ILLICIT DIAMONDS.

Hutt News, Volume 2, Issue 46, 24 April 1930, Page 2

ILLICIT DIAMONDS.

DISCOVERY IN CAVE

Amazing stories have been told of the methods employed to outwit the large force of police and detectives engaged in suppressing the illicit diamond trade, in Namaqualand, the newest of the South African diamond fields.

Police activities in. Namaqualand have been such that diamond smugglers have recently been having a lean. time. They have been, driven' from the immediate vicinity of the^State diamond diggings to places where the police surveillance is less severe, and where their opportunities are less restrictedi The whole of the Namaqualand coast .from the mouth of the Orange River southwards for many miles, had been, found to be diamondiferous and it has, therefore, not been very difficult for diamond runners to find fresh fields for exploitation.

About 20 miles from Port Nolloth there is a place known.- to local topograhpers as "The Cliffs." Here the Namaqualand coast dips down precipitously to the sea and the erosion of. the seas has eaten out innumerable caves at

the base of these cliffs. At high tide the seas completely flood the eaves and even, at low tide strong .waves dash into them,

In one of these eaves, it is alleged six European men worked when conditions were favourable. To reach it they had to negotiate the precipitous cliff by a tortuous path, partly - natural,' party manmade. It is stated that these six men discovered in the cave that the erosion of the sea ' had bared- a diamondiferous stratum 'several feet in thickness. It is alleged that they had been working this gravel for some time gathering from the interior of the cave diamonds of remarkable quality.

The sea itself, it is stated, at high tide did all the work necessary to reveal new diamonds and all the men had to do was to pick "the stones from the sides of the cave after each high tide.

in some iway or other their secret leaked out and suspicion fell ypon them. Detectives, followed a cine, .and one. day two members of the diamond' detective department descended the cliff and entered the cave. There they discovered the six men who were arrested.