NEGROES CLASH ON SHIP

Wanganui Chronicle, 27 August 1946, Page 5

NEGROES CLASH ON SHIP

FIGHTS AMONG CREW OF MARINE FALCON IN SYDNEY Sydney, Aug. 26. Fights between negro members o£ the crew of the United States transport .Marine Falcon delayed her departure last night

for an hour and a-half. While more than 2000 friends and relatives of the passengers stood on the wharf, the negroes fought on the crowded decks and in the mess hall. Police and United States provosts had to be called aboard the ship to quell the disturbances. The ship is carrying 774 passengers, including 72 Australian brides and 150 fiancees of American servicemen. A dispute between negroes developed on the wharf when one negro refused to leave a white girl. He struggled with two shipmates as they dragged him to the ship's side. The gangways were raised, so men tied a rope around his waist and hauled him aboard. Before he disappeared he was fighting among passengers at the! rail. Another negro, stripped to the waist, I

appeared on deck, and picking up a passenger’s child, kissed it. When the passenger remonstrated another fight broke out.

White girls embraced negroes leaning from portholes, and in a lull a white woman on the wharf diverted the interest of the crowd by knocking to the ground a man whom she alleged had insulted her. Before the arrival of the police the negroes were using table knives in a brawl on the mess deck. The ship eventually cleared Sydney at 1.40 a.m. to-day.

Inspection of the ship during the week-end, following complaints by passengers, resulted in a verdict favourable to the ship. The great majority of the passengers had expressed themselves as satisfied. There were only six cancellations of passages to San Francisco, of which four were because of sickness.