ESCAPED DEATH.

Star (Christchurch), Volume LXVI, Issue 20483, 8 December 1934, Page 30 (Supplement)

ESCAPED DEATH.

WAR EPISODE RECALLED. DRAMA OF THE BATTLEFIELD. Fourteen years ago a 21-year-old soldier stood before a general court-martial in Turkey and heard the death sentence passed upon him and another man. His companion was executed, but his own sentence was commuted to life imprison* nient. After rive years in gaol he was released. Thi6 story was related at the Old Bailey when the former soldiers, Frank Hardy,* 35, salesman, appeared in the dock. With Lewis Theodore Fieldmar, 3(i, traveller, ho pleaded guilty to stealing an attache case containing £l2O from Charles Herbert Carter and Fred Hodgson, employees of Alessrs. Way good Otis, of Acton, W. Mr. K. J. P. Cussen, prosecuting, related that Carter and Hodgson were on their way to the factory from the bank with an attache case containing wages. Suddenly they were set upon from behind, and Lewis Fieldmar wrenched the bag from Carter’s grip and ran away. Hodgson struggled with Hardy, who was detained. Shortly afterwards a four-seater car collided with a bus. and as it was about to be driven off a bus driver jumped on to the running board and eventually succeeded in stopping it. Fieldmar jumped from the car with ths bag in his hand, and ran into a publichouse yard, where he was apprehended. Detective’s Revelations. Inspector Mitchell stated that Hardy was convicted on two charges of murder, and charges of robbery and larceny by a general court-martial in 1920. His comrade was executed. Lewis Fieldmar had one previous conviction, receiving, at Derby Assizes in 1923, five years’ penal servitude for forgery and conspiracy to defraud.

Hardy, addressing the Court, explained that he joined up in 1914, when he was only M, and served in Egypt, France and the Dardanelles. He was awarded the Military Aledal,-and in 19*20 was sent to Turkey to fight against Mustapha KemaJ.

“I met with this trouble in enemy territory,” he declared. “Aly comrade shot two Turks. The robbery we were charged with was taking a double-barrelled gun from one of the Turks, and the larceny was taking a knife from his sash. I had five yearn in prison—11 years absent from this world. T had a very hard battle to rehabilitate myself.”

Fieldmar described how he started an electrical business after he came out of prison. Bursting into tears, he declared that he had to appeal to the Public Assistance Committee for sustenance for his wife and two children.

Sentencing the two men to three years* penal servitude each. Judge IVhiteley, K.C.. declared that the public must be protected.

Ernest Alexander Fieldmar. 3.5, traveller, brother of Lewis Fieldmar. who was also charged, was found not guilty on the judge’s direction, and he was discharged.