When the Blue Express Was Held up and 35 Foreigners Were Taken Prisoner: A Story of Evasion and Dela:
Penalties Demanded and What has Come of Them On May 6, 1923, the Blue Express from Pukou to Tientsin was derailed by brigands at Lincheng on the southern border of Shantung and 5 foreigners, men, women and children, were carried off to the lls, where some of them remained in captivity till as Tate as June 12. They included several well known Shanghai residents, Mr. G. D. Musso, Mr. R. H. Rowlatt, Mr. J. B. Powell, Mr. Leon Friedman and others; two American army men Major Pinger and Major Allen; a young Brazilian couple Mr. and Mrs. Verea, of whom Mrs. Veren earned great honour by refusing to Teave her husband for. many days after all other Indies hiad been re-Teased and only at last, being perently urged, consented to do 60; and Miss Aldrich niece of an American millionaire.
One unhappy foreigner was Killed, Mr. Joseph Rothman, a Rumanian by birth, naturalized British in South Africa, who had fought in the Boer War and wax Known as a merchant in Shanghai.
'The nationalities represented among the captives were. British, French, American, Brazilian, Ttalian and of course' Chinese, World-Wide Excitement.
The excitement produced by the outrage none will forget. A. telegram from Washington reported that Mr. Davis, Acting Secretary for War, had stated, after consultation with the Secretary of State, Mr. Hughes, that "the War Depart mont was ready to back up with armed forces any decision reached by the State Department or th council of foreign Ministers Poking." The latter body informed the Chinese Government that it would be held personally respon ible for the safety of the captives and. the Chinese Government promised to punish all guilty officials in Shantung and ensure the prison~ ers' speedy release, 'To this day It remains.a mystery why, exactly, these "promising beginnings came to naught. During the first few days after the outrage 'a number of prisoners were set But there remained always eight men in the bandits' hands, Freddy Elms, Mr, Leon Fried-Mr, Emile Gensburger, Me. A. D. Musso, Major Pinger, Mr. Powell, Bir, Rowlate and Bte, Lee Solomon. Toward the end of May these captives wore removed to an ecessible peak named Paotzeku, setonnly tcngeroun th tin ascent impossible to capture.
Tt says much for China's indifference to the bandit evil that or this lonely height, the foreigners found numbers of Chinese captives, including children, who had Veen' there for many months and were in some cases melancholy: mad. The filth and the general hardships of life on Paotzeku, comined with the uncertainty as to their fate, not improved by continued threats by the bandits to shoot them, made the existence of the "prisoners" most. bitter and nerve-wracking, in spite of the letters and supplies of minor kinds which their friends fu the outside world contrived to get through to them.
'The Bandits' Demands.
The terms demanded by the ban-its began as usual in the most extravagant strain—a vast ransom, pardon, enrolment in the army, the choice of their own magistrate in the district in which they were to serve, These eventually were reduced to pardon and enrolment in the army. A. number of foreign advisers had flown to 'Tsaochuang—the nearest point to the bandits'—headquarters—immediately after the outrage and it is by mo means clear that they contributed to expedite matters. However, at the end it was the personal' promise of Mr. Roy Anderson that the Government. would keep its word which got eight men of "the Old Guard' released. In the closing phases of negotiation mention must also made of the fine work done by Mr. Wen Shih-tsen of Nanking. His services were truly invaluable.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.