A Remarkable Story.

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume XVI, Issue 5624, 20 November 1889, Page 2

A Remarkable Story.

The London correspondent of the Christchurch Press sends the following explanation of a paragraph which has been going the rounds of colonial journals : — A newspaper correspondent has been making inquiries about the alleged windfall to the laborer John Pcarce in Northamptonshire. The windfall amounts to L 1,400 ( )0. and the story first came to be circulated through an advertisement being inserted in a Wellingborough paper, asking for information" as to the whereabouts of Pcarce, the announcement saying that the Rev. H. Turrell, of Sydney, New South Wales, had recently died, and by his will bequeathed the whole of his property, amounting to L 1,400,000,, 400,000, to the said Pearce. Pearce left his work on Saturday morning week, giving away his tools, and afterwards stated that he had received, on account from the London agents of the Australian solicitors, LIOO for his outfit to Australia. Pearce appeared to receive the announcement of his good luck with equanimity, stating that he had expected that a fortune would some time be left to him. Some three or four months ago his wife, owing, it is stated, to poverty staring her in the face, committed suicide, and Poart'c, who then lived in Northampton, broke up his home, sent his daughter into service, and resided afterwards in Kettering, where he now remains. Everything connected with the story seemed to be authentic and well substantiated up to yesterday, when enquiries at the office of the paper in which the advertisement was inserted elicited tho information that it had only appeared in that paper, and that it had been brought to tho office by a somewhat illiterate man, who asked that the terms of it should be properly drawn up for him. On the morning of the publication of the paper a telegram was received from London asking for care to be taken as to the fig ares. Pearce subsequently showed this advertisement to his employers at Kettering, to whom he had previously talked about a fortune coming to him, telling them at the same time that lie was the man sought after, and that he had proved his identity to the solicitor. He also said he had to go out to Sydney for the money, and requested the loan of LGO or L7O to pay for his passage and outtit. His appeal, backed up by the presumptive evidence of a good guarantee, appears to have had weight, for the money was to have been advanced to him tonight.