FARMER'S FAILURE

Waikato Times, Volume 96, Issue 15035, 5 September 1922, Page 5

FARMER'S FAILURE

COULDN'T "MAKE A DO OF IT." AN EXPENSIVE FARM. Showing a deficiency of £2890 fss sd, and with assets totalling only £32 15s, two young farmers named Arthur Henry Thomas and Ira George Smith filed their estate in the Hamilton Bankruptcy Court, before which they appeared yesterday to explain their position. Their statement showed unsecured creditors at £205 19s Bd, secured creditors at £0537 10s 9d, less estimated values of securities £3BBO, leaving a deficiency as stated above. As there was not a quorum of creditors present, the Deputy Official Assignee, Mr V. 11. Sans'on, put bankrupts through a short examination. They started in business as farmers, they said, 18 months ago, witli £IOO cash each, on an area of 301 acres at Te Rorc? The purchase price as a going concern was £6OOO. They subsequently got an advance of £SOO from the Commissioner 'of Lands. They milked 20 cows the first season, and the animals did well up to November, but 14 of them got a severe chill and they had to dispose of them. They also lost six cows and three heifers in the stream at' their property. Last season they took about £2OO from the cews. The Deputy Official Assignee remarked that it was a very expensive property tn he running only 30 cows on. The figures worked out at £2OO a cow. Bankrupts added that they had not drawn between them in two years more than £3OO, including money for store bills. Thomas said lie had a wife, and lie had ndt been able to buy her a stitch of clothing since he look over the place. Bankrupts added that they had no complaint against the Government, who had treated them very generously. They had simply been unable to make a "do" of things.