SPAIN ——-..SUNOCO Monday, August £4, 1956 There’s a consoling note in the news from Europe today. The international war clouds seem to have blown over, ihere'll be no general conflict! No world’s Armageddon over the Spanish revolution! ^Fascist and Communist nations alike, fell over each other today signing the French neutrality agreement. Hitler led the band, agreeing categorically and specifically to the French proposals. In fact Hitler immediately \ announced an embargo on shipments of war munitions to Spaing And, he went further than that: he announced the withdrawal of three of his warships from Spanish waters. There are still some German men-o-war off the coast of Spain, but they will leave shortly. Other vessels will come in their places, but they are not so formidable as the ones being sent home. A I Hitler’s lead was promptly followed by Moscow. In fact the action of Maxim Litvinoff, Foreign Commissar, was almost r\ simultaneous with the action of Berlin. J Two questions arise:— Are Hitler and Mussolini signing this neutrality agreement so freely and fully because they are vynically convinced that the Rebels have practically won their SPAIN - £ civil v/ar in Spain? Yes — there are indications in that direction. Yon may recall that last week I mentioned the reports of* airplanes Yiiily fueled^ waiting in Madrid to carry the Spanish government leaders to a place of safety. Today we learn that President Azana has made even fn ler preparations for his flight. The Spanish frontier is rife with rumors that the President had sent truckloads of baggage to the port of Valencia, ready for any emergency. r l Then, there are reports of increasing insistency that General Francisco Franco^ armies a e enclosing Madrid from all sides, advancing from the Guadarrama Mountains from the south, and from the direction of Burgos, along the upper reaches of the Tagus Nevertheless, there is again a dearth of definite news from the various battlefronts of the Peninsula. The summary execution of five Frenchmen by the Rebel army has so far produced no reaction. In reporting the indident the Rebel generals announced that any other foreigners found fighting on the government’s side, will be similarly treated. SPAIN - 5 No word has come from Paris on that subject. The other question arises:-What's the meaning of that long secret meeting held early today on the French side of the border. One of the members of this conference was Count Romanones, a former advisor of King Alphonso, and a leader of the extreme Right under the republican regime. He was at one time reputed to be the richest man in Spain. But though a former Monarchist, he crossed the border as a representative of the Popular Front government. He had been a prisoner— reported executed. But now was sent as a peace emissary. He went to meet Santiago Alba, formerly Minister of Finance, formerly Minister of Foreign Affairs, in the early days of the Republic. Today AlbaTs an out and out Rebel. Naturally, that long conference produced strong rumors of peace negotia­ tions, a compromise between the Fascists and the Popular Front. It was considered significant that Count Romanones was met on the French side- of the border by the French Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs. AH of which indicates a Spanish compromise may be in the wind. JAPAN A new explosion in the Far EastI Is Japan looking for fresh troubxe? The execution of nine Russians in Manchukuo 1 looks like a deliberate challenge to the Soviet. There is no : \ if;! question about the death sentence carried out upon those nine mti&teeL m it was announced in an official communication issued t l 1 I by the Japanese army headquarters in Hsinking. * Not only were those nine led before the firing squad, but eighteen other subjects of ® the Soviet, have been sentenced to varying terms of imprisonment. i: I- The crime of which the Russians were found guilty. was described as naudacious, subversive maneuvres.” Tha^s official language for the charge that those Russians have been caught organizing Soviet storm troops within the borders of Manchukuo "II : \ 11 to fight the Manchukuan governments The victims are said to have been members of a secret delegation. This company was sent out by the Soviets into when it — Manchuria. The purpose of the mission was to organize a colony in what is known as the Three Rivers district, right on the border of Siberia. There was no 1 ■I secret about the existence of a Russian colony at that I, JAPAN - 2 which is near the Argun Elver. But the Japanese authorities until recently believed it consisted of refugees. White Russians, people who hated fllfe soviet rule. Those Soviet agents continued to pose as White Russians and two years ago organized a shdck battalion of some three hundred soldiers. Not until this year, so the Japanese story runs, did the true nature of 7p* Rcsatnn^gr f^ntT leak out. The trial was conducted with the utmost A secrecy. The Japanese waited until those twenty-seven had been not only tried and convicted, but executed, before they made the news known. Meanwhile, the sons of Nippon were looking for trouble in a new quarter. The Japanese Consul General at Nanking has submitted a formal protest to the Chinese government. He charges that the Chinese authorities are protecting Korean A The Koreans, so the Japanese Consul General says, have been plotting to blow up the Japanese consulate and other buildings, He demands that they be extradited and sent to Japan for trial, He will not have them tried on the spot where their offense is said to have been committed, but on Japanese territory. JAPAN - 5 where of course they wouldn't have a chance. The Mikado's representative was as forcible as possible in his request. If it is not granted, he said, the Chinese government will be committing an unfriendly act. SEALS An interesting cargo was being unloaded today at the port of Seattle, Washington, Uncle Sam’s navy transport, VEGA, arrived from the Pribilof Islands with her hold full of seal skins whose value was estimated at a round total of one million, seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars. They say it’s one of the richest takes ever reported from the isles of the mists. Of those skins, seventy per cent go to the United States, fifteen per cent to Japan, fifteen to Great Britain, Such are the terms of an international treaty. Every spring herds of seal come to the Pribilofs to fight and mate and bear their young. Ninety per cent of the world’s finest pelts are found there every year. Seal pirates twice came near to wiping out the price­ less herds. Hard bitten, lusty, desperate men of all nations, who feared neither God nor man, fought pitched battles on land and sea. At one time there were as many as a hundred and fifty vessels preying on the Pribilof seal herds. In Nineteen Eleven, it was discovered that a herd once estimated at four million had dwindled to a hundred and thirty SEALS - 2 thousand sea^-s* After Uncle Sam drove the raide s off the ■beaches, the poachers took to taking the seals at sea. So — the U. S. A. declared the Bering Sea closed and Warships seized vessels with seals. A tribunal in Paris declared we had no right to close those seas. So the poaching cintinued. One year some Japanese poachers, working under cover of the fog, were killed by guards. That created an international incident. Finally, Russia, Japan, John Bull and Uncle Sam got together on the subject, signed the treaty that made it unlawful to take seals at sea, a criminal offense to be found in possession of a raw pelt. Under this protection, the herd has grown again until today it numbers some million and a half * The Prloilofs a e alive with seals. OWENS Aboard the revenue cutter this morning that went down New York Bay to board Queen Mary after her record-breaking trip, was a stout, middle-aged negro woman, quietly dressed and wearing heavy glasses. She seemed bewildered when she had climbed aboard the queen of the seas: — swirling crowds I the reporters! the news cameramen! and everything,. She looked impatiently and somewhat resentfully through the hubbub. Then she broke into speech, crying: "Where’s that Jesse? Who’s keeping my Jesse away from me?” At that moment a long-legged young negro came bounding down the companionway, six steps at a time, shouting: ”Hi, Mom!” It was Jesse Owens, the Olympic hero, the record-buster, winner of four gold medals. The negro woman was the mother of the celebrated young brown bullet from Ohio State. Jesse's fath r and wife were also in the crowd that came to meet him, as well as Charles White, the white man who discovered him when he was nothing buy a gawky lad at Fairmont Junior High School at Cleveland, For all his sudden fame, the young speedster bore himself with poise, modesty and sound common sense. OWENS - 2 He said he was not planned to turn professional and cash in on his Olympic triumphs. Just doesn’t know. Then of course he was asked about his suspension by the A. A. U., the charge made against him that he ran out on an engagement made for him at Oslo by the Olympic Committee. Said he: ’’The Committee just made up a list of those games without asking any of us about it. They didn't consult any of at at any time.” Then he went on to explain: ”1 wouldn’t have minded running. I was quite willing to give the best I had anywhere. But I did think I ought to have been asked about it.” His questioners then asked him:— "What is your opinion about Avery Brund.oge4?” Jesse’s tactiul reply was. ”1 admire him very much as a man. But as for his policies^ I don’t xnow^ X don't know.” CHILTON From Cleveland comes one of those stories, an oft repeated tale, that inspired Victor Hugo to write an immortal classic. At least I am assured it is immortal by those who have had the patience to read it through. But no matter how many times the story of Jean Val^s^n occurs, it always has a fresh, poignant appeal* For twenty-three years a man named Carlton Chilton, has been working harr* in Cleveland, living a decent, quiet, honorable life, that earned the respect of all his neighbors, One month ago, he reached the age of forty-one, without a flaw in his character, his neighbors,^mployer and nintwn wrrr shocked to learn that Chilton had been arrested. A Not for anything he had done in Cleveland, but something that had happened twenty-four years ago. Somebody had recognized in that respectable forty-one year old citizen the eighteen year old youth who had escaped from a reformatory in Oklahoma. 0j^3.t,on was only seventeen when he committed the act that has haunted him *±i all his life. He robbed a bank at CHILTOM - S Calvin, Oklahoma. The older, hardened criminals who had led him into it, escaped. But young Carlton Chilton was laid by the heels and sent to a reforinatory for two years. He served a year of that sentence and then one day made a break. By that timei he was only eighteen, but he had learned his lesson, went straight, made his way co Cleveland, settled down in a trade, made good. From then on he lived a quiet, honest, everyday sort of life. After his arrest^ his story, his clean record, appealed to even such a stern official as the prosecuting attorney of Cleveland, Governor Davey of Ohio. Even the Cleveland A cops tried to find some way of saving this forty-one year old man from being dragged back to prison in Oklahoma, The prosecuting attorney at Cleveland telegraphed Governor Marland of Oklahoma. He wired that in his opinion as a prosecutor, the true ends of justice will not be served by compelling the man to go back to jail after his long and honorable reform. Governor Marland of Oklahoma has taken all these weeks to consider the case, has heard every argument offered by the Cleveland prosecutor, and by CHILTON - S Chilton’s friends. His decision is to Ignore those appeals. He declines to pardon Chilton. He has sent a formal request to Governor Davey of Ohio, asking for The Oklahoma Governor explains that even though Chilton may have led a model life for twenty-three years, it would not be a good example to others to let him off the balance of his term. The Governor of Ohio apparently has no legal alternative but to grant the extradition of this unfortunate man WIDOW I 6f comes from Jerusalem by way of London. | : |!| A British captain in Palestine found himself confronted with P exceedingly unmi 1 itary ^rob 1 rin hiunl# A Jewish watchman was found murdered in an Arab village. Of course, as our English friends say,”that sort of thing oanTt go on, donTt you captain was there ‘to execute Justice. know- ■ u, 4. a f ’ uiid y CUX Kt Ui " S0 the British captain was ■ i mm/mtm X I 1 i But he couldn’t find anybody to if on. Apparently, there A 4 was no other place so full of completely innocent people as that I Arab village, How, it is the custom of the Ehglish, in administering law throughout Asia Minor, to follow so far as possible, the legal customs of the country. By the law of the Ayabs, if a man is found murdered and his murderer cannot be ^found, the community is held responsible. Arab law does nqt demand an eye for an eye. or a tooth for a tooth. It holds that if a man is slain, the /v tfvdr— crime can the payment of ^ sufficient sum of money 6 Unfortunately, there was no money to speak of in that village. nAli right," said the captAin, "then you shall pay in . ff ^ grain about the place, that it grain." But there was so llttla & WIDOW - B 1 / wasn’t enough to pay for the life of that Jewish watchman. The captain sighed and exclaimed: »0h, that I had a Daniel with me, to tell me what to do In the judgment seat!” At that moment, he espied a couple of, camel browsing by the wayside. So he said to the elders of the village: "Lo, these beasts will make up what is lacking,,” Whereupon he proceeded to JL S seize thj^a* camel. At that a loud cry of lament arose, A wailing woman threw herself at the feet of the British captain^ pleading: nfiave mercy, I am a widow and in all the world I have nothing save these two poor camels.” The captain turned to the elders of the village and said: nDoes this woman speak truth?" And the elders replied: "Protector of the poor, she speaks indeed the truth. Her husband is dead long since and all she has in the world are her camels. For behold, no man will wed with her, for she hath a shrewish I tongue." At that the captain exclaimed: "Go woman, take your camels and be gone," TOMOHrtQwfc /? ^ ^ ! |f: ISl