BOY SCALDED IN COPPER

Taranaki Daily News, 2 December 1933, Page 2

BOY SCALDED IN COPPER

INQUEST ON SYDNEY G. KING. CORONER ANNOUNCES VERDICT. Finding that death was due to toxaemia, shock' and extensive scalds through the child falling into a copper of hot water at his parents’ home in Belt Road on Monday, Mr. W. H. Woodward (district coroner) yesterday concluded the "inquest on the body of Sydney George King, aged 3j years, who died at the New Plymouth Hospital on Tuesday. No blame was attachable to any person, commented the coroner. In addition to the evidence given when the inquest was opened, the testimony of the mother was taken concerning the accident. She had just finished washing, she said, and on returning from outside with some wood about 10.45 a.m. she found the child sitting on the top of the copper, with his feet resting on the tubs, which were about six inches away. “I spoke to him and told her to get down, and with that he seemed to overbalance and fall backwards into the copper of water,” proceeded Mrs. King. ‘‘He seemed to sit in the copper and only his head, shoulders and feet were showing; I pulled him out immediately. I knew that he had been scalded and I undressed him at once and sent for Dr. Brown, who ordered his removal to the hospital.” The cdpper was about three-parts full, said Mrs. King, but was not boiling, as she had put in some cold 1 water about half-an-hour before and there was no fire under the copper. When she took off his clothes she saw that the boy s skin was beginning to peel off and she realised he was badly injured. Before her son fell into the copper he was m his usual health and spirits. There was no other adult in the house at the time, and, said Mrs. King, she was the only witness of the accident. She had often seen the boy sitting on the copper, where he would climb to turn on the tap for a drink. George Joseph King, the father, deposed to the identification of the body. Sergeant S. G. Cljst represented the police at the inquiry.