CASUALTIES.

Otago Witness, Issue 1966, 29 October 1891, Page 35

CASUALTIES.

J. H. Schmidt, of the Railway Hotel, Ly tteltoD, ' committed suicide at 9.40 a.m. oh Friday by shooting himself in the temple with a revolver. He got up at 7.30 ; was about the bar, and went into the private sitting room, where he lay down on a sofa and ahob himself. He has been much depressed for some time past, and was lately suffering from influenza and neuralgia. He bad been very low spirited, and was heard some time ago to say that he would shoot himself, but his suicidal tendency was never suspected. He leaves a wife and three children. A3 the express from Dunedin w»b running into the Invercargill station on Friday a youth driving a tilted express essayed to cross the line in Clyde i street. Being inside, and a strong west wind blowing, he alleged he did not hear the whistle. The horse and shafts were cut clean from the trap, which remained standing, while the lad scrambled out at the back. The horse was killed. Fortunately the engine did not leave the rails. Had it done so, the line being on a pretty sharp carve, it is probable much damage I ■would have been done to the rolling stock. Just as the afternoon goods train was approaching the bridge over the Olutha river on Thursday the engine ran into two horses owned by Mr Harvey which were standing on the line. Both were thrown off the line by the cowcatcher into the river, and of course killed. Had the animals been a few feet nearer the end of the bridge they would have been carried on to it, and a very serious accident would undoubtedly have been the result. As it was, it is a marvel the engine escaped being thrown off the rails, when it would probably have gone into the river along with the horses. John Cornie, an old man, a blacksmith by trade, was picked up dead in a ditch at Mata* whero, Hawkes Bay, on the 24th. He was walking home from the show the previous evening, when very drunk, and is supposed to have lain down or fallen into the ditch, where he died. Joseph Kennedy was killed in a sluioing claim at Upper Blackball by an immense slip of earth and trees. He saw the danger soon enough to warn his mates, who saved themselves. The slip wrb so vast they did not know where to look for their mate when help came. Next day they managed, with great labour, to sluice the body out. \ A man named Stephen Henry Richards, a signalman employed on the railways, and residing at Mornington, met with a very nasty gun accident on Saturday afternoon. He went i out for a walk, in company with his two children, and taking a gun with him, proceeded [in the direction of Eaikorai valley. On arriving at a fence, Richards placed the gun upon the ground, and putting one leg through the fence, he was in the act of getting through, when the charge went off. The calf of the left [ leg was completely blown off, and the whole | limb was seriously injured. The sufferer was conveyed to the Hospital, where he was attended to by Drs Barnett, Davis, and Copland, and is now doing as well as can be expected. Captain Sutherland, of the ship Piako, met an accident at the Blnff on Thursday by which his leg was broken above the ankle. Through the gangway tippiDg a little as he stepped on board, he was thrown on the deok, thus causing the accident.