A MISERABLE DEATH.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXI, Issue 18762, 16 July 1924, Page 9

A MISERABLE DEATH.

SURROUNDED BY SQUALOR. REVELATION IN BLENHEIM. CAT HIS ONLY FRIEND. fBY TEIXGfiSPH.—OWN COKRESPONDENT-] BLENHEIM. Tueaday. A Blenheim resident known as " Bottle 0 Bill," was found dead this morning in a hut which he occupied on the brink of the Taylor River, He had died alone surrounded by evidences of incredible squalor, and had probably been dead for a couple of days or. more before beis% discovered.

The place was an awful hovel. It consisted of nothing more than a few sheets of old corrugated iron tied together and propped up by pieces of manuka. The frost lay thick and white over everything, the shade of a thick belt of pines keeping the warming sun from it. There was no door—just a hole in one end.

All that was left of " Bottle 0 Bill" lay in a rude bunk at ona end of the structure. His bedding consisted only of sacks, and around him lay his household goods. Not an article in the place but should have been deposited in the rubbish tip on the other side of the river, indeed, there was strong evidence that the man had retrieved them at some time or other from that dump of the borough's garbage. There was but one article of value, a half-burned candle propped up at the head of the bunk on which the body lay. The rest was litter—old boxes, old tins, a decrepit old joil stove obviously unused for years and certainly from the rubbish tip, while stuck in the wall was a broken piece of mirror and close handy a rusty pair of scissors with which presumably the old man made his toilet.

There was no attempt at a fireplace, but in the centre of the earth floor stood a battered oil dram, in which were the remains of a fire, and by means of, which perhaps the poor wretch shivering beneath the inadequate sacks tried to keep himself warm. On a box within arm's reach of tho bed were the remains of a bottle, and his last frugal meal—a battered enamel plate containing a spoonful or two of a porridge-like substance, and alongside the stale" end of a loaf, with an empty fish tin. It was an appalling place, and its sordid misery and grim tragedy were emphasised by the bright sunlight and the flitting birds visible beyond tho frostrimmed doorway.

It is amazing that such a condition of things could obtain in a prosperous community like that of Blenheim. No slum in a great city could compare in its hopeless misery with the home of " Bottle 0 Bill,"

The man's real name is believed to have been Charles Johnson. At. one time he was known as Carl Johnson, and to some people he was known under the name of Petersen. He was about 65 years of age, and was believed to have been an exsailor hailing from Sweden, though nothing is definitely known on this point. He had lived in Blenheim for a number of years, as a bottle gatherer. He lived always a he"rmit-like life, and saw as little as possible of his fellow men. A grey cat, visible now and then outside the hut this morning, was probably the old man's only friend, and only mourner. The coroner has decided that an inquest is unnecessary.