BURGLAR HUNT.

Star (Christchurch), Volume LXIV, Issue 829, 1 August 1933, Page 5

BURGLAR HUNT.

London Policemen in a Maze. INCIDENTS AT AN INN. (Special to the " Star”) LONDON, June 24. The Swan Inn at Ash Vale, Hampshire, known affectionately to hundreds of thousands of army men all over the world as “ Tupper’s,” was the scene of an unrehearsed comedy on Sunday night, when a would-be burglar and his pursuers became involved in an overgrown maze attached to the inn. About hall-past eleven the proprietor’s wife saw an unknown man hanging around the inn, and called her husband, who shouted and gave chase, while she telephoned to the police. The burglar ran violently into a gate—and dived into the dark waters of the Basingstoke canal. He clambered out as speedily as possible, and ran down an alley behind a hedge, the inn proprietor trying to head him off. ! The burglar, still dripping, then rej treated into the maze, with the object iof baffling his pursuer. In this he was i entirely successful. i The maze is a natural one formed of ; light hedges, now so overgrown as to i form virtual tunnels. To follow the ! burglar into it alone was a dangerous | course, as he was armed with a pint ! bottle. J Passing motorists were stopped, and I illuminated the maze with their headI lights. Policemen to the number of J eighteen arrived from nearby police stations, and surrounded the maze, in which the burglar could be heard crash, ing round through the undergrowth as he explored every avenue. The police then closed on the centre. Or, at least, that was the idea. Unfortunately, the policemen also became lost, and the affair began to look like a rehearsal for the Aldershot Tattoo. Awestruck, the non-combatants stood round in the eerie glare of the headlights while wild shouts arose from the eighteen benighted policemen a? they mulled round in the labyrinth. It was some hours before they could be extri-

cated, by which time it was discovered that the burglar had escaped. A writer said: “ I inspected the scene, or as much as the impact of thirty-six constabulary boots had left of it, and T can state with confidence that no stone had been left unturned.”