Clues to mystery sought

Press, 19 October 1982, Page 6

Clues to mystery sought

A British member of Parliament, Dr David Clark, is combining an official visit to New Zealand with the chance to seek more information on a former British minister of Parliament, Victor Grayson. who disappeared from a London hotel in 1920. and was never seen again. Dr Clark is writing a book, and hopes to make a television documentary on Grayson, who enlisted in the Ist New Zealand Expeditionary Force, and was discharged before his disappearance. Dr Clark leaves Christchurch today as part of a British Commonwealth Parliamentary Association delegation tour, which will finish in Auckland on October 24. The other members are Mr Reginald Prentice, Conservative M.P. for Daventry; Mr Kenneth Carlisle. Conservative M.P. for Lincoln; Mr James Callaghan, Labour M.P. for Middleton and Prestwich; and Lord Oram. The party visited- Lincoln

College yesterday, and attended a "civic reception put on by the Mayor. Sir Hamish Hay. last evening. Today, they will visit Waitaki N.Z. Refrigerating. Ltd. and the farm of Mr M. R. Barnett at Dunsandel. before flying'to Wellington. Dr Clark, who is Labour member for South Shields, came to New Zealand several days before the delegation to continue his research into Victor Grayson. He has already had three telephone calls from people with information about Grayson. In addition, Dr Len Richardson, of the-University of Canterbury’s history department, found an interview with Grayson printed in the "Lyttelton Times" of October 4, 1916. Grayson was elected a Socialist Labour member of Parliament for Colne Valley in 1907. His fall from grace was eventually followed by his disappearance from the London hotel. Dr Clark, who has been interested in the Grayson

case for about 15 years, had also previously represented Colne Valley, and found that many people there still remembered Grayson. "When I used to travel round, people would still refer to him. which is very odd after 70 years." said Dr Clark. “People still remember him. so he must have made a hell of an impression. “Grayson was a great orator, possibly the greatest orator at that time." Dr Clark has heard from two people in the North Island, one of whom remembered attending a meeting of Grayson's in Auckland, and another who was in hospital with Grayson in England. He has also been in touch with a Nelson man who was wounded at Passchendaele with Grayson, and who remembers a change in his personality from then on. Dr Clark said he was particularly interested in the “Lyttelton Times” interview-, which quoted Grayson as

saying he would probably make his home somewhere near Christchurch. Dr Clark has various ideas on what happened to Grayson, but finds it rather strange that he left without his daughter, to whom he had been very close. Grayson's wife died in childbirth in 1918. Dr Clark's official visit to New Zealand as part of the delegation, is a fact-finding mission to look at New Zealand’s interests and problems. “It is so much like England and yet it is not England,” he said. “There is a vitality here which you do not see in England "or the United Stales. “I have got the view that New Zealand is going to get through the difficult times much easier than other countries." Dr Clark, who was first elected to the House of Commons in 1970. said that one in three people in his constituency were unemployed.