ESCAPE OF A PRISONER.

Otago Witness, Issue 2028, 5 January 1893, Page 16

ESCAPE OF A PRISONER.

Lyttelton, December 30. WUliam Dennison, an old offender, now serving 12 months for vagrancy, escaped from the hard-labour gang this morning. Eight men left the gaol at 7 a.m. for the top of Oxford street, where they are road-making, in charge of one warder. The men had just started work when Dennison was missed. He had apparently stepped behind a gorse fence, and under that cover got away. The rest of the men were marched back to the gaol, the alarm was given, and the warders and police started to scour the hills at the back of the town. At 10 o'clock Warder Ironsides found the prisoner's hat, trousers, and boots hid in the scrub, and at 10 30 a lad named Harkess informed the warder that b,e had seen the prisoner in the distance heading towards Heathcote Valley. A large body of warders and police are now out. Dennison, the prisoner who escaped from Lyttelton gaol, was captured on Saturday morning. He got into the house of a man at Heathcote Valley, and when the girl got up to light the fire she found him sitting over some embers in the fireplace. The girl screamed for her father, who ran and caught Dennison. Mr Cleary, governor of the gaol, who was on the watch not far off, heard .the screams, and ran up to the prisoner. Dennison presented a wretched appearance. He had nothing on but his drawers and shirt, and, as it had been raining heavily all night, he was soakiDg wet. He had had no food for 24 hours.