FINERY FOR CANNIBALS

Evening Star, Issue 21319, 25 January 1933, Page 4

FINERY FOR CANNIBALS

MAH WHO MADE FORTUNE The outfitter of cannibal kings and queens and native tribes of half a century ago, a man who made a great fortune by sending old clothes salesmen among the fiercest of black races, is now living in a little house at Brighton, England. He is facing poverty at the age of seventy-nine. Mr John Hyman supplied the belles of the native villages with the frills and furbelows once worn before the footlights of the West End stage. In return for the discarded tinsel and bangles of the- stage which he shipped to the islands off the Malav Peninsula, Siam, the Australian bush, and both West and East Africa, he was given by the native chiefs as much rubber as he could take away in his ships. Often there were loads of ivory and other precious things. In mid-Victorian days Mr Hyman was also one of the best-known of London costumiers. It is only a few months since he give up his shop in Leicester square. “ I am a broken man,” he said recently. “ Twice I have lost all 1 made. Now all 1 do is to dream of the days when the life of a millionaire was almost in my grasp. Once upon a time I did not know all the money I made with my romantic trading—now, 1 am penniless and sleepless.”

Mr Hyman was invited to speak of the days when he was the “ Worth of West Africa,” and , the “ Poiret of Polynesia.” “ I sold every kind of old clothing I could get,” he said. “ 1 used to buy up all the old military and police uniforms of this country and ship them over to the natives. " I was in partnership with two young men, and we had three ships to take tho old clothes out and to bring back loads of rubber and other things the chiefs gave us.” “ About 1890 we sent ships laden to the Plimsoll line with old clothes in charge of a young nephew of one of my partners. When the ships got to Buenos Aires there was a civil war, and one side persuaded the young man to lend them the vessels. “ Unfortunately they were on the losing side. We lost our ships and our fortunes m all that followed. " The two brothers wont out from Manchester to get the ships back, but they were captured in Buenos Aires and sentenced to death. One of them died of shock. The Manchester Chamber of Commerce interceded with the King of Portugal, and he was the means of getting the older brother released. He was able to return to England. 11 That was the first crash. The other was three years ago on. Wall street, after I made up for the first misfortune. 1 cannot bear to go near London now, and it is terrible that, although I am still active, I have to give up business.” Once one of Mr Hyman’s travellers returned from a world trip and reported that he had seen a native chief ruling his tribes in tho robes of a sheriff of tho city of London. John Hyman may be down now, but he can never forget the romance of the “ castoff.”