MELANCHOLY ACCIDENT.

Oamaru Mail, Volume I, Issue 196, 6 December 1876, Page 2

MELANCHOLY ACCIDENT.

It is our painful duty to chronicle a most serious acoident which occurred this morning to one of the men employed at the Breakwater Works. From what we could glean of the particulars, it appears' that about ten o'clock the men had one of the blocks on a trolly which they were pushing towards the end of the Breakwater—that being the method of removing the blocks from one place to another —a-nd a small engine being on the track beside it, the driver, a man named Morrisox, offered if they would hitch on a rope to give it a run down. The foreman of the works, Isaac Perriton, objected to the arrangement, and after he rope had been fastened, took it off. John Wildish—the unfortunate man who met with the injury —however, made the rope fast again, and, towed by the engine, the block quickly moved along in the groove between the Breakwater and the Wharf. Whea a j certain pace and distance had been reatfud, I in his efforts to cast off the rope he ran ii front of the trolly, and his foot becoming entangled he was thrown down, and the trolly passed over his leg a little below the knee. As the block weighed from twenty to twenty-five tons, the limb was severed in two, merely hanging together by a piece of skin. An engine and truck quickly conveyed the unfortuate sufferer to the Severn-street junction, where he was transferred to an express, and from thence to the Hospital. On his arrival.at

the institution he was found toTv^ ery weak from the loss of blood, but Drs Wait and Garland, who had had inteflt gence of the accident, were waiting at the institution, and gave him all the relief at their command. It is needless to say amputation was performed, but on our calling at the Hospital this afternoon we learned that the poor fellow was bearing \m strongly, and no further effects are anticipated than the los 3of the limb. Tj, e ! calamity is a grievous one for Wildi sn ! who is a hard working, most respectable man, has seven in family depending upon his labour for subsistence. Tins is the first—and we trust will be for a long time the last—call which the recently established Benevolent Society has had upon its exertions and funds. We might state thab while at the Hospital we were informed of another patient who was admitted yesterday morning, suffering from two broken legs. It appears the man, who is named John Philip Melsom, was jumping of a truck at Ngapai-a, when by some means or other the vehicle went over both his legs, breaking them. He also is progressing most favorably.