RED REILY

Greymouth Evening Star, 4 March 1926, Page 2

RED REILY

SECRET SERVICE ROMANCE. . The hero of many thrilling adventures in different .parts of the World, Captain Sidney George Reilly, a real modern soldier of fortune, has met his death at the hands of the Russian Terrorist police force at a little village called Allekule. His aeatlt-forms a fitting, though tragic, end to a career deliberately‘chosen because it offered the maximum of danger and thrills. “Red” Reilly, as he was called, was the typical Irish adventurer, soldier of fortune, and general good fellow. He had a firm belief that ingrained in the' heart of every Irishman was the desire to get himself killed off as picturesquely as possible, and he himself did his best to help fate to end his own career according to that plain. The Great War saw "Captain Reilly “joining up” at oiiC& He complained that infantry work was “too tame,” and transferred to the Royal Air Force. But even a round of night-bombing, in which he had the experience of being forced down in a burning ’plane over the German lines, though he escaped unscathed, left him with his craving for thrills unsatisfied. It was then suggested,to Reilly that he might find more congenial work by joining the band of trained men who were risking their lives by being dropped from aeroplanes behind the enemy lines in order that they might pick up valuable information. The idea appealed to Captain Reilly, and as he was a good German scholar with some knowledge of German mentality, he was an ideal man for work of this sort. He was “dropped” several times at different points, and had the experience of being arrested by the Germans in a Belgian village, and brought before a military court as a suspect. It was a tribute to his nerves of steel and his ability as an actor that he suc.ceeded in bluffing the Germans into accepting his presence of being a sort of village idiot, who had kept out of the way of the troops until then. In that role Captain Reilly frequented estaminetes, and other places resorted to by Germans, and, in the belief that it was only the half-wit they had to deal with, the .Germans were not particularly careful, and much valuable information about the movements of German_reserves came into his possession. In due course he was “collected” and taken back to the British lines with his information. After that Captain Reilly essayed the more desperate task of reaching Germany itself, and from a parachute he was “dropped” close to Mannheim, where he presented himself in the guise of an invalid Gei-man Toldier free to take up aircraft work. His bluff succeeded, and he remained in the district long enough to see the first moves in the big German concentration that was expected to end the war in their favour in the spring of 1918. When the Armistice came, Russia offered the best openings for Captain Reilly’s peculiar talents, and as he spoke Russian perfectly he was attached to the Secret Service interested in that region. In the disguise of a returning Russian, who had come back to enjoy the blessings of Sovietjmle, he reached Moscow toward the end of 1918, and was welcomed as a valuable acquisition to the ranks. He soon became an important official of the Soviet Government, and retained his post until he was denounced as a traitor because of inforimiation received from England. Even then his nerve did not desert him.

When the messenger arrived with the denunciation Captain Reilly denounced him and it as bogus, and secured the arrest of the messenger, who only escaped death because Reilly pleaded for respite until to-morrow. By that time the latter’s flight had altered the whole complexion of affairs.

It was after this exploit that a price was put on Reilly’s head, and instructions were issued to the Cheka (Secret Political Police) that he was to be shot at sight. Despite this, Reilly made several journeys into Russia, and one of his most daring, ruses was to carry though a number of insuections of police and military detachments in the name of Lenin.

Captain Reilly did not conceal from his friends the fact' that he was the man who was responsible for the British Government getting hold of the now notorious Zinoviev letter. In all probability the knowledge had reached Russia, and early last year Reilly received definite information that the price on his head had been increased and that his description had been broadcasted throughout Russlia with the intimation that he might be shot at sight as a menace to the Soviet rule. The knowledge of intensified danger only spurred Reilly on to take up the challenge, and within a few hours of learning the importance attached to his head he was in Paris conferring with the representatives of the Provisional Tsarist Government, who were anxious to find a man who would go among the Rusisan peasants to find how they were affected towards the old regime. Weeks of waiting on the frontier followed, and at last Reilly “jumped” it. “1 have a feeling this may be my last ‘stunt,’ ” he had told a few friends in a London club before his departure; and he was right. Disguised as a peasant, he got as far as the village of Allekule, and was working in the field one day when the political police arrived and opened fire, killing him where lie stood. Captain. Reilly was married to the beautiful and famous actress Pepita Bobadilla, widow of Mr Haddon Cham-

bers, the playwright. At the time tney were married in 192.3, Dlrs Haddon Chahmberas Chambers had been suffering from appendicitis, and she left the nursing home to go to the registry office. Son of an Irishman in the British 'merchant service and a Russian mother Captain eßilly had lived many years in Russia, and spoke Russian and German “like a native.” According to La Liberte, says the Paris correspondent of the “Sunday News,” Captain Reilly was the" officer who furnished the British Government with the plans of a contemplated Communist rising in France. M. Herriot, who was then Premier, turned a deaf ear to the warning and went so far to institute proceedings against La Liberte for publishing the informatlion. Later the Baldwin Government furnished M. Herriot with conclusive proof of the contemplated plot, with the result that M. Herriot took action an)d gxj[xjl)led (tine ringleaders from France. According to the same newspaper, Captain Reilly made allegations against certain members of the Britisn Secret Service. He said they were Bolsheviks in disguise, and in consequence they were removed.