ARMED BURGLAR

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXIX, Issue 20823, 30 June 1942, Page 5

ARMED BURGLAR

MAN WITH REVOLVER CHRISTCHURCH HOLD-UPS STORE AND HOUSE (P.A.) CHRISTCHURCH, this day. Two hold-ups with a revolver were carried out in Christchurch on Friday evening. Detectives are investigating, but no arrest has yet been made. Mrs J. H. Taylor, who in the absence of her husband on military service, runs a grocery and confectionery shop |at the corner of Simeon street and Athelstan street, Spreydon, about 8.35 p.m. on Friday served two customers and then went to sweep out the grocery - section. She heard footsteps and then heard somebody say: “Money!" She looked up to see a young man with a long-barrelled revolver in his hand and a black handkerchief with white spots over his face. He said again, determinedly, “Money,” and prodded in her chest with the revolver', his finger on the trigger. Mrs. Taylor, frightened but calm, stepped back and the man came forward and edged.her to the corner. The man stood there,' his revolver pressed into her chest. Mrs. Taylor tried to reason with him and then said her husband was in the kitchen. Mrs. Taylor called out fairly loudly: “Bert! Bert!” her husband’s name. The baby at the back of the shop, hearing the call, opened a door. The man, alarmed at the movement, hit Mrs. Taylor hard on her finger with the revolver and ran from the shop. The second hold-up on Friday evening was at the home of Mr. Stewart, of 9 Bealey tsreet, St. Albans. Mr. Stewart’s daughter, a schoolgirl, had gone into the room and turned the light on to see standing there a young man who, she said, had a revolver. He made off, taking with him some jewellery which he had stolen from the house. There was no violence.