AN UNNATURAL FATHER

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXVI, Issue 8179, 22 July 1912, Page 1

AN UNNATURAL FATHER

BOYS’ SAD PLIGHT MAGISTRATE TALKS PLAINLY TO THE PARENT. CHILDREN SENT TO A HOME. WUSSS ASSOCIATION. CHRISTCHURCH, July 20. At the Juvenile Court this morning three boys, aged thirteen, ten, and six years respectively, were charged with not being under proper control. Mr C. T. Aschman, headmaster of the Normal school, gave evidence as. to their attendance at school without boots or stockings on. He had seen them picking their way to school with the frosty air biting their bare, raw feet, and on more than one occasion they had to have their numbed feet thawed at school. Miss Ingpen, a kindergarten teacher, said that tne children's feet werte more like lumps of raw meat. One of them had had weals on. his legs which, he had informed her, were caused through his father thrashing him. The children were very dirty. Detective Gibson said the boys’ mother had divorced the father some time ago, and he believed she was now living in Auckland. The father had married again, a woman who was also a divorcee. The stepmother’s own children residing with the family were well looked. after. The father had two motor-cars and two or three houses, and his residence was connected. with tne telephone. His Worship: What is his occupation ?

Detective Gibson: A plasterer. His Worship; How can he keep two motor-cars?. Detective Gibson: Ido not know.

Continuing, Detective said they; had taken the woman’s children with one exception, from her some time ago. } This other child* was well nourished and looked after, and treated altogether differently from the other children. The condition of the children had been reported to him some time before the disappearance of a boy, another member of the family. ‘ Chief-Detective Bishop > said that, apart from the recent disappearance of one of the children, the matter Would still 'have been brought before his Worship. ■ ;The father .of the children said he was a plasterer- His first wife had diyijrced, him about fifteen months ' beV;ro. - Ho had paid her . the money , to get the" divorce. He had then married the woman he had been living with. Ho knew that some of.her children had been‘taken from her. She had one child with her when he married her. All the children had been looked after exactly 'the same as her child. His 'Worship: Well, if that .is the case that child ought to be before me now also. Look at those children now.

The father: I bought them boots, but they chucked them into the range. I could not keep on buying them boots. In reply to a further, question; the father said the boys had all had, a wash on Wednesday. ‘ His Worship: And their clothes .were washed for the last time last year. I don’t believe you. They’re a disgrace to anyone.

Chief-Detectivo Bishop (to the father): You’ve got two motor-cars and a lot of property. The father: It is mortgaged. His Worship: The possession of property _ does not imply a due sense of morality or looking after children. The whole thing smells horribly badly. In reply to, Miss Ingpen’s statement, the man said that the furthest he had gone in punishing the boys was in strapping their hands. The weals on one of the boys’ legs had not been inflicted by him. He hud tried to get them to go to Sunday school, but they would not go. Albert Lawrence tendered evidence on the father’s behalf. In reply to questions he said he was driving a cart for the father. He was eighteen years of age. He had never had -any objection to the treatment of the children. He was a relation of the stepmother.

His Worship: Stand down! I prefer to trust the evidence for the police to that of an irresponsible youth of eighteen. • His Worship ordered the children to be committed to the Christchurch Receiving Home, to be brought up in the faith of.the Church of England. He also asked Mr Aschman to renort to the police similar cases that came under his notice.