RIGID AMERICAN PRECAUTIONS

Southland Times, Issue 23839, 9 June 1939, Page 7

RIGID AMERICAN PRECAUTIONS

Peers Forbidden To Pass Guard SCENES OF ENTHUSIASM AT NIAGARA FALLS (United Press Assn.—Telegraph Copyright) (Received June 8, 9.40 p.m.) NIAGARA FALLS, June 8. The tiny, dimly lighted platform of the little station of Suspension Bridge was jammed with the welcoming committee, a horde of journalists and a guard of honour of the 28th United States Infantry from Port Niagara as the time drew'near' for the King and Queen to cross into the United States. The public was kept well outside the station yards. The Army had stationed radio units along the entire length of the line to Washington, maintaining constant throughout the night. The strictness of the American precautions was illustrated when troops refused to allow Lord Eldon and Lord Airlie through to the platform. They explained that they were a gentleman-in-waiting and a chamberlain respectively, and they received the reply: “It’s no good, buddy. Our orders are to let no one through.” The Prime Minister of Canada (Mr W. L. Mackenzie King) slipped through unnoticed. The greatest crowds in Niagara’s history gathered to witness the historic crossing of the King and Queen into the United States, says the special correspondent of the Australian Associated Press. Those present numbered 500,000 including thousands from the United States. Their Majesties reached Niagara after one of the most strenuous days of the tour. They drove through the streets of London, Ingersoll, Woodstock, Brantford, Hamilton and St. Catherine’s. The train proceeded throughout the day through an almost unbroken lane of cheering people. At Brantford, which is the hub of die huge reserve which in 1784 Britain presented to the Six Nations of Indians for loyalty during the American Revolution, the Queen signed a Bible given to the Indians by Queen Anne in 1712. Among the crowd were Mr Angus McChellan, his wife and his five months old baby, who flew 1100 miles from Yellow Knife (North-West Territory) to Timmins (Ontario) and then travelled by train 500 miles to Brantford. The King and Queen entered cars at St. Catherine’s and drove 14 miles to Niagara by the new four-lane highway. On the way an electric eye operated by the Royal car dropped a string of flags to christen the road "Queen Elizabeth Way.” The sight of the Union Jack flying with the Stars and Stripes on Fort Niagara across the river, to symbolize 125 years of peace, was the first welcome from the United States. SIGNIFICANT DAY In this cradle of Canadian achievement, where monuments on many hills chronicle three centuries of history, the international demonstration today was particularly significant. From the grizzled ruins of the Canadian Fort Erie, where the boundary of the Niagara river begins, from the hilly field of the sanguinary battle of Lundy’s Lane in 1814, from the American Fort Niagara, where the stream flows to Lake Ontario, the Jnion Jack and the Stars and Stripes flew side by side. In the streets of the city of Niagara Falls Americans joined in the National Anthem and cheered to the echo of the Niagara Canyon the Royal couple whose Canadian tour has drawn expressions of loyalty and affection from the remotest comers of the Dominion.

For the first time since man organized the Niagara Falls into one of the world’s greatest crowd attractions the famous cataract put on a private showing. The Queen had not seen the falls previously but the King had visited them with a party of midshipmen from H.M.S. Cumberland in 1913. As a midshipman the King crossed the honeymoon bridge, but he could not take the Queen to that sentimental span as it had gone for many years. But he did take her to Table Rock, where he also stood as a youth. It is only halt the rock it was then. He also showed the Queen where a wire was strung when Blondin crossed in the presence of the King’s grandfather, King Edward VII. At the new General Brock Hotel, replacing Clifton House where he stayed before, the King found Mr Vernon

Cardy who had served him years before as manager of Clifton House. The King and Queen dined informally with the United States Minister to Canada (Mr Daniel Roper) and Mrs Roper in the rainbow room at the top of the General Brock Hotel and sat at the horseshoe table overlooking both the Canadian and American falls, after their entry into the United States over the Niagara Falls. During the dinner the 1,400,000,000 candle power floodlights illuminating the falls were turned on and the King and Queen appeared on the balcony to greet the 10,000 school children massed below. NO MAGINOT LINES The Buffalo Times in the first souvenir edition ever published by an American newspaper for visiting Royalty, said: “Today for the first time in history the reigning monarchs of the British Empire have set foot on the soil of the United States. They will not pass any border guards. None of the decorations we hang out for them will be there temporarily to conceal frontier barriers. They will not pass any Maginot or Siegfried lines. The only military they will see will be there only for show, to honour them. We think that they will find us talking about much the same things and thinking in much the same way as the people they have been visiting during the past two weeks. We think that they will detect in us the same unyielding love of human liberty that marks their own people. They may find our curtsies a little bit stiff, but when they shake our hands we shall be offering the same sincere friendship with which they have been made welcome to their own Dominion. They will find that this country and theirs are good neighbours and that ‘good neighbour’ is more than a phrase.”