“KIDNAPPED” BY STUDENTS

Press, Volume XCVIII, Issue 28887, 6 May 1959, Page 7

“KIDNAPPED” BY STUDENTS

Brigadier And Dean

For Ransom

With a precision and co-opera-tion which scarcely rippled the calm of the Christchurch Rotary Club lunch in the Jellicoe Hall yesterday, students of Canterbury University spirited the president. Brigadier J. T. Burrows, and the Dean of Christchurch, the Very Rev. Martin Sullivan, from their places and took them to an undisclosed destination. “Kidnapped” and “held to ransom.” Brigadier Burrows and Dean Sullivan will be produced at the interval of this evening’s performance of the students’ revue, “My Square Daddy.” if the citizens of Christchurch have subscribed the £2500 which the students hope to raise for the Christchurch branch of the New Zealand Epilepsy Association.

Anxious to speed the captives’ release, the general manager of one retail firm last evening telephoned Mr A. Lexington Jones, chairman of the executive of the Epilepsy Association, and promised £lO towards the fund, expressing the hope that another 100 firms would do the same. That would leave only £l5OO to be subscribed by the' public to ensure the release, and might solve the problem of what to do with the captives if today was still wet and the students’ fundraising activities were hampered. Mr Jones said. Anyone wishing to follow the retail firm's lead could do so by telephoning 79-833 at any time, he added.

A note, stating the conditions of release, was to have been left when Brigadier Burrows was taken away. But here occurred the only hitch in a smoothly working plan. The “ransom note” could not be found. It was produced later. It said that these two well-known citizens would be held until this evening. It was adorned with suitable drawings. What will happen to them if it is wet today for the students’ procession and the amount aimed at is not collected was not known to | the students.

The “kidnapping” was carried out in the best traditions of thriller fiction. The students arrived at the Gloucester street entrance of the hall by motor vehicle, lined up silently outside the doorway, walked in at 1.20 p.m.. left by a side door with their unresisting captives to Armagh street. where Brigadier Burrows and Dean Sullivan, with escort, got into a large black car and were driven away.