SHOCKING GUN ACCIDENT.

Thames Advertiser, Volume XVI, Issue 5178, 27 May 1885, Page 3

SHOCKING GUN ACCIDENT.

TRAGIC) TERMINATION'OF A : .; ~; SHOOTING PARTY, - : V;^ One of the most melancholy gun accidents which has occurred for some time took place on Monday evening, at tho Mount Eden railway station, when Mr Waterhouse Nicholson, a young man of about 20 years of age, was killed by the accidental discharge of. a gun., It that Mr W. Nicholson (son of the late Dr Nicholson, formerly Provincial Secretary) with Messrs E. Brabazon and Herbert Brabazon,: JI, Nokes, and W. Oolebrook proceeded on Saturday last to Waitakerei on a shooting expedition. ; Their holiday being up, they returned to town by train from Helensvilla onMonday evening, and all got out at Mount Eden station platform. ; AH had luggage, and it appears.that Mr' Ernest Brabazon's swag becoming stuck in some .way, he handed his gun to MrNioholson to hold foj him. Mr Nicholson had then his own double-barrelled gun, which was disoharged, but Unfortunately the one handed to_ him was not, and ha had hardly' taken it iu hie hand when it exploded. The charge entered the right side of his head, shattered the skull, and scattered the brains of the young man over the platform. His companions at once sent a messenger for Dr Lawry, who resides close by, and. who was soon on the spot, and bound up the wounded side of the head. In the meantime a messenger had : been despatched for Sergeant Gamble, and when ho arrived, about twonty minutes after the accidont, the young man hud breathed his last. Mr Brabazon states that when' he handed the gun to the deceased it was on half-cock, and he cannot understand how it could have been disoharged, except by tho hammer having been accidentally raised in the crush and hurry of getting out of the train. ' . \ \