STRANDED IN AMERICA

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LXII, Issue 18759, 16 July 1935, Page 5

STRANDED IN AMERICA

NEW ZEALAND YOUTH MOTHER’S EXPLANATION (Per Press Association.) WELLINGTON, this day. Mrs. G. Melrose, the mother of Cecil Melrose, who was mentioned in recent cable messages as being stranded in New York, is at present visiting Wellington. Interviewed, she said that she wan very upset when she read in tire newspapers that Cecil was likely to be deported from the United States. The idea oi her son being deported like an undesirable was a great shock, because all who knew him recognised that ho was a levelheaded boy. People had been thinking that Cecil'and his friend Smoothy had doue something to brand them as undesirable aliens, but the cable reports in Monday’s papers cleared it all up. Tiie mother went on to tell how anxious she was for the well-being of her son. She had written to Admiral Byrd after the return of the expedition to the United States, and he had replied that there was no need for her to worry so long as Melrose was in the States, as lie could come to no want while he remained there. Mrs. Melrose said that her son would never seek assistance unless driven to it. Letters from him since he arrived in America had expressed a desire to return to New Zealand. Mra. Melrose said her son had worked his passage home in 1934, and was stranded in London, but eventually reached New Zealand on another vessel.