Mishaps Near Apia

Double Motor Accident

From Our Own Correspondent APIA, January 5.

A SERIOUS motor car accident, with fatal results, occurred on December 16 on the west coast main road.

A car owned by Mr. F. Stewart and driven by a young boy, Willie Stewart, from Apia to Leulumaega, struck a young Samoan boy, Prula, who tried to cross the road in front of the car at the village of Tuanai. The boy, who was six years old, was struck by the bumper and knocked insensible.

As apparently the boy was seriously hurt, he was put into the car and taken to the hospital by another driver. On the way to the hospital, at the corner of Taufusi and Vae Roads, close to Apia, one of a group of Sa

moan children, Ali’va’a, six years old, rushed in front of the approaching car and was also struck by the mudguards and sustained injuries to the head.

He was promptly loaded into the car, which, with the two injured boys, pro ceeded on its way to the hospital.

The boy Prula died shortly after ad mission to hospital from a fractured skull. The second boy, Ali’va’a, was operated upon and his life will prob ably be saved.

An investigation has been started by the police. The driver Stewart was only learning to drive, and seems not to have held a driver’s license. After the accident the excited Tuanai nat ives tried to lynch the responsible driver and only the interference of the Samoan missionary at Tuanai saved the boy from serious injury.

The death occurred at Levuka, Fiji, recently of Jekopi Levau, a well known native teacher, who had been connected with the Methodist Mission at Levuka for some 15 years.