AGAIN INSULTED

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXVI, Issue 23382, 26 June 1939, Page 11

AGAIN INSULTED

NEW ZEALAND AGENT TIENTSIN OUTRAGES RELEASE OF MR. SMITH PROMISE ■BY JAPANESE By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright LONDON, Juno 21 The honorary agent for the New Zealand Government, Mr. Cecil Davis, who was subjected to indignities at Tientsin on Thursday on entering the concession, was stripped again yesterday, in spite of his protestation that he represented the New Zealand Government, says a message from Tientsin. The Shanghai correspondent of the Times says Air. Davis, who escaped undressing on Thursday, entered the same examination shed next day with the intention of leaving the concession. He was told to take off his shoes and complied, but he refused to undress. A gendarme then hit Mr. Davis three times on the mouth with his own passport, Mr. Davis saying each time: "Thanks." Ho then elected to return to the concession, but gendarmes forced him to strip naked and kept him in this degraded position while at least a do/.en foreign women passed.

Once more to-day Mr. Davis was stripped when, with Mr. John WhiteWright, son of a missionary, he was forced to queue up under a tierce sun. Mr. White-Wright was compelled to dress in full view of a crowd which included foreign women. The Japanese have promised to release Mr. G. A. Smith, a British subject who has been under arrest for some days. The British Consul-General, Mr. E. G. Jamieson, up to yesterday had received no replies to any of his many protests. The Japanese were insisting that the British authorities should deport Mr. Smith as an undesirable before agreeing to hand him over. Nobody, with the exception of a doctor, had been allowed to see him.

Mr. C. G. Davis is managing director of Hatch, Carter and Company, importers and exporters, of Tientsin, and owns a considerable amount of property there. He was born in Christchurch and was taken to China by his parents when he was in his childhood about 40 years ago. His mother lives in retirement in Melbourne.

Mr. Davis' residence is about half a mile outside British territory, near the racecourse and country club, a fact which probably accounts for his frequent encounters with Japanese troops at the barbed wire boundary.

He served with the Chinese Labour Corps during the European War and in appreciation of the services he rendered the Empire he was given a partnership in Hatch, Carter and Company, and afterward took over the business. He was appointed corresponding honorary representative of the New Zealand Government in 19H5.