Norfolk Mills - Smallburgh Moy's drainage milll

Mr Coroner Culley yesterday held an inquest upon the body of Eveline Sarah Abigail, aged eight years, who met her death on Good Friday, in an attempt to save her little brother, who had fallen into a water mill pit at Wayford Bridge.

Arthur Abigail, a malster, of Wayford Bridge, stated that on the afternoon of Good Friday, at about half past two o’clock, he saw deceased and his son, aged six years, go with two other children, named Brooks, down the road. He assumed they were going to the “strip,” a piece of uncultivated land with trees on it about 200 yards from his house, he hearing them told them to go and play there. At about four o’clock Mr George Gedge told him that his girl had been killed in Mr Durrell’s mill wheel, and his son severely injured. Witness went at once to his son, who was lying at Mr Gedge’s house and waited till Dr Williams came and attended to him, immediately after which the child was sent to the Norfolk and Norwich Hospital. Witness then went on to the mill, and saw the dead body of his daughter. The mill is about 200 yards from the “strip,” and is easily reached by a footpath from there. Whenever his children were sent to play on the “strip,” they were warned not to go near the mill, and on this occasion he heard his wife caution them. The mill was a marsh drainage mill, and was used for pumping water from the dykes. It was at work on Friday, and probably the children were attracted to it, because it was at work. A lad named Wilfred Gedge told witness that his son fell into the pit in which the mill wheel revolved, and that the deceased in trying to rescue him fell into the wheel, and was carried round by it. The boy was not carried round by the wheel.

George Gedge, farm labourer, of Smallburgh, said his son at half past three on Friday afternoon told him that the children had fallen into the pit of the drainage mill. He was in his garden, about 400 or 500 yards from the mill, but he went at once and saw the deceased child and her brother in the pit. He stopped the mill, and got the children out. The girl was dead, but the boy was alive and conscious, although much injured. The girl’s head was at the base of the pit and her feet were pointing upwards. The position in which witness found the body suggested that the girl had been caught by the wheel, and carried over the top, and then head foremost down the pit, and had become fixed there and so killed. The deceased was at one end of the pit and her brother at the other end, the wheel revolving between them. The boy was in a sitting position at the base of the pit, and the wheel grazed his clothing as it revolved.

The jury, of which Mr. F. W. Durrell was foreman, returned a verdict of “Accidental death” and expressed their sympathy with the parents of the deceased.

The little boy is lying in a critical condition at the Norfolk and Norwich Hospital. Upon inquiry yesterday evening, we learned that his condition is much about the same.
Eastern Daily Press - Tuesday 25th March 1913