ACCIDENTS & FATALITIES

Southland Times, Issue 20200, 10 June 1927, Page 8

ACCIDENTS & FATALITIES

FALL FROM MOTOR LORRY. (Per United Press Association.) Auckland, June 9. How a boyish attempt to balance on a moving motor lorry at Mangere yesterday ended fatally was told this morning when the inquest on Bernard James Louden, a schoolboy of 10 years of age, was opened. The lad’s uncle said the boy attended the Mangere Bridge school. He usually walked, but in bad weather he travelled in the bus. His mother, who is a widow and lives in Robertson road, gave him the money for his fare yesterday morning, but on the way to school with four other boys he was picked up by the motor lorry .driver, William George Dunstan. The boy, like three of the other lads, was standing up on the lorry. On the way Coronation road, each was endeavouring to keep his balance longer than the others. Near the top of the hill the lorry, which was travelling at a moderate pace swayed, and Louden and a boy named Gordon Eric Overton fell off on to the road. Overton was not hurt. Louden, however, was hurried to the Auckland Hospital, but died on the way from concussion of the brain. An inquest was opened and adjourned. PORTER’S SUICIDE. Auckland, June 9. Walter Hill, employed as a hotel porter, was found dead on Tuesday night. His landlady noticed a strong smell of gas in the room he rented, and found Hill sitting in a chair with an overcoat covering his head and a gas tube beside him. He left a note stating that he intended to commit suicide.