REFUGEES IN BOXES

Wairarapa Times-Age, 23 December 1938, Page 2

REFUGEES IN BOXES

MODERN ‘SCARLET PIMPERNEL’ FOUND GUILTY OF JEWEL FRAUD. RECENT EXPLOITS IN SPAIN. Many people smuggled out of Spain during days of anarchy after the civil war began are said to owe their escape to a man who was lately sentenced to 18 months’ imprisonment at the Old Bailey, London. His wife, sitting balow the dock, wept bitterly when he was found guilty on a fraudulent conversion charge that strangely recalled his activities in the role of a “Scarlet Pimpernel.” The man who now looks back on his exploits through prison bars is Albert Gourgues, aged 39, a French engineer. In a state of distress, his wife, Mme Marguerite Gourgues, of Avenue des Fleurs, Nice, was allowed by the recorder, Mr Gerald Dodson, to see him in a cell following the trial.

Afterwards she .stated: “I intend to stay in England if I can help my husband, but if not I must return to my children, who, thank heaven, are safe in Franco. They were there while my husband was doing his work in Spain. “It was terrible for me,” she said, “while he was risking his life in Spain saving people from death. He was so brave, and I was afraid for him.” Mme Gourgues explained how her husband, through being connected with an exporting business, had friends among the crews of French merchant ships. He bribed these men to carry “human merchandise.” PRIESTS AND NUNS AIDED. More than once refugees who came to her husband’s house were packed into large wooden boxes that had been used to bring food into Barcelona. “For days in the spring of last year,” said Mme Gourgues, “we had two priests and three nuns in the house. Then at night, when the ship was ready to take them, they slipped out. The priests wore my husband’s clothes, and I gave my own clothes to the nuns. “Relatives of people whom my husband rescued would be in grave danger if he had to mention their names in court, but the English courts are good. The Republicans let my husband go, but now the Franco authorities want him. They sent word to him through an agent in France that he was to go to Burgos to do more rescue work. But friends warned us—they wish to kill him for helping Republicans. Now my husband has gone to a British gaol.” 1 . Gourgues was accused of fraud in connection with his alleged attempt to get two daughters of a Barcelbna merchant, described as “Senor X,” across the border. It was alleged that he fraudulently converted to his own use miniatures valued at £l,OOO and a pearl necklace which cost £ 2,000, x entrusted to him in the early months of the Spanish fighting. An odd chance led to Gourgues’ appearance in the dock. The valuables concerned in the charge were given to him by "Senor X’s” soh, Ritafdo, in 1936, the idea being that he should get them out of Spain. Gourgues subsequently told Ricardo that the Barcelona Government had seized them. In July last Gourgues called on a London art dealer to sell the miniatures. By a mere coincidence hb Called on the man who had assisted “Senor X” to catalogue his collection. The dealer recognised the miniatures and Informed the police. DISCOVERY IN A TRUNK. Detective-Sergeant Burgess said when Gourgues was arrested at a West End hotel he found the miniatures and nebklacO at the bottom of a ti’Uiik. Mr Derek Curtis-Benhett, for the defence, told the jury they might thihk the miniatures and pearls were given to Gourgues as part payment for his services in resetting the two girls, Senoritas Carmeh and DOlorbs. Ricardo saw Gourgues in France, and begged him to try to save his sisters. Was it not likely, asked counsel, that Ricardo would say, “I will give you anything to get them out?” 1 Gourgues, giving evidence through ah interpreter, stated that, seeing the terrible cruelties which were taking place after the revolution broke out, he and some of his compatriots decided to assist people out of Spain. “It was extremely dangerous, and I ran the risk of being shot at any time,” he declared. “Including ‘Senor X’s’ family I rescued 159 persons.” Gourgues added -he was detained for 22 days because he was suspected of. taking part in this kind of work. On the very day he was released he renewed his efforts, but when he heard that some of his comrades had been caught and shot for rescuing people, he returned to France.

Gourgues declared that it was “with tears in his eyes” that Ricardo asked him to save the two senoritas. He told Ricardo that 20,000 francs (about £200) was not enough, but on being promised the miniatures and pearls he agreed to go. Mme Gourgues gave evidence on her husband's behalf. She stated she and her husband met Ricardo at an hotel at Marseilles.

“Ricardo wanted my husband to fetch his sisters, who were in danger in Barcelona,” she said. “My husband said he did not want to go as he had beeen arrested before. I did not want him to go. Ricardo said that in Barcelona my husband would be handed a necklace and miniatures for the work he would carry out there.” Mr Maude, for the prosecution, said if Gourgues was to believed, the jury had to brand “Senor X” as a man who had entered into a conspiracy with his daughters and son to send an innocent man to prisoii. “In this case,” added Mr Maticle, “a lot of nonsense has beoh talked about the Scarlet Pimpernel. “If you have read the books, you will know why Sir Percy Blakeney, their hero, carried out his fescues. Can you imagine a man more uhlikc Sir Percy than Gourgues?” The Recorder, in passing sentence, told Gourgues he had been convicted on the clearest possible evidence, and his explanation was “quite hopeless.”