NEVER RETURNED.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 247, 17 October 1936, Page 32 (Supplement)

NEVER RETURNED.

ABYSSINIA VISIT. MANY VIEWS ADVANCED. EARLY in 1904 the American Government ratified, an important treaty with King. Menelik of Abyssinia, who also called himself Emperor of Ethiopia and who boasted of being a descendant of'the Queen of Sheba, mentioned in the Scriptures. The Assistant Secretary of State, F. B. Loomis, commissioned his brother, Kent j. Loomis, as his confidential representative to bear the treaty to the dusky monarch at his capital, Addis Ababa. The mission was one entailing little responsibility and much interesting travel, and Kent Loomis, being th& editor of a newspaper at ■ MBiaiMIVaiWMMMBiHMaaiHHIHiMBiaiMHiaiMB

' Parkersburg, W. Va., had the mental equipment "to both enjoy and fulfil it. After delivering the treaty he expected to hunt big game in Abyssinia.. Stating that he would be gone two months, he bade his wife and child goodbye in their southern home, and on June 14 sailed for Cherbourg on the Kaiser Wilhelm 11. But before the ship reached its, destination he was missed and no sooner had the cable flashed word of his disappearance than all sorts of p.uzzling rumours sprang up from various sources Investigation showed that Loomis had been last seen an hour or two after midnight, June 19, when he had gone on deck following the usual captain's dinner, which had been given on the eve of the vessel's arrival at its destination. Shortly after that time the ship made a 6top at' Plymouth, England, where one passenger was positive he saw Mr. Loomis land with the crowd, in which he was borne along in what was described as a>sort of dazed condition.

./ \ Vain Search. But the Kaiser Wilhelin's captain and head steward, who both had stood at the gangway when the passengers alighted, were equally as sure Uncle Sam's confidential messenger did not leave the ship with the other passengers. Finally, when .the vessel reached Cherbourg, whither he was booked, a vain search of all of the cabins was made for the vanished passenger. A promoter, William H. Ellis, Loomis' cabin mate and travelling companion, and who claimed to be a Cuban, stated, when questioned, that the editor's absence from his berth had not 'alarmed him after the vessel touched Plymouth, late at night, since the young man had been up very late the several previous nights. Ellis continued on the journey to Abyssinia, bearing the tin box containing the treaty, and a week went by without the appearance of a single clue to the mystery. Then followed reports that the lost man had turned up alive at Paris; that he had been found dead at Cherbourg; also that he had been placed in a sanitarium at Plymouth —there to be kept until he might recover from a fit of abstraction. This fit, according to the last-mentioned rumour, had seized him about 2 o'clock 011 the night of his disappearance, and while he was acting strangely in the company of a man and woman on deck. Body . Washed Ashore. . All sorts of .contradictory statements as to Loomis' fate continued until July 10 when —four weeks after his disappearance —his body was found washed up at Warren Point, some 15 miles from Plymouth. Under his right ear was § circu-