IN BANKRUPTCY

Southland Times, Issue 19276, 21 June 1924, Page 2

IN BANKRUPTCY

BUSH FARMER’S FAILURE. A meeting of creditors in the estate of Mark Riddell, carpenter, of Invercargill, was held at the Deputy-Official Assignee’s Office yesterday. There were only two unsecured creditors present, the firms represented being Lewis and Co. and Matheson’s, Ltd., while Mr A. L. Adamson appeared on his own behalf. Secured creditors were shown as £559 2/5, and unsecured at £377 3/8, while the value of securities was estimated at £559 2/5, leaving a deficit of £377 3/8. In his sworn statement, bankrupt said that he drew a bush farm near Orepuki by ballot in February, 1912. After a year and three months on the place he was getting along all right, when they were unfortunate enough to be burned out through the bush fires. They had no insurance on house or furniture, and were left with what they stood up in and £lO9 in debt. He should have filed then, but had hopes for the future. He set about building another house, and brought the family back in October of the same year the fire occurred, 1914. There were six children to keep, the oldest only seven years old. He got a loan of £l5O from the Advances to Settlers’ Department. They would not advance him any more, although the present building cost him £3OO and he did the building himself. He managed to get Mr Adamson to stand to him for food and a little clothing for a year by paying him 8 per cent, on it. When the year was up, he had to borrow £lBO from Mr Tait to pay Adamson. Then Mr Adamson stood to him for another year, at the end of which time he gave him a mortgage over the property for the amount of his account. He could not work the farm to pay for the want of capital, and had to go out to work to keep it; all he could earn going out to pay for the house, grass-seed, wire, etc. Then he tried cattle. The money he got for the first lot he sold he had to pay to the National Mortgage, from whom he purchased in the first place. He then bought 27 head of cattle at £9 per head; prices dropped, one died and 13 were stolen. Next he started cutting posts and firewood, and bee-keeping. It would have paid all right only for the road, which was in such a bad state he could not get the posts and firewood carted. He only got three trucks of posts carted in 12 months, and so lost a lot of orders. He was a year and ten months bad with a poisoned hand, and the bloodpoisoning went through his system. During that time he earned only £3O 2/-. They had a bad time at the time of the epidemic, and after that he was again a long time unable to work. Another time he had his foot hurt and was also off work six months for that. He would never have been bankrupt but for Court costs, etc., as almost every bill cost him extra in that way. Often he would get a summons, and he must have averaged one a month all those years, but he hated to be dragged into Court and managed to get the monej’ some way until lately it had got too much. Further examined, bankrupt said that when he was burnt out a public subscription was taken up, which he understood amounted to £47. It was given to him in the form roofing iron, windows, etc. The farm was put up for sale by auction by the National Mortgage Co., but they got no bid. He owed the National Mortgage Co. between £3OO and £4OO, and he did not know why his solicitors had omitted it from his statement, although the National Mortgage Co. told him they had written it off. The account was for cattle and interest. There was a lot of good timber on the farm, and at the back of it 30 to 40 acres of good milling bush. He had omitted from his statement a number of small accounts, which he had overlooked.