YOUNG SHEPHERD KILLED

Timaru Herald, Volume CXLVIII, Issue 21624, 9 April 1940, Page 8

YOUNG SHEPHERD KILLED

Fall Down Steep Bluff Watched Kea And Missed His Footing By Telegraph —Press Association CHRISTCHURCH, April 8. Falling down a steep bluff on the Woodbank station near Hanmer on Saturday, John William Joynt Thacker, aged 28, the head shepherd, suffered injuries from which he died shortly afterwards. The accident occurred 12 miles from the homestead. Thacker was accompanied by a youth who witnessed Thacker’s fall. The youth scrambled down to the spot where Thacker came to rest, about 200 yards away, but Thacker died within a few minutes, apparently from injuries to the head. A party set out to bring the body back as soon as news of the accident was received, but heavy fog prevented them from going on. The party went out again this morning. It is understood mat the youth who was with Thacker at the time said Thacker was carrying a rifle, and. when watching a kea, missed his footing, crashed down the bluff, near the Waiau River at the boundary of the Woodbank and St. James stations. The boy with Thacker made a fast trip back to th- station, across high country, borrowed a horse on the way, after he had found he could do nothing for the victim. Thacker was a son of Mrs M. S Thacker, of St. Andrew's Square. Christchurch, and of the late Mr John Henry Christopher Thacker, of Amberley. He was educated at the Christchurch Boys’ High School and had been engaged in sheepfarming for most of the time since he left. He was engaged to be married, and had recently enlisted for service in the Royal New Zealand Air Force.