Rest of World (assorted) – Death On My Doorstep

1/ Brazil, (Decomposed Stowaways) November 1897

Two teenage lads from Stockport in Cheshire went to Liverpool in order to go to sea. They ended up as stowaway’s on board a ship bound for Brazil. They remained totally inconspicuous, for good reason, because when the cargo was being unloaded in Brazil, the two decomposed bodies were found. One was identified as Joseph Barton of Stockport, only seventeen years old.

2/ Papua New Guinea Cannibalism, November 1878

3/ Indian Pirate Murders, May 1879 (Those poor bugger’s.What a way to go!)

4/ Bermuda Murder, June 1880 (Murdered in 1878)

5/ Vanuatu, South Pacific, January 1890 (New Hebrides is today better known as Vanuatu.)

6/ “Aurania”- the Atlantic Ocean, June 1895 (Wife of Capt.Gorley of the S.S.Domingo. Lived at Church St, Maryport, in Cumbria)

7/ Ballantyne’s Department Store Fire, Christchurch, New Zealand November 1947

This remains to this day (2016), New Zealand’s most deadly fire, with forty-one as the final death toll.

“Thirty-eight bodies have been recovered from the shell of Ballantyne’s Department Store in Christchurch, New Zealand, where it is believed fifty people were trapped in yesterday’s fire. Only one body has so far been identified. Most of the bodies were found near the main door, suggesting that the victims were overcome as they tried to escape down the staircase from the upper floors. Forty-six people are known to be missing and other reports under investigation make it unlikely the casualties will be fewer than fifty.”

8/ Solomon Islands/Bougainville (Papua N.G.) (Pirates Loot and Kill) March 1899

9/ Solomon Islands,(Crew Murdered) March 1885 (N.E. of Australia in South Pacific Ocean)

The schooner Elibank Castle arrived at New South Wales, reported that the vessel had touched at several of the South Sea Islands, amongst them being Point Banquetta, one of the Solomon group. Whilst she was here the natives of the place attacked the crew of the vessel in a treacherous manner, murdering the commander of the vessel and four of the crew.

10/ Kimberley Mines Explosion, South Africa, June 1899

A disastrous explosion has occurred at one of the Kimberley mines. It is believed that the dynamite magazine blew up. Seventeen natives were killed and three Europeans and twenty-seven natives, seriously injured.

11/ Bombay, India, October 1885

A Reuter’s telegram from Bombay says that one of the houses in the bazaar fell in yesterday. Sixteen persons were killed and eleven were seriously injured.

12/ Port Phillip Bay, Melbourne, Victoria (Eaten by Sharks) June 1888

13/ Congo (Now Congo D.R.) (Abandoned by Locals) March 1899

14/ Congo (Now Congo D.R.) (Cannibalism) May 1899

15/ Congo Cannibalism, September 1885

A letter received from Mossamedes (Angola) reports that certain stations on the Congo belonging to the International Association have been attacked by cannibals and the white men killed, roasted and eaten. The names of the stations are not given and no further particulars have been received.

16/ Tangier, Morocco, (Man’s Killing Spree) October 1885

A tragedy of the sensational order took place yesterday in Tangier. A man named McHugh, formerly an artillery sergeant in the British army, murdered his paramour and then ran through the streets wounding everybody whom he met. He stabbed four Moors, two Spaniards and one Jew. One of the Moors died soon afterwards and one of the Spaniards is dying.

17/ Queensland, Australia March 11th, 1899

Two hundred persons have perished in the hurricane which has been raging off the coast of Queensland.

March 14th, 1899

The hurricane on the Queensland coast has claimed eighty-three vessels. The search steamer which was sent owing to the recent hurricane has returned to Cooktown and reports that three schooners and eighty luggers of the pearling fleet have been lost. It is estimated that four hundred coloured men and eleven whites were drowned during the storm.

18/ China, Missionaries Murdered, June 1899

19/ Hooghly River, West Bengal, India August 1885

The ship “British Statesman”, laden with rice and bound for the West Indies left Calcutta on the 15th inst. and foundered on the 17th at the mouth of the Hooghly. The captain and twenty men are missing. Six men were rescued.

20/ Roebourne,? West Australia, January 1885 (Double Murder in Bank)

The manager and accountant of the Union Bank of Australia’s branch at Raeburne (?), West Australia, have been found tomahawked on the premises. There is no clue as to the assassins.

21/ Hobson’s Bay, Melbourne, Victoria, (Watch, Clothes in Shark) February 1885

The “Melbourne Argus” says the clothes, watch, etc, of Mr Hugh Browne, who was drowned with his brother and a companion while yachting in Hobson’s Bay, have been found in the stomach of a shark that was recently captured. Mr William McDonald Browne’s body had been washed ashore had been mutilated by sharks a week previously.

22/ Kenya, (River Voi/Mombasa) (Killed by Lion) April 1899

23/ South Africa, (English Lady Murdered) May 1899 (Was it solved?)

24/ Valparaiso Murder, Chile, November 1885

Captain Lawrenson of the ship Jungfrau of Swansea, who has been murdered at Valparaiso was sixty-four-years of age and was the part owner of the vessel, the crew of which were almost all from Swansea. John Beavan the carpenter, who is in custody charged with the crime, is forty years of age. His family reside at Swansea.

25/ Egypt, October 1885 (Shipwreck Survival)

26/ Adelaide, Australia, (Suicide at Sea) June 1852

The “Gazelle” arrived in Swansea from Adelaide in Australia with hundreds of tons of copper ore and a number of passengers. One lady who embarked at Adelaide was Mrs Lydia Webber Jenkins, who committed suicide at sea. Approximately nine p.m., she left her cabin, walked past the man at the helm and leapt overboard and was drowned.

27/ South Yarra, Australia, (Body Parts Found) November 1892

Various body parts were discovered in a park at South Yarra and these include a pair of hands and arms, severed at the elbow. It is being connected with the discovery of a bag containing the lower portions of the legs of a male which were found a week ago at Hawthorn, a suburb of Melbourne. The police have no clue to the mystery.

28/ Melbourne/Hobart, May 1860 (Dream Leads Man to Suicide)

A bizarre story this one! Mrs Fenwick and her four children left Melbourne for England on the “Royal Charter” and were all lost at sea. The husband and father, Mr Fenwick, stayed put in Melbourne, but five days before the shipwreck he had a nightmare in which he saw his wife and kids drowning, calling him to help them. So vivid was the dream, that he committed suicide by slitting his throat with a razor. Coincidentally, that was the same night that the ship went down.

29/ India, January 1885 (Suicides Coincidence)

30/ South Sea Islands Cannibalism, April 1885

An officer from the German gunboat,”Hyaena”, gave the following details about the fate of two German crews of merchant ships whose contents were robbed, then the men were killed and eaten by the savages on the South Sea Islands.

“Our Christmas holidays we spent near the Anachoretes Islands(?), north of New Guinea. Some natives we proceeded to examine, as it was reported that the natives of the neighbouring Hermit Islands, a warlike race who had been severely punished by us two years ago, had again attacked two vessels, and plundered, then burnt them, afterwards killing their crews and feasting on them at a cannibal banquet. The news was brought by a prisoner of war on the Hermit Islands, he being from Anachoretes Islands, who had escaped and returned home. This was reported to General Consul, Herr Hernsheim.

Our investigations have confirmed these statements to be true. Among the relics of the two burnt vessels was a woman’s chemise, with the initials “A.P.”. We ascertained this was a woman on the schooner named Annie Pagels.”

31/ Chinese Great Floods, September 1885

32/ Pacific Ocean, June 1867 (Discovery of a Pacific Island) (Is this Midway Island?)

A San Francisco dispatch states that a new island has been found in the North Pacific Ocean. It is between 50 degrees west longitude and 40 degrees 30 minutes north latitude. It is twenty miles long, right along the path from vessels on their way to China or Japan from San Francisco. The steamship “Colorado” passed it on her way back and the area is renowned for being misty and foggy. It is also believed that many vessels have been wrecked there and the Government has sent a vessel to explore the island. A company has organized a survey and they will send a vessel to examine, then take possession of the island.

33/ Caulfield Racecourse Fatality, Melbourne, December 1885

34/ Australia Murder/Cannibalism, October 1885 (Found Moresby Island in Canada/Fine Gold Creek in California?)

35/ Port Stanley Mutiny, Falkland Islands, May 1885

36/ Falkland Islands, (Crew Missing) August 1885

37/ Atlantic Ocean, November 1884 (Cannibalism Case)

This case caused quite a stir in late 1884 in England. Thomas Dudley, the captain of the “Mignonette” and Edward Stevens, mate, were indicted for having murdered 17-year-old Richard Parker on the high seas. There was great interest in the case as people were trying to decide if they would do the same thing in their position, and that was, would you eat another person to survive, if you were floating in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. Parker had been drinking sea-water and his health was getting worse. The other two decided to put him out of his misery and kill him then eat his tender teenage flesh. Anyway, they did exactly that and survived. Back in England, they were put on trial for justifiable homicide, but the judge and jury thought that they hadn’t really done anything wrong and got six months imprisonment. There is an incredible coincidence to this story, in that Edgar Allan Poe wrote a tale in 1838 of just such an occurrence and on a boy named Richard Parker. If you don’t hear the theme from the “Twilight Zone” there is something wrong. (Richard Parker’s grave is at Jesus Chapel, Peartree Green, Southampton in England)

38/ Ghana, West Africa, (Natives Executed) March 1885

39/ Ghana (Quitta-Keta in Ghana) (British Sailors Run Amok) February 1885

40/ Algeria (Ships Engineer Murder) February 7th, 1885

41/ Algeria Murder, February 11th, 1885

42/ Daylesford, Australia, (Children’s Body Parts Found) November 1867

On June 30th, three young children went missing from Daylesford and the townsfolk turned out in force to look for them. A man by the name of McKay was walking his dog around that had a child’s boot in its mouth and a portion of the child’s foot in it! The little corpses were discovered near McKay’s hut on the Mack Creek near the saw-mill. Two were found in a hollow tree, which they seemed to have gone in there and embraced each other to keep warm. The third child had very little left of the body, as McKay’s dogs seemed to have enjoyed the vast portion of its body. They had got lost. McKay had nothing to do with their disappearance. Their escape route was impeded by a brush fence and if they had gone a few hundred yards along they would have seen the light on in McKay’s hut, but it was pitch black and they’re out in the bush. It is believed they fell asleep and died of exposure. Two of them were brothers named Graham and the other was named Burman. They were buried at Daylesford.

43/ Hingoli Human Sacrifice, India, April 1899

44/ Tinnevelly Murders/Arson, Madras (now Chennai) June 1899

45/ Khokand Prison Break, Uzbekistan, February 1885

A terrible outbreak occurred in the town prison of Khokand in Ferghana province, on January 14th between twenty-four hard-labour convicts and their military guards and sailors. The officer of the guard was killed and nine soldiers were wounded by the sudden onslaught of prisoners, while in revenge, ten of the latter were eventually shot dead and eleven others wounded.