the distance was in a blaze. He rushed away to the mill, rousing the men on his way, aud, with ihe assistance of others who had arrived previously, endeavoured to preserve from lire some stacks of timber lying near the mill, all efforts for the purpoie of Having the- building itself being quit--hopeless. The caus.e of the confl-igration in not known, but there is no reason for supposing it to have been other than aecMental. The mill which Ins been destroyed had idle for the past two years. The Kiwi Flour mills, near Hamilton, had a narrow iscape from lire recently. The rats got into the cookhouse adjoiumg the mill, and worked through the fbeplace, so that the hot embers got through underneath. The outhouse was burned to the ground, aud about £20 trorth of property in it destmyod. It stood ab .ut eight feet from the mill, but the direction of the wind, and the exertion of those present, saved the main buildings.