A NEW ZEALAND CASE.

Feilding Star, Volume XIII, Issue 3336, 4 September 1917, Page 3

A NEW ZEALAND CASE.

ESPIONAGE IN AVAR OFFICE

In the current number of the Lone Hand magazine, a remarkable story is told of an aero-gun invented in Christchurch. which became the property of the enemy by methods typically German. The narrative comes from Messrs Izard and Loughnan, writing on behalf of a client, Mr Hugh M'Gloin. In the June (191u) number of the Lone Hand appeared a paragraph headed "Special Zeppelin Aerogun, describing the gun as consisting of two guns fired in directly opposite dilutions one discharging the projectile the other water, clay etc.. thus neutralising the recoil and adapting the <nin for firing from any unstable gun platform, such as an aeroalpne. The paragraph stated that J his gun was used by the Germans on Zeppelins. ~ _ , , r , Tt. now appears that Mr Hugh M - Gloin actually invented this very gun many vcars ago, and, going to London ' offered it to the British War Office for .-£20,000. The offer was declined. Mr M'Gloin improved the weapon, and in March .1915, again offered it for sale to the British War Office. Tho model remained at the War Office until November, 1915, and was then politely declined, being shipped back to New Zealand on November 26. Now. Mr M'Gloin naturally wants to know how the enemy became possessed of the gun which the War Office in its wisdom didn't use. The conclusion, the Christchurch Stat points out. is clear: Treachery somewhere in the War Office. The foe has his agents everywhere, and those a"'er)tfi"nave ways and means of oirsumveuting British officialdom. Tho o-alling fact is equally clear that officialdom somewhere lacked sufficient sense to recognise a useful invention when it saw it. Hut. th a L w,, B m' cV the wav of the British War Office until the grim lessons of war compelled its reorganisation.