COLLEENS ROBBED BY MASKED MEN.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 18888, 14 October 1929, Page 15

COLLEENS ROBBED BY MASKED MEN.

SHOES AND STOCKINGS TAKEN; GIRLS FORCED TO WALK BAREFOOT. (United Press Assn—By Electric Telegraph —Copyright.) LONDON, October 12. A party of twenty-four pretty Derry colleens, who were returning from Londonderry after a dance at Fort Leenan, were the victims of an astonishing outrage at the hands of fourteen armed and masked men, near Clonmany. The girls had been the guests of the Royal Artillery at Fort Leenan. The hosts provided a motor omnibus to take the girls home in the small hours. Some masked men stopped the omnibus when it was half-way on its journey, and at the point of the revolver they forced the girls to submit to being driven to the lonely Isle of Doagh, which is notorious as a haunt of potheen-makers. There the girls were compelled to take off their shoes, stockings and ball dresses, which were gathered in a heap. Petrol was then poured on the clothing, which was set on fire. The girls and the soldier driver were then lined up and told that they were to be shot, but the masked men finally turned the girls adrift on the lonely countryside to find their way to Londonderry without their shoes, stockings and coats. —Australian Press Association.