LORD ROBERTS'S ESCAPE.

Wanganui Herald, Volume XXXV, Issue 10502, 25 November 1901, Page 3

LORD ROBERTS'S ESCAPE.

Further light on the dastardly plot to blow up Lord Roberts while attending church in . Johannesburg was thrown by a letter read before tho Compensation .Commission at the Westminster Palaco Hotel (says the Daily Express). Tho missive was from Colonel Davics, the Military Commissioner of Police at Pretoria, to the Military Governor of Johannesburg, and Sir John Armagh, in reading it, 'was perceptibly moved. The moving spirit in the whole villainous business was Gambini; tho Italian, who had tho bombs prepared, and had studied the disposition of tho commander's bodyguard in order than the scheme might be carried out without a hitch. Tho number of bombs, their composition, and the way in which they were to bo disposed prove that the conspirators had matured- their .plans. The first bomb was a sardine box filled with nitro-glycerine, with a glass tube inside, which, on breaking, .would cause an explosion ; the second, a round bomb filled with small shrapnel; and tho third a gin flask, which was to be buried in St. Mary's Church. It was the intention of Gambini to so fix the flash that- everyone must, inevitably perish. He had arranged to go to to the Com-mander-in-Cltief's house the next day, and two Frenchmen had been told off to settle the sentries if necessary. Indeed a snapshot had beon taken of Lord Rooerts's house, and the man selectedto light , the fuse had everything ready. Such, at least, was tho story, as unfolded by Gambini himself in a conversation overheard by a detective secreted in the house the arch conspirator used. Prister, the man to light the fuse, was found, from his professional card, to be a -chemist of explosives. In some way he had obtained permission to use tho Ferreira- Company's laboratory. The secret agent employed had on several occasions urged the arrest of Gambini, but it was decided to delay action in the hope of gaining further information. Colonel Davies's letter recounted the . sensational incidents which led up to the^arrest of Gambiui. Pristcc was also found, and with him the man Deli, who, after taking the oath of neutrality, and afterwards joining a commando, was found guilty of murder and hanged. The arrest of the conspirators proved timely — so timely, in fact, that a little further delay might have proved fatal. Gambini managed to escape on his bicycle.