VISIT TO FORMER PRISON

Press, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22336, 25 February 1938, Page 18

VISIT TO FORMER PRISON

COUNT VON LUCKNER ON MOTUIHI ISLAND INSCRIPTION WRITTEN ON 'WALL OF OLD ROOM (FiIESS ASSOCIATION TELEGRAM.) AUCKLAND, February 24. With feet planted wide apart, hands deep in jacket pockets, his pipe alight, blowing clouds of smoke, and with his wife on his arm, Count von Luckner stood to-day on a bluff at Motuihi Island, and, laughing repeatedly, pointed out the path of his escape from the island in the launch Pearl while a prisoner of war 20 years ago. From heights of a promontory his eye travelled to the hazy blueness of Cape Colville. “It hasn’t changed a bit,” he said with a laugh. Accompanied by Major-General Sir George Richardson, General Hewlett, a British Army officer, the Hon. T. Bloodworth, chairman of the Harbour Board, members of the board’s staff, and several guests, Count von Luckner visited the island in his auxiliary schooner Seeteufel. Throughout.the morning he explored again the beaches, hills, and valleys of the island with the enthusiasm of a schoolboy, always with his wife on his arm* v On the wall of his old room he' wrote, "My old room which I entered again after 19 years. 24/2/38: Felix von Luckner." He insisted that his wife should also lign .her name. Later the party inipected'the health camp of the Com-