L.T^ SUNQ,CQ_. TUESDAY. JULY 1^. 1^7. GOOD EVEN MG EVERYBODY: The State Department in Washington today received a comnrunication from the British Government, Now what can be in that diplomatic message? What is Great Britain sajiing to the United States? That's not revealed. It’s a secret* as so many diplomatic things are. But* itfs not difficult to guess. Today* Secretary of State Cordell Hull conferred with the am­ bassadors of Japan and China* and he told them the United States fiovernment would deplore an armed clash between China and “apan* it isn't hard to surmise that the note of His Majesty's Govern­ ment in London deals with tot same Far Eastern problem of war - especially as Foreign Minister Anthony Eden told the House of Commons the other day that the British Government was considering an appeal to the United States for joint action in averting an Asiatic war. Eo we can be quite sure that today's British note to the United States is a discussion of events so prominent deplore it as a grave blow 1® the news toni#ht LEAD - ^ The fighting in China continued bitterly all day. Advancing Japanese troops fought their way to the ancient walls of Peiping They skirmished along in armored cars. But a^t the walls they were stopped. The Chinese garrison fought them off, and the Japanese are waiting there during the night. Heavy reenforcements are being rushed to support the attack while the Chinese are hurrying troops to strenghten the defense. The Japanese are reported to have cut the one important Chinese line of communications, and have isolated a powerful enemy detachment. The fighting is most confused. It is impossible to dpict any kind of battle line. There’s a maze of skirmishing between isolated, rapidly shifting units. The main line of combat is along the railroad, especially the steel tracks from Peiping to Tientsin, which lies to the southeast, that great seaport to Peiping. The Japanese fighters are troops stationed in the northern Chinese provinces, which are under Japanese domination. They are also garrisons defending Japanese consular 1 posts. They’re parties of railroad guards and armed Japanese colonists. It’s all miscellaneous and confused. lead - s One splash oi* the fantastic comes in the story of a fight for a bridge. The Chinese used swords — those ancient blades, broad, sharp, and waving fiercely. It's described as a close encounter, with artillery and machine guns out of the picture. The Japanese used bayonets, while the Chinese charged them with the gleam of naked blades. And they are said to have won* The Chinese drove off the Japanese in the fight for the bridge - fencing-sword against bayonet. tr£ Today’s line the news gives us a large journalistic i s exploit, and the newspaper man who achieved it Webb Miller, chief —. European correspondent for United Press^ Webb and I traveled to Europe together a couple of months ago. He told me that he A was bound for Spain to pick up civil war stories for his press service. So that's where he is nov/, and he certainly hSIr gathered in a banner headline for today’s news. It*s an interview with General Franco in which the nationalist chieftain makes a series of formal declarations. How formal they are is indicated by the fact that Franco with his own hand wrote out his answers to Webb Miller * s questions. "vio;& ‘J Will Franco accept a compromise peace? he insists on a knockout. What terms of agreement would he accept? His answer is — unconditional surrender. Franco told the United Fress correspondent that France, under an understanding with Russia and the radical Valencia government asked the United States to Intervene in Spain and stop the war. But the United States refused. Tfwtmiiftmxdirali Valencia’s desire for an armistice, says Franco, Indicates that it Is A ififould Franco xx consider an armistice for the purpose of negotiating peace? The nationalist gfrjTrf-frMTfyynre chief answered —— only if the ■‘■•eft Wingers surrender all their artillery and aviation and release all prisoners, r, ^ ^ *441- stand So today we have^=q»gii-coiapromising^iam declared by the chief of the Spanish rebels — war to the bitter end And how bitter that end is may be judged from another answer that General Franco gave to Webb Miller. The question was - how many have been killed in the Spanish civil war? Franco gave no total figures, but he claims that the Left Wingers have killed four hundred ____ — ------- thousand people,^victims of Red terror^ He says that on his side the executions have totaled about thirty—five hundred. This, « of course, jima one side of the argument, and on the Madrid A side quite a different story is told. But there*s agreement about the fact of horror and havoc. ! I s t Jr FOLLOW bPAIifl Great Britain issued something of an ultimatum today, not publicly it was given by Foreign Minister Anthony Eden to the ambassadors of the four powers most interested in the Spanish embroglio France, Germany, Italy and Russia. The non—interventi committee last week turned over to His Majesty* s government the task of working out some new agreement to keep the Spanish civil war from spreading, foreign Minister £den told the ambassadors today the Ttxtwmiea. statesmen of Londoj — and they wante* it to be accepted. If not — why England will drop the whole intervention scheme. Foreign Minister Eden will present the plan to the Committee of twenty-seven nations on ffiday. If it is accepted, there wil^another try at neutrality in Spain. If not — Britain will drop out. Zvdt , On the battlefield it is hard to tel^what is happening. The war reports from Spain are so contradic^^^^^ that about the only time to make up fcx your mind about anything is when both sides agree — and that is seldom. In this case they both agree that the Left Wing drive against the Rebel lines west of Madrid has bee^^TtfCjor proportions and the utmost violence. A * Madrid claims a large success, a forward push of ten miles. On FOLLOW bPiilfl Franco1s side. It Is admitted that the attack made progress, but not that much. The Rebels claim to have stopped Today* s reports indicate that .the fighting on the ground was at pretty much of a standstill —— the battle turned to an aviation phase, intensive fighting in the sky. Both ±x sides agree that a giant air battle was fought — as many as A A one himdretl planes engaged. * TheiL the* contradiction begins. The Left Wingers report they brought down thirteen Rebel planes and lost only three. The Franco dispfctch admist the loss of only one plane and declares that the Nationalist flyers brought down mt eight Madrid pursuit planes and five bombers. Eight plus five makes thirteen— perfect contradiction. MDIVANI A couple of years ago, the news of the day was ornamented by the princely name of Mdivani, those three marrying brothers - one of whom led Barbara Hutton to the altar. This princely Alexis Mdivani was later divorced by the Woolworth heiress, and finally killed in an automobile accident^ During this period, the glory of the princely name was made brighter by the mention of still another Mdivani. He, oddly enough, figured in the news as a high personage in Communism, a Soviet diplomat. Budu Mdivani^«H&3*<fcb^ Soviet Commercial Attache in Paris. He was a Georgian, as the marrying Mdivanis were. And the report was that he was a relative of the princely brothers. This they denied. K They scorned any hint of Communist connections y*\ tlMft. V when the talk of the land was the romance of Prince Alexis and the heiress to the A Today the name of Mdivani occurs in the news once more. It appears in the latest account of more Soviet executions. Stalin liquidates another group of his enemies. A Soviet r'rtnrtemnation of seven conspirators, newspaper announces the conaemnax,j.uu officials accused of conspiracy and treason. sentenced to death. MDIVANI - 2 and by now they1 ve been executed. One of them is Budu Mdivani former Soviet Commercial Attache to Paris and mentioned one time as a member of the princely family of the three marrying brothers COflGftESS The presidential hold on Congress has become proverbial, but once in a while it slips. I’m not^ referring to the ^Senate battle about the Supreme Court, although thatfs an affair of sizzling opposition to the Administration court plan. It was the Lower, House ***■• that flouted the White House today. The Representatives passed a bill over the yygifrfr presidential veto —— the second time such a thing has happened in the present session of Congress. The first concerned a bill to extend insurance t privileges to World War veterans. Congress passed that over the President's head. Today it's a bill providing loans for farmers. The government has bean lending money to farmers at a low interest rate three and one-half percent. The bill proposes to continue that low Interest rate for two years more. Yesterday the President vetoed it, on the grounds that it would cost Ihe government thirty million dollars a year and would upset the President's plan to balance the budget. Today Congress paid no attention to those arguments. Chairman Marvin Jones of Texas led the attack on the veto saying that money at low interest was still necessary to enable the farmers to solve their financial problems. It needed a two—third majority to over—rine the veto. Did they get it? I’hey sure did. The vote was 260 to 97. GOLFER Troubles are heaping up for that mystery golfer of Hollywoodj John Montague. Yesterday we heard how the Paul Bunyan of the Hollywood golf courses was wanted in Hew York State on a seven year old charge of robbery, a stick-up. Today there was added another charge - extortion. The police of Syracuse, New York,* tell of an extortion case in which five men got money from a merchant, representing themselves as detectives making an investigation. They got Ninety Dollars, of which their leader kept Fifty, fie was arrested, convicted and given a six months* suspended sentence. Later on, the police, by means of fingerprints, identified him with the robber who was wanted for the hold-up of a tavern in the Catskills. This stick-up man, they now claim, is the prodigious golfer, John Montague,who created legends of driving and putting on the links of the Hollywood movie colony. Today, sports writers in newspapers are recalling some of the exploits of that golfing Paul Bunyan. The dramatic angle has been that it was Montague's mighty deeds on the links GOLFER - 2 that gave the New Y0rk authorities a clue to his identify. But today in the NEW YORK SUN, George Trevor boils it down specifically to - trap shots. It wasn't merely that the eighty Montague could shoot such a hard driving game of golf, it was more especially his prowess in getting out of bunkers. The Essex County, New York, police remembered how the young man wanted so long for robbery was a wizard at trap shots, a miracle man of the bunkers* So you dan understand their detective deductions when they heard things like this ttKFfe George Trevor relates in the NEW YORK SUN. He tells how Montague would bury five golf balls in a sand trap, bury them out of sight. Then he^ blast them out with one swing of a driver shoot three of them to within six feet of the pin - the other two landing fairly on the green. That's Paul Bunyan xtxt stuff. iinendous long shots at the Lakeside course was a phenomenon. WithfSSSdi&l^wings he'd cover five hundred and sixty yards He was equally great as a driver. The way he’d smash With GOLFER _ 3 Montague would win against the present amateur champion. And Qeorge Von Elm considers him as the greatest shot-maker he ever saw. So the Irony Is - that here*s a who A ^ A might have become a champion, save for that^charge agAinst him back in New York State. He oouldn1! appear^ a tournament, couldn’t bear the limelight of publicity, .couldn’t have his flashes of the news cameras. He never allowed himself to be photographed. George Trevor of the SUN tells how once Scotty Chisolm, the Los Angeles golfer, snapped a picture of Montague, who saw it and said - "Give me that fillE.,' He took out a huge wad of bills and handed one over, sayings "This is for your trouble." He took the steel film pack .and tore It apart with his bare hands. Yes, Paul Bunyan — wanted by the sheriff in his home county. It*s a tfcaglc tale, yet with its turn of the comic - stories of how that mighty mystery man of golf used to play a photograph published far and wide. He would have^aawcp under the bang-u; and a Incredibly unique. when we find GOLFER - 4 romantic realm of duelling, the field of honor, ^hat's one story we have today. It occurred in Italy and it takes us to Shakespeare. We’ve all read the VTwo Gentlemen of Verona" - or have we? Anyway, we recall that the scene of the comedy Is that ancient and romantic Italian city. It*s a big railroad center nowadays, but still It1 s romantic. Our story today is a new version of the "Two Gentlemen of Verona." Those two gentlemen had a quarrel, and there was a challenge to a duel, which is an old Italian custom. They selected their weapons. And what ones do you think they chose? No, not aristocratic rapiers, not duelling swords. One selected a spade, a common garden spade. The other - a pick-axe - a common, dig-in-the-ditch pick-axe. What kind of gentlemen would you call those two guys? all the formalities;-challenge, seconds, code of honor. One duelist swung with the pick-axe, while the other chap swung But that’s the way they fought their duel — and with Both were injured. with the spade. They knocked each other out^ and the seconds packed the two duelists of the "Two Gentlemen of Verona." off to a RUsiPli^S ____ _ This latest Soviet North Pole flight bringa a touch of Having dramatic suspense today. Xlagc^crossed the North Pole from Moscow, the Russian aviators now don*t fenow where they are going. But,theyfre on their way. What causes all this confusion as to goal? Why, the weather. The flyers, crossing Canada and almc& xx at the borders of the United States, have been advised by the United States Weather Bureau* not to keep straight on*to San Francisco according to their schedule. Uncle San^s weather man warned them about storm conditions over the Rocky Mountains, dangerous for itx flying, and advised them to steer Bast and avoid yh the storm. This the Soviet flyers are doing, turning the tail of their plane to the setting sun. And they may wind up in Chicago. They're taking advice from the ground and the Weather experts will tell them whxjni whether it* s to be xx the Golden Gate or the Windy City. Arpiray, they have a number one chance to break the world's long distance record.