Australian Tells of Escape From Reds In Baltic

Northern Advocate, 26 December 1940, Page 8

Australian Tells of Escape From Reds In Baltic

Hundreds of pounds in notes smuggled in the peak of his cap and the lid of a cabin trunk by an Australian provided money for the evacuation of 174 British subjects from Baltic States to Australia. The story was toid when the last group of 23 landed in Sydney, 151 having disembarked at Queensland ports Four groups of Britons from Russianoccupied Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and the Bukovina (Rumania) had assets aggregating £200,000 which have been confiscated.

Most of them had little left of the £l2 the Soviet decreed they could take from the country. The only Australian evacuee, Mr. John Sydney Graham, had more than £IOO left after financing most of the exiles. Ruse Worked. “I could see I was certain to be pushed out of the country, so I hoarded up ail the money I could after war broke out/’ he said. “I ripped out the lining of the peak of my cap, and carefully padded it with fivers.

"Then I worked on the lid of a cabin trunk, and did a first-class job packing it with more fivers, and relining it. "I did not think I would get away with it, but I had hopes. “The ruse worked, and I lent £350 of the smuggled money to British Embassy officials to aid destitute fellow exiles.

"The trunk was searched three times at the Estonia-Latvia and LatviaRussian borders, and at Vladivostok, but the money was not discovered. "I held my cap tight on my head on the windswept station platforms al which we stopped on the transSiberian railway.” Lost Their Money.

Mr. Graham left Sydney 31 years ago, and retired from the British Civil Service eight years ago to live in Tallinn with his Estonian wife. Mr. and Mrs. W. Sewell lost all their money. £9/10/-, as the ship was berthing. This was all they had out of £30,000 assets in Riga. Mr. Sewell had the money in a wallet in his coat, which he took off because of the heat, and left in his cabin for 10 minutes. The money was stolen, and, although police and ship’s officers made a search of the ship, it was not recovered. “We land absolute paupers. It is terrible,” said Mrs. Sewell. “We lost about £93,000 in the Bolshevik revolution in 1917. “We have worked and built up another fortune since 1922, and now we have nothing.” she added.