MURDERED BY GERMAN

Manawatu Standard, Volume XLV, Issue 59, 9 February 1925, Page 9

MURDERED BY GERMAN

PRIVATE CROMER'S- FATE. SHOT ON RHINE BANKS. DUNEDIN, Feb. !. An echo of tho Great War has 1 eeii heard in the story unfolded by rei-ent cable messages from the German cipital telling of a tragic happening on the Rhine banks in 1919. An 01 ago soldier, Private Cyeil Francis Cror ter, a member of the Army of Occupat on, was murdered by Germans while in the company of a German girl. The cables state that a band of Geri lan youths at tho beginning of tho Al led occupation swore to cut off the hai: or girls fraternising with the member! of the Army of Occupation. On February 7, 1919, Private Cromer entered into conversation with a girl who vas sitting on the same seat in a public park. The self-constituted watch committee approached and attempted to molest the girl, and Cromer, after explaining the harmlessness of the conversation, drew his bayonet to defend her, upon which one of the men s lot him dead. There were many arrests, but Fn.nz Swaboda, whom his accomplices lenounced as having fired the shot, lied to the unoccupied territory. The ethers w r erc severely punished for tl oir complicity. On January 23 last Swaboda yisi cd his parents in Cologne and was inn lediately arrested by the British police, having been recognised by a Gern an cx-detectivo standing at tho Colo{ ne railway station. That is the story as the cubles tell it. Swaboda is now >eing tried before a British military co- irt on the murder charge. A DARK WINTER'S NIGHT. Now from nearer at hand than B srlin comes a full description of Ihe tragedy. It was told this morning by a Dunedin ex-soldier who was standing right besido the Otago lad when be was murdered. "Private Cromer was a member of the Fourteenth Company, Second Battalion, Otago Regiment," he sad. "The whole New Zealand Division hid gone up the Rhine as part of t :ie Army of Occupation. We were mar Mulheim, on tho bank of tho Rhii e. The tragedy happened on what is called the Stamheimerveg, a walk alo ig the bank of the river. "It was about half-past eight, a winter's night, pitch dark. Cromer was sitting with a girl on a seat >n the bank. He was about 100 yar Is away from me when the party of G< rman youths were seen to molest hiia. The Rhine bank, generally crowd :id with people, had not another soul nn it. It was as though the' fates hid conspired to make easy the commission of this deed. I heard him ci 11 out and went to his assistance. Win n I got down there I found about t< 11 Germans gathered round. They hi d passed me previously. The girl hi d gone away and was by this time aboi t 100 yards along the Rhine bank. Tl e Huns were 'giving cheek,' and he Wis telling them to get out of it. SHOT THROUGH THE HEART. "I got right along besido him an:l ho asked me to give a hand to shiit some of them. He had no sooner get the words out of his mouth than ho was shot through the heart with a r< - volver. The -cables say that -he pulje 1 out his bayonet to defend tho gir . That is not so, nor have I heard anj - thing of the scheme for cutting off th ; hair of girls associating with soldieri of the Allied army. Immediately 0:1 the firing of the shot tho Huns fled. Five of them were later caught b;' German detectives. They were tried Two of them got three years and threu of them 18 months. The man wh»< fired the shot evidently escaped to tin unoccupied territory. "The incident caused great excite ment at the time. Cromer was 1 genial chap, just turned 21. and wel liked. I fancy his people still live ir Dunedin."