ROWDY ELECTIONEERING.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIX, Issue 21076, 9 January 1932, Page 2 (Supplement)

ROWDY ELECTIONEERING.

TWO ALLEGED ASSAULTS. SIR 0. MOSLEY PROSECUTED. INFORMATIONS DISMISSED. Without hearing all the defence had to say, Lord Ilkeston, stipendiary magistrate, recently slopped a ease at Birmingham which echoed one of tho wildest meetings of tho British . general election campaign. He dismissed summonses against Sir Oswald Mosley,' leader of the Mow Party, for alleged assaults upon Walter Jennings and Richard Thomas Cornwall. Tho incidonts complained of, occurred at a meeting on October 15, held, appropriately enough, in the Rag Market, Birmingham, and attonded by 15,000 people. Counsel for Messrs. Cornwall and Jennings stated that while Sir Oswald was addressing tho meeting thoro was some heckling, which was heard more effectively when the loud-speaking apparatus failed. Sir Oswald jumped off the platform, walked through several rows of seats, and approached Mr. Cornwall, who stood up as Sir Oswald sto.-l over him. Sir Oswald remarked, " Is it going to be fair speech or a free fight?" and Mr. Cornwall replied that it did not matter to him. Thereupon, counsel alleged, Sir Oswald struck him and knocked him over. Stewards then dragged Mr. Cornwall away, and treated him so roughly that his eye was in bandages for a week. " Oome on and Fight Me." The crowd became angry at such an assault and in tho crush Mr. Jennings was thrown toward Sir Oswald, who, again without any warning, said counsel punched his eye and kicked his shins. " After something of a general melee, during which chairs were thrown dbout," continued counsel, " Sir Oswald retired from the battle and tie and his supporters, instead of trying to soothe and pacify the meeting, stood on tho platform and incited tho people to attack them." One man on tlis platform, it was alleged, took off a glove, showed that ho had a knuckleduster, and said, " Come on and fight me."' Sir Oswald obtained a truncheon from somewhere and waved it ill front of the crowd. Counsel alleged that the chairman threw a bottle among the people. " The assault on Mr. Cornwall," counsel declared. " precipitated this disgraceful scene—the worst that has beey seen at a political meeting in Birmingham for many years." Mr. Jennings gave evidonce, and in cross-examination denied that there was anybody supporting him financially in tho case. Counsel: I suggest this is a put-np job to try and injure Sir Oswald politically ? No. Sir Oswald Gives Evidence. . Mr. Cornwall declared that Sir Oswald punched him with his right fist, where* upon counsel mentioned that-Sir Oswald was a trained boxer, and boxers usually hit with their left. Sir Oswald, giving evidence, said that he had no bodyguard. "Wo have stewards'to maintain order at meetings where we have reason to anticipate that 'thero will be trouble," he remarked. " but I take no one around with me as a bodyguard. '" Cornwall and others adopted a menacing attitude," he continued,'" but it was not until Cornwall raised a chair to strike me that I took action I Rot him by the arms and lifted and pushed him backwards with the result that he fell on his back. It was the least violence I could, adopt to provent being hit over tho,head by a chair." ■ Sir Oswald added that it was not until after a meeting at Glasgow, when some of his supporters were attacked with razors, that they carried truncheons to protect themselves against similar attacks. Tho summonses were dismissed, the magistrate intimating lie was satisfied that Sir Oswald had dono nothing more than he was entitled to do.