CRUEL CAPTORS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 66, 18 March 1936, Page 11

CRUEL CAPTORS.

CHINESE BANDITS.

AUCKLAND MISSIONARY HELD. MR. HAYMAN'S EXPERIENCES. The first complete story of the captivity of the Auckland missionary, Mr. A. Hayman, at the hands of Chinese Communists, has come to hand by the last London air mail. Mr. and Mrs. Hayman, their two children, Mr. and Mrs. R. A. Bosshardt, and Miss Grace Emblen ware captured by the Chinese under Hsiao Keh, in Kiuchow, on October 2, 1934. Mrs. Hayman and the children and Mrs. Bosshardt were left in the city the next day to deliver the demands for ransom, and Miss Emblen was get free a few days later when the Reds, who were making forced marches north-eastwards, saw that she could not keep up with them. Mr. Hayman was released on November 18 of last year, after 413 days, having' met with great hardships, when the Chinese believed that he was going to die. Mr. Bosshardt, as far as is known, is still a captive. They are all members of the China Inland Mission. Story Told At Last. Since his arrival in London from Shanghai he has been in hospital, his health having broken down, and on his doctor's advice, he did not speak of his adventures until the memory of them had been softened a little by the reunion with his wife and children.

For 26 days after their capture, Mr. Hayman and Mr. Bosshardt accompanied the Reds towards Hunan, marching over rough and mountainous roads at a great pace, sleeping on hillsides, and eating what the Reds threw to thorn. Among the other captives some could not stand the ordeal and were beheaded as they fell out. But a good number of them reached Ho Lung's encampment in north-west Hunan, where they settled down.

On December 17, 1034, the couple escaped. They were quickly recaptured aud publicly tried. The Communists' form of trial, Mr. Hayman explained, was by appeal to the general public. The accused were brought before the presidents of the Court., who appealed to the public for a verdict and sentence. The president, however, decided to refer the case", to the Central Committee, which later delivered a written judgment fining Mr. Haynian 400,000 dollars ( £25,000) and Mr. Bosshardt 200,000 dollars ( £.12,500). Some time after this the two men were kept in a dark room for five weeks on end. Mr. Hayman said they never found out why this was done. Prisoners Beaten. While negotiations were going on for their release, they . were once brought out in front of the messengers who had come to discuss terms and severely beaten. Each prisoner was givep 50 strokes with the bamboo after having been stripped to the waist. "There was not much blood," said Mr. Hayman, "but we were black and blue for a month afterwards." The Communists thought this beating would be an incentive to their friends to raisti the ransom money. Mr. Hayman said he and Mr. Bosshardt were fairly well treated. While the Chinese captives were given two bowls of rice gruel a day, the two foreigners ate the same food as the Communist soldiers —ricc, chiles and sometimes meat, three times a day. They were looked upon as imperialist spies, and it was perhaps fortunate for them that neither was English, for the Reds expressed the greatest hatred for the English. The English (not the British) were "imperialists" of the deepest dye, and were execrated accordingly. Mr. Hayman was a New Zealandcr; born in a British "colony," he was one of the oppressed races that were being devoured by the imperialist ogre. Mr. Bosshardt was a Swiss. The Reds found it hard to understand how a Swiss could be brought up in Manchester and receive hia later education in a London Bible school, and were more suspicious of him in consequence. They gave him the benefit of the doubt, as the Swiss were not an imperialist nation. Another Penelope. The monotony of the captivity was relieved by occasional air raids, which brought further conviction to the foreigners that they were regarded as special prisoners. When bombs began to drop the two missionaries were taken to the Communists' dug-outs, while the Chinese captives were handcuffed tof ether or bound and left in the open. Ir. Bosshardt found another way to relieve the tedium. It happened that a Communist who had committed some offence was imprisoned with them for a few days. This man unravelled his woollen socks to while away the time, and Mr. Bosshardt pounced on the wool. When in quarantine as a boy he had been taught by his mother how to do crochet work. Nicking the end of a ■bamboo cliopstick to make a crochetnook, he set to work to make himself some overshoes. The result so pleased the Communists that they brought iim more wool and he knitted them clothes. As he became more proficient they used to bring him whole garments, which Mr. Hayman would unravel and Mr. Bosshardt remake in different shapes.

Towards the end Mr. Havman's health gave way. He suffered from arthritis, and was unable to eat with chopsticks. The Communists were anxious about his condition. They gave him a spoon to eat with, and augmented his ordinary food with eggs. He grew steadily weaker, however, and it was more fear that he was going to die on their hands than anything that caused them to set liim fr*e at last.