'PLANE TRIP TO PARIS

King Country Chronicle, Volume XXVI, Issue 3439, 5 March 1932, Page 2

'PLANE TRIP TO PARIS

CONTEMPLATED DIVORCE BEFORE HE WAS MARRIED. A SUITOR’S THREATS. An amazing story of how he flew by plane from England to Paris and back with a girl, and how, before he was married, he had contemplated divorce, was told by a young man who appeared at Winchester Assizes on a blackmail charge recently. Edward Uleston Cawsey, aged 24, described as. an electrician of Torrington Road, Portsmouth, was charged with demanding £SO with menaces from Mrs. Alice Agnes Cox, of Gosport, and fraudulently converting to his own use £lO realised by the sale of a motor car.

At the previous day’s hearing it was alleged that Cawsey in June of last year, at a time when he was considerer a suitor for the hand of her daughter, sent to Mrs. Cox a letter demanding £SO. The letter, it was alleged, contained the sentence: “Many months ago a member of your family did me a serious wrong. I now propose to profit by it. I have happened upon a certain well-known person, and have concluded that it is to your advantage to keep dark certain facts which concern that person.” Cawsey denied sending the letter.

Decided to Marry. Cross-exaxmined by Mr. C. Bray, Cawsey agreed that in June of last year he was a welcome guest at the house of Mrs. Cox, who, he believed, considered him a suitable suitor for the hand of her daughter. He was a married man separated from his wife. He did not tell Mrs. Cox he was married. He was married on June 5 of last year, and a separation order was made out a fortnight ago on the application of his wife. Replying to Mr. H. H. Bayford,,his counsel, Cawsey said that he had a girl friend whom he took across to

Paris by air and came back in a machine which was not licensed to fly by night. They had to land at Lympne instead of Croydon on account of dusk. His car was at Croydon and it took some hours to get back there. Cawsey said that people came to him —parents and others —and for some time he debated the subject and spoke about it to Miss Cox. Finally he decided to marry this girl. He told Miss Cox of the trip to Paris when it happened in February. He was going to marry Miss Cox later when he was free. Judge Acton: What do you mean by being free? Cawsey: I contemplated getting a divorce. The Judge: Before marrying? Cawsey: Yes. Mr. Bayford: Did you ever live with your wife? Cawsey: No. Cawsey was sentenced to 18 months’ hard labour. The jury having found Cawsey guilty, Superintendent Johnson said Cawsey had used various names and had represented himself as a pilot of Imperial Airways and as a flightlieutenant in the R-A.F. In August, 1930, he became acquainted with a young girl of good family, and represented that he was of independent means, with an estate at West Meon, Hants. The association continued until the girl’s .parents found out he was lying. Resuming his association with the girl unknown to her parents, he eventually had to marry her. The parents assisted them, but he stayed only one night with his wife at a Southsea hotel, borrowed £3 from her, which was all the money she had, and left her without means and without paying the hotel bill. He borrowed his wife’s wrist watch and gave it to Miss Cox. Released on bail following police court proceedings, he absconded to London, and since then a humber of warrants had been taken out for alleged offences, but he declined to have these taken into consideration. The Judge said that anyone who had heard Cawsey in the witness-box knew him to be a rascally liar if they knew nothing else about him.