STEWART RIVER, May 18. - Operator Peters and Lineman Wridgeway, when coming down the river along the line from Selwyn, cut in about the Halfway post at an early hour this morning and reported the drowning of W. B. Copping on the 5th of this month.

    He had finished unloading scows that were caught in the ice about two miles below the steamer Lafrance, and was trying to go up to the steamer and broke through the ice and was drowned. Further details are not given.

    They did not state whether the body had been recovered and it will be impossible to get full particulars for several days, when the river will be clear, so that the boys can cross to the police post and continue on down the river.

---

    A brief telegram corroborative of the foregoing report was received this morning by Major Cuthbert, in charge of the Dawson division of the N. W. M. P. It is from Constable Jackson, in charge of the Stewart river detachment, and says:

    "W. B.Copping, unmarried, drowned between Kirkman and Shafer's roadhouse, forty-five miles above Stewart, May 5."

    The police have heard nothing more of the accident than the foregoing.

Copping's Mission.

    Last fall Mr. Copping attempted to bring several scows down the Yukon from Whitehorse at an extremely late period. The scows were caught in the ice near Steamboat Slough, and had to remain there for the winter. This spring Mr. Copping went up from Dawson, and was preparing to bring the scows to Dawson or have them brought down or put in a safe place before deciding exactly what to do when he net his death.

    The scows are laden with freight for Fassbender, the Bonanza operator, and a number of other Dawson people. Fassbender has a six-ton pump on one scow. He telegraphed Mr. Copping late In April to put the scow in a safe place and await further orders.

    S. G. Spence, of the Oak Hall clothing company, was financing the bringing of the scows down for Mr. Copping, and hads a mortgage on the freight charges.

Life of Mr. Copping

    William B. Copping was born 31 years ago in the little town of Rawdon, Montcalm county, Quebec, where his parents have long since lived. He was raised there, and has many relatives in the vicinity. He has an uncle, William Burns, in the machinery business on Fourth avenue between Queen and Princess in Dawson. Archie Burns, formerly a prominent transient trader between Dawson and the outside, is another uncle to the deceased.

    Mr. Copping came tom the Yukon in 1898. He traveled over the famous Ashcroft trail. Nearly ever since his arrival in Dawson he had been engaged in transient trading and operation of scows between Whitehorse and Dawson. He was one of the most expert scow pilots on the Yukon, and never had an accident inn the business before this.

    Since coming to Dawson, Mr. Copping had worked tirelessly. He built the well known Copping house on Seventh avenue, and was proprietor of the place three years. It passed into the hands of W. D. Bruce several months ago.

    WHITEHORSE, May 18. - Two lives were lost in the treacherous whirlpool of the Whitehorse rapids Saturday. The victims are:

    Bud Harkin, formerly of Dawson, 29 years.

    Miss Leila Wallace, of Whitehorse, 20 years.

    Late Saturday evening a party consisting of Bud Harkin, proprietor of the Windsor restaurant; Leila Wallace, a waitress in his employ, and Eugene La Rose, a riverman, started through the Whitehorse rapids in a Peterborough canog for a pleasure trip.

    They came through the turbulent rapids safely, but in the whirlpool just below were capsized by the girl attempting to change her position in the canoe to avoid water they had taken aboard during the passage of the rapids. The girl and Harkin were drowned.

    La Rose clung to the overturned canoe and reached shore in a dazed condition a short distance below, and made his way to a point opposite town, where he gave the first news.

    The N. W. M. P. and others searched for the bodies.

    The body of Miss Wallace was found early yesterday morning on a sand bar a quarter of a mile below the rapids.

    The police are still dragging using dynamite to raise Harkin's body.

    Miss Wallace is sald to be a native of Michigan. She was about twenty years old and had been in Alaska and the Yukon for several years. She had no relatives in the north and the address jf her relatives outside is not known.

    Hankin had been in the Yukon five years and was very popular. He was 29 years old and well known in Dawson. His parents are at Marshfield, Wisconsin, and if the body can be found) it likely will be shipped there for burial. He leaves a widow and one child by the widow's former husband.

    Hankin and La Rose had come through the rapids safely Saturday forenoon.

    The girl was warned not to attempt the dangerous passage, but said she was not afraid. Her funeral is being held this afternoon.

    La Rose has a brother at Hootalingua.

Harkin a Pioneer.

    Bud Harkin is the only one of the two Whitehorse victims who probably is well known here. He is known to every trader and roadhouse man between Dawson and Skagway, and to nearly every merchant in Dawson. He made perhaps more round trips over the old river trail between Dawson and Whitehorse up to two years ago than any other man had ever made. He was engaged in bringing in supplies for the Yukon Iron Works of Dawson, now out of business; The iron works were at Third avenue and Fourth street, Dawson, and were managed by W. J. Walther, who died three years ago. Walther was an uncle to Harkin.

    The proper name of Harkin was Patrick Henry Harkin. He was better known as Bud. He was born in Fon-du-Lac, Wisconsin, 29 years ago last March. His father and mother and three sisters and three brothers live at Marshfield, Wis.

    In 1897 Mr. Harkin was in business in Colfax, Wash. He left there that year for Dawson, and came over the Teslin trail with Charley Jones, now in Dawson, and Ned Jones, who later went to the South African war with a Canadian contingent. They started over the Teslin trail with eight horses.

    Last winter Mr. Larkin conducted a roadhouse on Henderson creek. The winter before he had a roadhouse at Ogilvie, on the Yukon river trail to outside. This spring he went to Whitehorse and took the proprietorship of the Windsor restaurant. Mrs. Harkin went there with him, and is now there with her child.

    Mr. Harkin was married last September. The bride was Mrs. Bertha Foss.

    Mrs. O. W. Roberts, wife of the chief engineer of the steamer Prospector, is a cousin to Mr. Harkin. She speaks of Mr. Harkin as always energetic, sober and industrious and feels keenly the blow that death has struck to the family. Mr. and Mrs. Roberts live at the north end of Second avenue near Albert. They have received no particulars in respect to the drowning.