A "RAGGING" SCANDAL.

Press, Volume LX, Issue 11580, 11 May 1903, Page 8

A "RAGGING" SCANDAL.

ENQUIRY ORDERED BY LORD ROBERTS. United Press Association—By Eleotrio Telegraph—Copyright. (Received May 9th, 9 a.m.) LONDON, May 8. Lord Roberts has ordered an enquiry into a charge of ragging on the part of officers at a dance at the Mount Nelson Hotel in Capetown, on Christmas Eve of 1901. W. E. Stanford, C.8., of Capetown, a colonial, who served in tnie South African war, is the complainant. Briefly the details of the above case are these:—On Christmas Eve, 1901, a party of officers staying at the Mount Nelson Hotel, Capetown, gave a dance, and Mr Stanford was one of the committee. Application was made to the authorities for the attendance of an infantry band, a request which was acceded to on the condition that Mr Stanford's name should be withdrawn from the list of the committee. No reason was given for this stipulation, but privately it was asserted that Mr Stanford was a Boer sympathiser and writer, or something equally indefinite. Mr Stanford was warned of this, and advised not to attend the dance, but, being innocent of the offence implied against him, he declined to be absent from the function or leave the hotel. At two in the morning several officers inveigled him into a room, held a mock court-martial, and subsequently threw him into the pond iij_the hotel gardens, dragged him out, shaved off half his moustache, stripped him, and cast him back into the water. The officers then made their victim sign a paper stating that the whole matter was a joke, and he was turned out of the hotel at 6 a.m. in his wet clothes; he was ill for some time afterwards. On recovering, Mt Stanford sued his assailants, and was awarded £1500 damages and £2000 costs, and letters of apology were ordered to be written by the officers concerned. The money was paid, but the censors prohibited publication of the proceedings. Mr Stanford considered he had not obtained sufficient redress, notwithstanding the decree of the civil Court, hence the further action detailed in the above cable message.

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