BABY IN FLAMES.

Waipawa Mail, Volume XLVIII, Issue 86, 13 April 1927, Page 1 (Supplement)

BABY IN FLAMES.

ONE-ROOM HOME TRAGEDY. LONDON, March 31. How a child received fatal burns while her mother was out at work and her father—a night worker —was asleep, was described at an inquest held at Beckenham yesterday on the 23-months-old child of Frederick Ernest Lcat, a Post Office worker, of St. Hugh’s Road, Anerley. The father stated that for eight years he had lived with his wife and four children in one room. On Wednesday, having come home from night duty, he was left with the baby, whom he took to bed with him. About midday he was awakened by the baby’s screams, and found her standing on a burning easy chair with her nightclothes alight. He assumed that she had picked up a piece of burning paper, and dropped it on the chair. It was not his wish that his wife went to work. She did so because of the depression of living in one room. Mrs Lcat agreed with her husband’s Statement, and said they had tried hard to get a house. “I feel I cannot remain every day in one room,” she added. The coroner recorded a verdict of accidental death, and expressed the hope that for the family’s sake the mother would soon succeed in getting more accommodation.