MORE BOMB OUTRAGES

Evening Star, Issue 20040, 4 December 1928, Page 11

MORE BOMB OUTRAGES

DAME TO TWO HOUSES EARLY MORNING EXPLOSIONS SENSATION IN MELBOURNE. i Three rooms were wrecked by the explosion of a bomb at the home of Mr j W. H. Swanton, Kew, Melbourne, re cently. None of the occupants was in- ! jured. Mr Swanton, who is a director ; of William Crosby and Company, Ltd., | shipping agents, left Melbourne for Sydney the previous evening, leaving his wife and two daughters in the house with two servants. I The house, which is a two-story brick ! structure, occupies a commanding posij t*°n. Miss Gwandoline Swanton, in a stateI meat to the police, said that at 10.30 p.m. she and her mother and sister retired. About two hours later she heard a sound as if the brakes of a motor car had been applied suddenly. A few seconds afterwards there was a ternfio crash. Thinking that, the car had struck the front fence, Miss Swanton did not leave her bed, but within a short time the room became full of smoke Rushing from her room, she called to the other occupants of the house. Holes were noticed in tho floor of a landing outside the bedrooms, and Miss | Swanton and her sister went down--1 stairs. The vestibule and dining and 1 drawing rooms were in groat disorder , Windows in the dining room had been ’ shattered, and a huge hole had been torn in the paroquet flooring of the vestibule, tho walls of which were peppered with small holes. A section of the plaster in the ceiling had been dislodged, and pictures and ornaments broken. Large pieces of wood had been splintered off a grille in tho vestibule. In ' the drawing room each of the three windows was broken, ! and vases and ornaments were piled , upon the floor. DISCOVERY OF THREE FOOTPRINTS. Two police motor patrols were sent to Kew. An inspection of the grounds ■ showed that apparently the person whi ! had thrown the bomb, pieces of which ' wcie similar to those recovered from other houses which have been wrecked by bombs, must _ have .entered the ; grounds surrounding Mr Swanton’e house by the front gate and crossed the ; lawn to the dining room windows. In I a garden bed under the window three footprints were discovered. Returning to her homo shortly before 12.30 o’clock, a woman, who resides near Mr Swanton’s residence, told {the police that she saw a dark-coloured I sedan motor car pass slowiy along the street, and as it approached Mr Swan--1 ton’s house a spotlight wms thrown 1 over the building. _ Two men of beaw build were sitting in the car. Shortly afterwards she heard a loud explosion. No other motive than vengeance or intimidation can be found by the police for tho throwing of the bomb. Mr Swanton is a leading member of the Overseas Shippers’ Representatives’ Association, but other shipowners have j taken a greater part than he in the I strike negotiations. It is thought in . some quarters that tho bombing might have been inspired by Mr Swanton’s connection with tho new stevedores organisation, which was formed during the strike on the waterfront. Pieces of the bomb found among the wreckage at Mr Swanton’s homo show that it is exactly similar to the missiles used on previous occasions. It evidently consisted of a. short length_ of lead pipe, which contained gelignite, and had been sealed at both ends. THE SEVENTH OUTRAGE. - Another bombing outrage occurred early last Thursday morning, when a house at South Melbourne was greatly damaged. Several rooms on the ground floor were wrecked by the explosion, and James East, a lodger, suffered severe cuts lo his hands and aims. This is the I seventh bomb outrage in Melbourne I since the recent waterside strike began. The building, which was formerly an hotel, is used now as a boarding house, and is conducted by Mrs Hannah Fielding. It is a two-story brick structure, and contains more than fourteen rooms. Following several threats said to have been made to destroy the building, a close watch was kept upon it by the police until recently. Mr East, who has been employed 9a the wharves since the waterside dispute, his wife, and two girls (aged nine and twelve years) occupy a room 011 the corner 0 fthe ground floor. Mrs East said that she saw tho reflection of the headlights of a motor car through the window of the room. The car appeared to stop outside the building for some seconds, and something wms thrown through the window. There was immediately a hissing sound in tho room. A terrific explosion followed.

MILD PANIC AMONG BOARDERS. For some time Mrs East could not realise what had occurred, but, leaping from their bod, she and _ her husband rushed to the cots in which their children were sleeping. The room was in complete confusion. Practically tho whole of the plaster had fallen from tho coiling, tho furniture was wrecked, and the doorway leading into the room occupied by Mrs Fielding and her daughter, Sylvia, was torn from its hinges. Curtains on the windows of Mr East’s bedroom were flung across the footpath. For some time a mild panic was caused among the eleven boarders in the house. Windows on the floor were shattered, and the roadway was littered to the far side with broken glass. A large crack appeared in the face of the building. Mrs East found that her two children. had had remarkable escapes from serious injury. Beyond suffering from severe shock neither of them was hurt , . , . , Mr East, it was found, had received deep cuts in one of lus hands, and he was taken for treatment to a hospital. Mrs Fielding and her daughter, who occupy the room adjoining that of the Easts, were sleeping in a double bed. The force of the explosion wrenched a stout wooden door from its hinges, and it was thrown across the bed, which collapsed. The two women struggled out of bed to find that the contents of the room had_ been wrecked. Pieces of broken furniture in both roon were carried across the corridor into a sitting room. A reward of £2,000 for information leading to the conviction of the offenders has been offered by the Victorian Government.

[The detectives last week arrested five men.]