A REGRETTABLE INCIDENT.

Auckland Star, Volume LI, Issue 293, 8 December 1920, Page 5

A REGRETTABLE INCIDENT.

RUCTIONS IN WHITEHALL. LONDON'S ALIBX PERILS. (-from Our Spedal Correspondent.) LOXDOX, October 19. London had last Monday a foretaste of the unpleasantness predicted by our pessimists as an addition to our ordinary winter's discontents, namely, serious trouble with the unemployed. Whitehall, the spacious thoroughfare leading from Charing Cross to the Houses of Parliament, was the scene of a "most regrettable incident," vividly recalling those nnhappv days of 'So, when John Bums'—then foremost among the "fiery untamed Labour leaders —encouraged the "out of works to demonstrate in Trafalgar Square. Monday's affair was, howe\er not really the fault of the genuine unemployed, who. headed by the Mayors of fifteen London boroughs, assembled on the Thames Embankment and processioned in orderly manner to Downing Street, where the Mayors on their behalf were, by arrangement, to interview Mr. Lloyd George and other Ministers. As always, the trouble was created by the motley crew of nondescripts who, ever ripe for mischief of any kind, inevitably attach themselves to demonstrations in London organised by Labour, no matter what the object'of the gatherings may be. In tills case, the Mayors concerned gave practically a guarantee to the authorities that there should be no disorder, and the processionists proper were certainly in no mood for "ructions." But the Mayors' pledges and the men's desire to demonstrate peaceably were set at nought by a crowd of some four or five thousand hooligans, composed to a very great extent of the hybrid foreign scum of the East End, who, egged on by a party of extremists, who carefully kept in the centre of the crowd, commenced- to make trouble whilst the Mayoral deputation was still closeted with the Premier in his Downing l Street residence. In obedience to a suggestion from a long-haired raucous-voiced individual, the riff-raff made an attempt to force a way through the cordon of police drawn across the end of Downing Street. They met with purely passive but quite effective resistance from the/nen in blue, who, though they suffpred some casualties in repelling the crowds' repeated attacks, kept their temper in a manner which won the unstinted admiration of all neutral witness©.. Presently, however, the real "ugliness" of the rowdy elements began to develop, and • the crash of glass told its own tale. Stonethrowing had commenced, and presently a policeman went down with blood streaming from an ugly cut, which barely missed his eye. Just then the Mayors emerged from Downing Street. and seeing the state of affairs, endeavoured to pour vocal oil on the troubled waters. They might as well have addressed the wind, and were almost at once swallowed up in a seething mass of humanity. This was shortly after four o'clock. but it was not until another half-hour had elapsed that the authorities felt compelled to take the drastic step which eventually brought peace to Whitehall, and meanwhile many ugly little incidents marked the rising tide of the mob's passions.

Mounted police in force rode up smartly to reinforce the little squadron already present, which, with the unmounted men ,held the approach to Downing Street. By this time stones and brickbats were flying freely. For about half an hour in all the police stood this cowardly attack stoically, now and then bearing a stricken comrade to the doorway of the Privy Council offices, where his wounds were dressed. Then, just as a woman was carried out of the crowd, a great red gash staining her forehead, the, mounted police charged in a body. First down and then up Whitehall they swept, their long truncheons—stout staves with a guard below the handle-— clearing a passage.' Stones continued to fly at men and horses, but the crowd scuttled like rabbits for the most part. The bolder spirits were dealt with by the unmounted police, who completed the clearance of the streets and arrested a dozen or so of the most turbulent.

The approach to Whitehall was free, but the ugliest" feature of the whole miserable affair now developed. Brickbats and stones came hurtling into ■Whitehall from Richmond Gardens, where a section of the mob had barricaded itself behind the gate_ and were (busy wrecking rockeries and railing, to provide themselves with missiles and weapons. Brickbats, whole bricks, huge lumps of vlinker and jagged flint—anything, indeed, that could be thrown— was used to pelt the police. One miscreant threw a navvy's spade at a group of constabulary and inflicted a nasty gash on the face of an old man who had sought refuge among them. This'roused the police to action. Lining up, they dashed across Whitehall, forced the gates behind which the rioters were entrenched, and "went for" the crowd in real earnest, though most of them used only their fists, reserving their truncheons "for the benefit of those ruffians who had armed themselves with weapons—loaded sticks. and in some cases iron staves wrenched from the railings in the gardens. There was some "dirty work" for a few minutes, but the stone-throwing scum had no stomach for band-to-han.l fighting and bolted. OA gang made its way into Whitehall Gardens and commenced a flank attack on the police with flints torn from the ornamental edirings to raisell flower beds, varying their human objective to take pot shots at the windows of the Government offices in their vicinity. But their "rally" was of brief duration, for the police by a skilful manoeuvre took them in the rear and scattered them like chaff.

Meanwhile the mounted police, aided by sundry horsed baton wielders in civilian attire, had dealt very effectively with the main crowd. Where a mere rush would effect a clearance they h ; it suffice, but where resistance un- < "end they suffered their long a«h "sivn. ■.:■," to "persuade the recalcitrants, 'ihey ay

very effective weapons in the hands of mounted men, and a. few score of those who demonstrated unwisely carried away mementoes of their folly in the eiiape uf sore heads and limbs.

By twilight the crowds had entirely dispersed and the only signs of what had been were the broken windows and a roadway strewn with bricks, stones, flint-, pieces of broken concrete, and here and there a smashed beer bottle.

As regards casualties those who had to be taken to hospital numbered about two score, including the police, of .vhom a dozen were rather seriounly injured. As a rule the damage had been done by bricks and stones, and very feiv indeed who needed hospital treatment could trace their injuries to the "brutality" of the police. But it was a miserable business all round, and demonstrated once again the folly of permitting processions of unemployed to concsutr&ta. io- the centro-af London .