GRAF VON LUCKNER

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Issue 175, 11 August 1937, Page 3

GRAF VON LUCKNER

World Tour Begun in ■ Former Trawler GERMANY AND WAR # Graf Felix von Luckner. "The Count " who ia expected to call at Auckland within the next few months in the course of a world cruise, left Hamburg last May for the Baltic Sea. In a former motpr trawler which car/ies sails and has been thoroughly re(Itted for the arduous voyage, he will probably cross to the Atlantxc coast of America before heading for the Antipodes. The name of the vessel is Seeteufel (pronounced Zeetovfil) and its English oquivalent is Sea Devil, a sobriquet generally applied to von Luckner for his daring exploits on the high seas during the Great, War. This information was gleaned from recent German newspapers by Captain Georg Meiners, of the N or ddeutscher-Lloy d steamer Anliaic, which recently called at Auckland. t* _ Captain Meiners, who is in the German Naval Eeserve, does not know Graf vonf Luckner personally, but for : him he holds great admiration. He said j ihat he was quito satisfied tnat it was not the intention of von Luckner to disseminate Nazi propaganda in New Zealand. The Count, he said, paid for J the present expedition by conducting j iecture tours only in his own country, , and when he rejmrned to the Fatherland would probably embark on another tour. . The Count, he added, had written two books, which were very widely read in Germany.

Over good German beer and cigars fche other morning, the captain vetoed the suggestion of Germany 's making war. "Germany does not want war. Herr Hitler and the ieaders of the nation fought in the last war, and they know exactly what it is like. They were not in high offieial po'sitions, either, but were right up in the front line all the time. ' ' He admitted that the real menace to Germany was Russia. ShoUld that country launch an offensive against Germany then there would be war, but Germany would not undertake aggressive action on her own initiative. On the same subject, he eaid that German dockyards, while building a few naval vessels, were chiefly interested in the construction of craft for the merehant service, and were also building sfiips for other countries. Qiiestioi^ed about the return of ex-German colonies in the Faeific, Captain Meiners had lit,tle to say but he concurred that had Germany a country like New Zealand, which is half the size of the former, it could eettle one or two million people hera. Chatting good naturedly to his aristocratic looking Argentine-bred dog, Astor, he digressed a little to talk of affairs in his own country, which he has not visited for 'a year., While many biergartens existed there, if was very rare to isee an intoxicated person in the streets. "If there are, they are locked up, and if a man in a motor car collision is found to have had liquor his licence is taken away."