SOUTH AFRICAN STRIKE

Press, Volume L, Issue 14884, 26 January 1914, Page 7

SOUTH AFRICAN STRIKE

LABOUR M.P. SENT TO GAOL. fOR PUBLISHING A PAMPHLET. (by Cable.—Pre«« Aeiocistion.— Ccpyriehi.) JOHANNESBURG, January 23. *Sj F. H. P. Cresswell, Labour 31 P. for Jeppe, who was arrested for attempting to address strikers, has beon sentenced to a month's imprisonment, without hard labour, and fined £'20, for" publishing a Tjamphiet. His sentence is likely to excite ill-feeling. Hβ was also lined £10 in deiault fourteen days' imprisonment, for attempting to induce men to refrain from working. Cresswell declared that owing to the proclamation of martial law he issued a lea Set instead of giving advice orally. Hβ Wished to advise tho men as to the jjjjt •sray of couducting themselves, especially in preventing public violence. Hβ would always advise men once they struck, to stand together, loyal to one another. The prosecutor admitted that there was nothing very inflammatory in the pamphlet. No doubt Cressweil'e intention vat not violence. The pamphlet, however was calculated to induco a continuation of the strike. Cresswell's sentence will prevent him from attending the opening of Parliament on tho i3th inst. Martial law being in force, no appeal is possible. 'Ibe magistrate hoid that tho preamble of the pamphlet was likely to cause disaffection. Cresswell, as an educated Juan, and a member oi Parliament, ought to be punished more severely than the others. Ho would not inflict hard labour, though ho tuougnt it was deserved. Mr F. H. P. Cresswell is a consulting niiung engineer by profession. Ho went h> tke Transvaal in 1893, and there he held several appointments, at one time manager of the Village Main Reef. After the. war ho set iioot a white labour experiment, winch led to his beveriuu his connexion with the company. Since then ho has been a firm adherent of the white labour Dolicy He was a member of the lYansvaal Parliament under the new constitution. OTHER SENTENCES. PRETORIA, January 23. Jlilee, printer of the "Strike Herald," was fined £25, m default a month's imprisonment, and three others £20, in default three weeks' imprisonment, while a fifth was acquitted. ALLEGED DYNAMITARDS. ; PRETORIA, January 23. ; It js anderstood that a general courtjnaHial, under General Lukin, will be 'cdnyened for the eummary trial of the foar men—Drake, Steyn, Ferguera, ■ and Oliver. • The first two are charged with causing an explosion, and the others with haying explosives in their possession. The section, of martial law whereunder the court is convened, prescribes & MBtence'o'f death for these ofiencos.