A DOUBLE TRAGEDY

Otago Witness, Issue 3590, 2 January 1923, Page 23

A DOUBLE TRAGEDY

NEW ZEALANDER SHOOTS HIMSELF. WIFE DIES' OF POISON. News comes from Lucerne of a grim tragedy in which an Auckland man took his own life. Becoming mad from the sudden death of his wife, it is stated, he tired a shot at her dead body and then committed suicide. Mr Cyril Vernon Wallace, who. it appears, was badly wounded during the war, married an English lady, and recently they had been living in furnished rooms in tlemstall road, West Hampstead. Some weeks ago the couple .went on a tour to the Continent. They arrived at Lucerne from Vienna on Saturday night. September 30. and the tragedy occurred next day. Mr 3 Wallace complained of feeling unwell when they arrived at the station, and her husband took her in a cab to one of the best hotels of the town. She at once went to bed, and her husband called a doctor. The patient complained of violent stomach pains, and at first thought she was suffering from acute indigestion. I-ater sho showed symptoms of food poisoning. FIRED AT HIS DEAD WIFE. The doctor prescribed for her and went away, saying he would call the next morning. But her condition became rapidly worse, and alter some hours of agony sffe died. When her husband realised that sho was dead he threw himself on her body an gave way to a paroxysm of grief. Later, when left alone, he apparently obtained a revolver from his luggage, fired a bullet in the dead woman s bead, and then shot himself. Inquiries made at the house where Mr and Airs Wallace resided reveal the fast that tffey left a month ago for a holiday trip. "They appeared to be extremely tond of each other,” said one of the other tenants. Mr Wallace owned a motor ear and appeared to be in comfortable circumstances. They have lived in this house since Christmas. Last year they went away to the continent, and I understood they were combining business with pleasure.' This year, however, Air Wallace said that they were going for pleasure, and he added that they were to visit Paris and pass through Belgium and Switzerland to Italy. We were expecting them back in a day or two when we received word of the tragedy.” Mr Wallace was described on liis passport as a cutter and designer. He was 27 years old, and his wife, whose maiden name was Howard, was the same age.