TWO ESCAPEES

Hokitika Guardian, 22 February 1933, Page 7

TWO ESCAPEES

FROM FRENCH FOREIGN LEGION

THRILLS FOR ENGLISHMEN. | Two Englishmen who had served for , two years in the French Foreign Legion l and spent nearly nine weeks •in a French military prison in Morooco rej ccntlv made a thrilling escape 'across : the Spanish frontier. . • ! One of the men who escaped , was j stated to he C'ptain 'Roland Wilson Jones, who served in the Great War with the Duke of Wellington Regiment, and holds the D.S.O- with two bars.

After joining the Legion, .Captain Jones and his companion went to fight in the desert, but becam. e “fed up.” Fo,. 60 days Captain Joneg was incarcerated in a military prison south of Marrakesh, his comrad e undergoing 30 days’ imprisonment. Awaiting their chance, the two men made a daring (.scape at night-time as stowaways on an ammunition car and spent the next day in hiding. Next niglht th e runaways made their way to Oueezem, where they obtained civilian clothes from a British subject, and reached Casablanca on the. light railway. Here -fresh dangers threatened them, for a treacherous steamer captain, after inviting them on board, tried to get them arrested by the police.

Fortunately they succeeded in getting away, and finally dashed over th e frontier into 'Spanish .Morocco at Abbaouh, They were just in time, for as they neared the frontier they \ver e chased by a party of 50 French who fired at them as they fled.

After crossing into Spanish Morocco the two men made their way to Te.tuan. Th e Spanish authorities invited' them to enlist in the Spanish Foreign Legion, but they emphatically declined, saying they had “'Bad enough of foreign legions.”

A -Spanish -lieutenant .gave the;, men three ipasetas (2s), and, proceeding to Ceuta, the, fugitives made their way to Gibraltar.

Thence they made the long -trek to Portugal, subsisting by making of the peasants, who gave them-' food ,jm re turn.; Finally they reached sLisbon. and wore flioping 'to reach . England,: shortly.