GIRL'S TRAGIC FATE.
MURDERER'S DAUGHTER.
HAPPINESS THAT HAS GONE.
The most tragic figure in Britain to-day is Mary Maguire, a pretty, blue-eyed girl of 21 with a beautiful head of blonde hair, who, following the execution of her father, John Maguire, a hawker, in November, for the murder of his wife, has been left alone in the world to " mother " a family of ten.
The youngest of the Maguire children is a baby aged 18 months. Mary's eldest brother is 23, and the eight other members of the family are below the age of 15. All of them are doubly orphaned and look to their sister to keep them with a roof over their heads. Mary intends to try to do so, in obedience to a promise made to her father on receipt of a letter > he wrote to her from the condemned cell, imploring her '' to look after her dear little brothers and sisters." What the sacrifice means to Mary Maguire was revealed to a Sunday Chronicle representative in an interview at the Maguire's humble dwelling, where the family for months past have been living in a state of semi-destitution. Before the tragedy Mary was deeply in love with a young man of her own age. They had hoped to bo married next year. Now, because of the sacred trust which devolves upon her, and also because she says she would never allow her sweetheart's name to bo linked with that of a murderer's daughter, Mary has. decided to give him up. " Owen," she said, referring to the young man by his Christian name,was a dear lad. There are few men who would have stood by their girls as he tried to stand by me.
" As to my future, of course, I shall never marry. Those happy days when I was engaged to my young man seem a dream. It was just a glimpse of happiness, but it was not for me.
" Owen came to me and said he wanted to marry me before the trial, "so that he could protect me and help me through it. X realised how splendid and fine 'he was, hut I was so bitter against Fate that I could scarcely tell him of tho thankfulness in my heart.
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https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/NZH19300125.2.160.37
Bibliographic details
New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVII, Issue 20472, 25 January 1930, Page 3 (Supplement)
Word Count
375GIRL'S TRAGIC FATE. New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVII, Issue 20472, 25 January 1930, Page 3 (Supplement)
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