A SHOCKING TRAGEDY.

Otago Witness, Issue 3756, 9 March 1926, Page 70

A SHOCKING TRAGEDY.

TWO INFANTS MURDERED. A FATHER’S TERRIBLE ACT. AUCKLAND, March 4. A shocking tragedy occurred in the Cleverdon district between 7 and 8 o’clock this morning when a father killed his two infant children (twins) aged three months, by cutting their throats with a razor, and afterwards attempted to take his own life by slashing his throat. The man’s name is Septimus Page, a farmer of about 33 years of age, whose four-roomed home is just off the tourist road which runs through the picturesque Otau Valley. Page has a farm in the Otau settlement, the house being distant about two miles from the Clevedon township. The family are early risers and Page was up soon after dawn to attend to the milking, while Mr.s Page and Miss Eileen Finn, a’young woman of 21 years, who has been helping Page with household duties since November, when the children were born, busied themselves with breakfast preparations. Mrs Page had arranged to visit Auckland to-day to take her small son of three years to a dentist and at 8.30 this morning she left with the boy in a service car for the city, leaving Miss Finn alone in charge of the two infants, Frank and Jessie. Shortly after his wife had left, Pago entered the kitchen by the side door after finishing some work in the dairy. He said to Miss Finn : “I am going to kill the lot of you, and you will not see your lover again.” Miss Finn, alarmed, went to the telephone to ring up the neighbours, but Page rushed towards her. and seizing her attempted to drag her away from the telephone. A desperate struggle ensued, in the course of which the gill received scratches. She managed to break away from the frenzied man, however, and running out of the ' ouse rushed across a paddock to Janies Colquhoun’s house, about 500 yards away. Colquhoun immediately notified another soldier settler, B. Quinn, that something was wrong with Page, and the two men, accompanied by Miss Finn, returned to the house. On entering the kitchen a shocking sight confronted them. One child was lying on a sofa and the other in a pram, both with their throats cut, while the father was lying on the floor in a pool of blood. At first glance he also apparently was dead. They left the kitchen and rang up Constable Holland and also summoned Dr Page, of Papakura, and Nurse Brodie. While they were in the passage thev saw Page suddenly stagger out of the kitchen with a basin in his hand, evidently with the intention of washing himself Dr Page and Nurse Brodie arrived on the scene shortly f ter 9 o’clock, and Page’s injuries were attended to bv the doctor. Although weak from loss of blood he was able to walk about and wash him- ' self. The nurse on arrival exclaimed to the apparently crazed man: “Oh. Sep. why did you do this terrible thing?” and Page laconically replied. “T don’t know.” A little later he said that he had been feeling unwell for a long time, .and had been suffering from pains in the head It is said by people in the district who knew hin. that one time in his life Page suffered from fits, and that lately he had complained about feeling queer. As soon os possible Constable Holland, accompanied bv Mr M, J Sutherland, who at one time owned Page’s house, left for the Auckland Hospital with the injured man in a motor car, while Sergeant Cowan took charge prior to the arrival from Auckland of Detectives Purling and Nalder, .and Constable Hook who i-eached the scone about 11 a.m. The car containing Page passed the detectives about two miles from the house and Page was then sitting back in the seat looking old and haggard with his eyes half closed, and appearing to he in a verv low condition. The unfovtunate man was well respected in the district and was always, considered to he passionately fond of his children and devoted to his wife, all his acquaintances regarding him as an ideal husband in every way. He has always been a verv hard working man of abstemious habits. He has lived on his present 30acre farm for about two vears. hut has been well-known ip the district for the last 15 vears. Mrs Paco was formerly a Miss Fraser, her father being a blacksmith at Clevedon. Before being taken to hospital Pace sat down at a table and wrote a confession which was taken by Constable Holland. An inquest was opened this afternoon on the bodies of the two children.