THE CASE OF THE SEVERED HAND – THE HOWARD MYSTERY

As Arthur Rennage Howard sipped his beer at the Day’s Hotel in Sumner, he looked at the time on his silver pocket watch. It was 4pm on Saturday, the 10th October 1885. He looked out the window as Sumner beach began to empty of sunbathers and swimmers, the sun beginning to lower in the sky. …

New Zealand’s First Serious Fraud Case – 11th October 1885

On the morning of 11th October 1885, a neat pile of folded clothes were discovered by a young lad on Sumner Beach, not far from the Scarborough Heads. The owner was one Arthur Rennage Howard, a mechanic who worked at the Addington Railway Workshops and lived with his wife Sarah and two children at No. …