David Harris, Free “To Enjoy Life”

Manawatu Times, Volume 62, Issue 149, 25 June 1937, Page 3

David Harris, Free “To Enjoy Life”

TELLS OF GAOL UNREST Bright-eyed and with a confident step, well-built David Harris walked into a flat overlooking Streathain Common, and was excitedly greeted by his beautiful platinum-blonde wife. He had arrived home alter completing his term of five years, less remission for good conduct, in Maidstone Prison for complicity in the big fire conspiracy, which ended in the Old Bailey trial of August, 1933. After embracing his wife ho picked up his three-year-old daughter, who is exactly like him, and was born while ho was in prison. It was not, ns has been reported, his first sight of the little girl, for his wife had taken her to the prison with her when visiting her husband. “There is such a lot for us to talk about,’* Mr Harris said to his wife. “It will be days before I have told you everything 1 want to say.” Mr Harris married Miss Gwendoline Stone, formerly a cashier at the Kit Cat Club, during a week-end adjournment of the Bow street Police Court proceedings. They had a brief honeymoon bo fore Mr Harris had to resume his place in the dock with the other defendants “We are all particularly happy,” Mr Harris said to a reporter, “because the authorities were good enough to let mu out some days earlier than I had anticipated. “The only person who will feel my departure keenly will be my brother Leopold, who has always been my best pal. “We have worked at the same' table in the various workshops ?n prison, we have joined together with other prisoners at recreation time in the evening. , “I should like to say that Leopold I has maintained his courage marvellous- I to

“He has every hope that the great assistance ho has rendered to the police and the insurance companies will earn him a comparatively early release. From time to time he has had long conferences with interested parties and has a wonderful head for figures. “My wife and I,» to say nothing of our daughter, are going to start life 1 anew. I have never been penniless; I managed to save a comfortable sum before the proceedings began, and my : wife has been in comfortable circum- ] stances the whole of the time. *‘L have already received several offers of remunerative employment, and ! I shall probably close with one of these 1 in the near future. “All my friends are being very kind. 1 I have received a cordial message from 1 Mr Loughborough Ball, one of my co- 1 defendants at the trial. Since his release from prison he has, been doing very well, and we aro dining together nest Wednesday. “I was treated with the utmost con- 1 sideration all the time by the authorities, and was on friendly terms with many of my fellow prisoners, including 1 Clarence Ilatry, for whose stoical endurance I have the greatest admiration. “Recently, however, there has been a certain amount of unrest among the ex Service prisoners, who allege that they 1 owe their imprisonment to the fact that they were not given the jobs they had been promised when they came out of the Army. “Another factor of unrest is that word has gone round that there is to be no amnesty for certain classes of prisoners at the Coronation. Some men have been so incensed that the authorities have ceased to play tho National Anthem at the end of concerts because many of the prisoners have been booing and jeering.” Parting shot from Mr Harris:— “I feel quite lost without a motorcar. I intend to buy one at once.”