LADY SMOKER QUARANTINED.

Clutha Leader, Volume XXXVI, Issue 51, 7 December 1909, Page 2 (Supplement)

LADY SMOKER QUARANTINED.

NEW YORK OFFICIALS SHOCKED

Bocauso sho smoked cigarettes on the dock of the liner Philadelphia, which arrived from ,Southampton on 29th August, an Englishwoman named Miss Betsy Hill was forbidden to set foot in oho "homo of the brave and the land of the free." Next day she was a prisoner at Ellis Island, awaiting the verdict of the officials' inquiry into her case. Aged» about sixty, Miss Hall is, according to the testimony of her fcllowassengcrs, "a woman ot refinement and culture, much interested in antiquarian research."

During the voyage sho daily sought comfortable armchair and smoked. She ivas smoking when the Philadelphia reached quarantine. The shocked officials immediately searched her cabin and confiscated four packages of cigarettes.

"Wo do not consider it proper for women to go about in public smoking .•igarettes," they informed her. • "That is no reason for confiscating my property," Miss Hill indignantly reported. "I have been a' resident ol Southampton for years and have travelled on the Continent, where I smoked in the finest'hotels. In no place have I met such impertinence and insult be ioro this because of my smoking." "America is not Europe," the oificials told her reprovingly. The excuse given by the immigration authorities for the detention of Miss Till is that "a woman who thus smokes s probably insane, and therefore m.ist K' deported to Ellis Island." The day after Miss Hill had the-sat-isfaction of reading illustrated ac~ ounts in the Sunday newspapers ol hoW American ladies who lire lot' •iddon to smoke in their own hotels be onie "champion smokers" in European society. , "Quite sane" was the verdict ot the mrgeon at Ellis Island in the case oi diss Hill, of Southampton, the lady ,vhom the immigration authorities de :ained because she smoked cigarettes on .lie promenade deck of the liner 1 hila lelphia. , ... The fact that Miss Hill politely oiler. >d her cigarette case to friendly pas.engers convinced the shocked oifici.iU' hat she was insanse. They promptly jaused her to be locked in the psycho/athic ward at LUis Island, whoic vas kept under medical cxaminalior or forty-eight hours. _ Miss Hill took u>r incarceration philosophically, ob ■erving sarcastically that the " .rom the hosoital was magnificent, •ilie was released on the second day and inmediately joined her frionds at then * otel • , . 11 Miss Hill, when I saw her at the Jotcl St. Donis' (says the 'Mail' corresKindent), took a humorous view ol thi| situation, ohowinfr me tnreo betmaiu •ii'iireltc cases —one gold, the second ilver and tfie third gun-metal—and issuring me that the cigrrett-eij the\ , cntained were excellent. "The action ;l' the immigration officials is mcomorehensible to me," she said. Wnen ( indignantly declared I would not g« o Ellis Island the officials informed me bet if I persisted in my refusal they .-o'uld otrap me on board and carr- me there. "I. was packed in a barge wich a mass if immigrants and subjected to the roughest treatment by ignorant oln "ials, whose language was viulescnlv■iblv coarse. On Ellis Island, after 1 '.;ui been without food for the greater ■oai't of the day, a nurse flung a piece t dry bmul on tlu 1 tabk*. 'Doi. t you have plates here"' 1 asked. There was no reply. 'ls it bread, then, or nothing 5 ' I inonired. 'Yes,' said the nurse. 'Then it's nothing for me, 1 declared. "Later a doctor came and allowed tne to order meals at my own expense. Widespread indie-nation is expressed at the action of the immigration authorities.