HARSH TREATMENT.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 19967, 8 December 1926, Page 4

HARSH TREATMENT.

NEW ZEALANDER IN CANADA. INTERNED BY IMMIGRATION AUTHORITIES. LOCKED UP WITH CHINESE AND INDIANS. (Special to Daily Times.) AUCKLAND, December 7. An extraordinary story of apparent harsh tieatment by the Canadian immigration authorities was told by Mr F. Nancarrow, who returned to New Zealand with his wife and live ehilden by the Niagara. Mr Nancarrow is an ex-service man. He wears decorations for service with the British Navy during the Great War, but accordi/ig to his story that did not make him welcome in Canada w’here he and ins family were interned during the Niagara’s stay at Vancouver, and kept under lock and key in detention barracks among Chinese, Indians, and other coloured aliens, amid dirt and squalor, and fed on rice and garlic. On their arrival at Vancouver the Nancarrow family was interviewed bv the immigration authorities. “Wo told them we. were going through to the United States,” said Mr Nancarrow. “They said they would see us through and we handed over our luggage for them to transport. Then wo found that we were trapped, for they took ns to the immigration detention barracks and put ns under lock and key. They absolutely refused to allow us to cross the border into the United States, although my wife’s father, to whom we had cabled from Honolulu, came to Vancouver from Idaho to take us back with him ... , . “I asked the reason why British subjects were thus held up when the Canadian papers said there was work for thousand.-, in Ontario and elsewhere, but I got no satisfactory answer. My father-in-law saw the American Consul, and he said he would place us on the quota and allow , us \° cross into the United States, but th Canadian authorities refused to libel ate us, saving wo had told lies in our immigration papers. The American Consul tried his best, and said that it we could oven get out of the barracks for a walk ho would get us across into the United States, but we had no chance of getting out. “We were told we were not waned Canada, and when we said wo dld n ° want to stay there but wished to get to our people in Idaho, where I was going work on a ranch owned by my wife s father, the reply was that wo could not cross the border as an agreement had been reached bv tho United States and Canada whereby there were to be no more mmn grants allowed across the line. °, f this was all bunkum. We were kept foi five days in the barracks, tho only food given vis for the first three days being the Sul” Zy threw to the Chinese and Indians —rice and garlic with a bit of stea of some sort which wo could not eat. \ o asked for something else, so M had some egS given us on the last last two days. g “Tlfe barracks,” continued Mr Nancatrow, “were dirty and squalid and no attempt was made to clean our Q u artcis while we were there. They told us they made no provision there for white people, and what do you think the Canadian immigration officer said to me when 1 reminded him I was an ex-service man ana a British subject who had fought for England and tho Empire, and demanded to know why we were treated in this manner. He said; ‘We run our own Godam country hoV-never mind England-Englancl’s oft tho map. I told him that if that weie tho way they dealt with Britishers who had done their bit I would do no mofe. “From tho barracks wo were returned on board the Niagara,” continued Mr Naiucarrow, “and wo were placed under lock and key in our cabin until tho ship had left Victoria (British Columbia) tho next day. The captain informed mo this was by orders of the Canadian Government. I hen, when we arrived at Honolulu I was again locked up in tho cabin. My wife and children were allowed on deck but weie not permitted to go ashore. The excuse made by tho Canadian authorities for our deportation ivas that we had stated we weie going to settle in Canada, whereas our intention was to cross into the United States. They took a dog in the mangel attitude. They didn’t want us, and would not let the United States have us. The ages'-of the Nancarrow children range from two to eight years, and they are now suffering ' from an eye complaint alleged to have been acquired from the dirty towels in the Vancouver immigration detention barracks. “The doctor of the Niagara told mo I would have to get the attention of a specialist or tho children would Ro j n said Mr Nancarrow. Iherefoio I will not be returning to Waihi, but will have to stay in Auckland for a while. - The Waihi home of the family was sold to pay tho passage to Canada. Every penny wont. However, the passengers on the Niagara, on learning of the unhappy adyen-tm-pb of the wayfarers, took up a collection and over £BO was raised for their relief.