DEPORTED FROM CANADA

Dominion, Volume 20, Issue 62, 7 December 1926, Page 8

DEPORTED FROM CANADA

WAIHI FAMILY’S UNHAPPY ADVENTURE ALLEGATIONS OF HARSH TREATMENT INTERNED UNDER LOCK AND KEY Dominion Special. Auckland, December 6. An extraordinary story of apparent harsh treatment by the Canadian immigration authorities was told to-day by Mr. F. Nancarrow, who returned to New Zealand with his wife and five children by the Niagara. Mr. Nancarrow Is an ex-service man. He wears decorations for service with the British Navy during the Great War, but according to his story, that did not make him welcome in Canada, where he and his family were interned during the Niagara’s stay at Vancouver, kept under lock and key in detention barracks among Chinese, Indians, and other coloured aliens, amid dirt and squalor, and fed on rice and garlic.

On their arrival at Vancouver the Nancarrow familv were interviewed by the immigration authorities. “We told them we were going through to the United States,” said Mr. Nancarrow. “They said they would see us through, and we handed over our luggage for them to transport'. Then we found z that we were trapped, for they took us to the immigration detention barracks and put us under lock and key. They absolutely refused to allow us to cross the border into the United States, although my wife’s father, to whom we. had cabled from Honolulu, came to Vancouver from Idaho to take us back with him. . “I ask the reason why British subjects were thus held up when Canadian papers said that there was work for thousands in Ontario and elsewhere, but got no satisfactory answer. My father-in-law saw the American Consul, and he said that he would place us on the quota and allow us to cross into the United States, but the. Canadian authorities refused to liberate us, saving that we had told lies in our immigration papers. The American Consul tried his best, and said that if we could even get out of the barracks for a walk he would get us across into the United States, but we had no chance of getting out. “Not Wanted in Canada."

“We were told that we were not wanted in Canada, and when we said that we did not want to stay there, but wished to get to our people in Idaho, where I was going to work on a ranch owned bv my wife’s father, the reply was that we could not cross the border as an agreement had been reached by the United States and Canada whereby there were to be no more immigrants allowed across the line. Of course, this was all bunkum. We were kept for five days in the barracks, the only food given us for the first three days being the stuff they threw to Chinese and Indians—rice and garlic, with a bit of steak of some sort which we could not eat. We asked for something else, so we had some eggs given us on the last two days.” “The barracks,” continued Mr. Nancarrow, “were dirty and squalid, and no attempt was made to clean our quarters while we were there. They told us they made no provision there for white people. What do you think the Canadian Immigration Officer said to me when I reminded him that I was an ex-service man, a British subject who had fought for England and the Empire, and demanded to know why we were treated in this manner ? He said 'We run our own country here—never mind England—England’s off the map.’ I told him that if. that was the way they dealt with Britishers who had done their bit I would do no more. Locked in Cabin, “From the barracks we were returned on board the Niagara, and we were placed under lock and key in our cabin until the ship had left Victoria, British Columbia. The next day the captain informed me. that this was by orders of the Canadian Government. Then when we arrived at Honolulu I was again locked up in the cabin. The wife and children were allowed on deck, but were not permitted to go ashore. The excuse made bv the Canadian authorities for our deportation was that we had stated that we were going to. settle in Canada, whereas our intention was to cross into the United States. Thev took a dog-in-the-nianfer attitude They didn’t want us, and they would not let the United States have ns.” The ages of the Nancarrow children range from two to eight years, and they are now suffering from an eye complaint alleged to have been acquired from dirty towels in . the Vancouver immigration detention . barracks. “The doctor of the Niagara told me that I would have to get the attention of a specialist, or the children would go blind,” said Mr. Nancarrow. “Therefore I will not be returning to Waihi, but will have to stav in Auckland for a while.”

The Waihi home of the famijv was sold to pay the passage to Canada, and everv pennv went. However, the passengers on the Niagara, on learning of the unhanpv adventure of the wayfarers, took up a collection, . and over £BO was raised for their relief.