DEATH AT AVENUE ROAD.

Taranaki Herald, Volume LXVIII, Issue 16680, 1 March 1920, Page 2

DEATH AT AVENUE ROAD.

CASE OF SUICIDE. A sad discovery was made in some bush adjacent to the Avenue Road on Saturday afternoon, wiien the body of William Edward Ingle Cliff, carpenter and contractor, residing on the Avenue Road, was found suspended by a rope from a tree under circumstances that pointed to suicide. At 8 o’clock in the morning he. was at a house which he was building nearby, and spoke to a carpenter employed on the job. When the carpenter (Mr. R. H. Earley) was about to go to lunch he noticed his employer’s bicycle leaning against a hedge, and thinking this strange, he commenced a search, accompanied by Constable-Hadler, whom he met on the road.

An inquest wad hold on Sunday before Mr. T. A. B. Bailoy, S.M., district coroner. Senior-Sergeant M'Coorie conducted the inquiry. Evidence was .given by A. L. Humphries, Dr. H. A. M‘Cleland, R. H. Earley and Constable Had)er. It was deposed that Mr. Cliff was about 56 years of age and that he had been worried by the fact that he. was unable to get material to complete the building on which he was engaged. The doctor said he had attended the deceased man for many years. About ten days ago, when he last consulted the doctor ,he w-as suffering from dyspepsia and extreme despondency. His despondency was such that it might ovin'cmne him.

The verdict was that the deceased man had committed suicide by banging himself * v hile temporarily of unsound mind.