GESTAPO STORY

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20102, 23 November 1939, Page 5

GESTAPO STORY

ALLEGED CONFESSION

ARREST OF ELSER

TWO BRITONS TAKEN

CONNECTION DENIED

(Eire. Tol. Copyright—United Press Assn.) (Reed. Nov. 23, 11 a.m.) LONDON, Nov. 22.

A German official news agency report from Berlin declares that George Elser, aged 3G, was arrested by the Nazi secret police on the night of tile Munich beer-hall explosion on November 8, while attempting to cross the German-Swiss frontier to meet the instigators of the crime.

He allegedly confessed that the explosion was planned a year ago. He built a time-bomb in the pillars of the beer-hall while doing small jobs over a period of weeks. The fuse was set to explode the bomb in 144 hours. The instigator was the British secret service and the organiser. Herr Otto Strasser, a former lieutenant of HenHitler's, who fled from Germany.

The agency adds that German secret service agents, describing themselves as revolutionary German officers, mado contact with British secret service agents at The Hague, from whom they obtained a portable radio enabling them to make contact with the British Government daily.

Overpowered on Frontier

In November, a Mr. Best and an accomplice. Captain N. Stevens, attempted to cross the Netherlands-Ger-man frontier into tiie Netherlands, near Venlo, but were overpowered and taken prisoners by the State police. Authoritative quarters declare -hat Mr. Best and Captain Stevens are at present in custody in Berlin. The Foreign Office describes the German statement as -‘quite incomprehensible,” and declares that there is no connection between Elser’s arrest and the alleged kidnapping of two Britons on the German-Netherlands frontier.

The Foreign Office adds that neither the British Government nor any British agent has any knowledge of Elser. The public will draw its own conclusions from his long examination by the German police. The Berlin correspondent of the Associated Press of Great Britain says that the arrest of the two Britons and that of Elser are not linked. The official announcements were made separately. German Press Versions

However, the German newspapers display the reports side by side to the exclusion of all the war news from the front pages.

The Berlin correspondent of the Copenhagen paper Politiken says that the Britons have protested to the German authorities ag'ainst their arrest, alleging that they were kidnapped from Dutch territory. The correspondent states that the official claim that Elser revealed all the details of the Munich plot is untrue. The Gestapo apparently is still in the dark and has appealed to the public to answer nine vital questions concerning Elser’s movements, his friends, and occupation before the bombing.