HATRY TO LEAVE PRISON

Southland Times, Issue 23378, 9 December 1937, Page 5

HATRY TO LEAVE PRISON

HALF OF SENTENCE SERVED FINANCIAL MANIPULATIONS RECALLED (United Press Assn.—Telegraph Copyright) (Received December 8, 7.40 p.m.) LONDON, December 8. The Daily Herald says that Clarence Hatry, who was sentenced in 1930 to imprisonment for 14 years, is being released soon as a result of the decision to modify long sentences taken by the Home Secretary (Sir Samuel Hoare).

Clarence Charles Hatry. the British financier whose arrest in September 1929 created one of the biggest sensations the City of London had experienced for many years, began his business career as a boy clerk in a London broker's office. This occupation did not satisfy his enterprising mind for more than a year or two and while still a youth he started a silk business. This, however, failed and for some time he had a hard struggle to meet his liabilities. By the time he was 20 he was clear of debt and launched a business for the utilization of waste metal. This prospered, and began to accumulate money. The control of one concern was not enough for Hatry's insatiable hunger for work, however, and he opened a travellers' insurance agency which was doing well when the Great War stopped it. The ability with which he conducted it had attracted the attention of a wealthy City man who told him that money would be put at his disposal as soon as he was ready with a new enterprise. With this support Hatry took up building projects which brought considerable profits. He then ventured into banking and the financing of jute and glass concerns. _ For some years everything Hatry handled seemed to turn to gold. Although generally working at his office for 12 hours a day and often on Sunday, he began to display his wealth by building a luxuriously equipped house with a swimming bath, and by taking a fine yacht in which large parties of distinguished people were his guests at Cowes. A set-back came in 1924, however, and he suffered heavy losses. Readjusting his affairs by promptly selling much of his property, he started new enterprises within a year. The chief of these was the Drapery Trust, which secured the control of a chain of important stores in London and the provinces. In the next few years he was responsible for many reconstructions and mergers, including the combining of nine companies in the light castings industry into a new concern called Allied Ironfounders Limited. In the spring of 1929 he started negotiations for a merger of British steel and iron firms with a capital of over £160,000,000. The idea was to provide money for the re-equip-ment of works throughout the country with modern machinery. RUMOURS OF TROUBLE Meanwhile he had brought into existence the Photomaton Company for the exploitation all over the world of an automatic machine which supplied a series of portraits for a small fee. This was one of his most successful enterprises. Suddenly, however, rumours arose that he was in difficulties. The value of Photomaton shares fell and those of other concerns with which he was connected followed. On September 20 warrants for the arrest of Hatry and three of his associates were issued. They surrendered to the police and on December 16, 1929. were committed for trial on 56 charges of forgery and fraud involving nearly £2,000,000. The total losses suffered by municipalities and individuals were estimated at £13,500,000. Hatry pleaded not guilty, stating that if the transactions complained of were illegal, he could prove that he had no intention to defraud his creditors.

“When I saw that matters were getting serious,” he continued, “I pledged every penny I possessed, my reputation and maybe my liberty to avert a crash. I took grave personal risks, whereas I could then so easily have let things go and have walked off a free man. The losses would then have fallen on thousands of shareholders instead of, as now, on comparatively few. By having taken these risks I am now irreparably ruined. My name has become a by-word and, if I am found guilty, when I leave prison, my punishment will begin all over again. I fully realized all this when I took the risk, but I had every reason to be convinced at the time that I was saving the situation and protecting my creditors. Sir Gilbert Garnsey (the accountant) has already told you that not one penny of the money irregularly raised has gone into any of our pockets.” Garnsey in his evidence admitted that the rationalizing of the steel industry was a fine conception and that the efforts to get the steel shares to support the steel market probably led to the crash.