GUARDED ROYALTY

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 867, 10 January 1930, Page 13

GUARDED ROYALTY

Detective Who Protected Kings LIFE OF ADVENTURE You would hardly notice him. as ha stood a few yards from the King—.an inconspicuous, neatly dressed man. with his right hand thrust negligently into his pocket and his left hand holding an umbrella, and an air of mild'interest on his face, writes a special correspondent of the London "Eveniug News.” But that right hand was clasping an automatic pistol—a weapon ho could whip out of his pocket in a second—and liis eyes, glancing round with such apparent carelessness, were as keen as the eyes of a hawk. For he was Superintendent Janies Mcßrien. And Superintendent Mcßrien, who is now about to retire from his position as head of Scotland Yard's Special Branch, has been responsible for thu Royal Family’s safety for a generation. This tali, strong Irishman, who looks anything but the conventional detective, lias done enough other work to make him famous during his 40 years’ service. He has captured spies; he has had a death struggle with an anarchist in Solio; he has lived in fear of his life from Sinn Feiners. But it is as the mau who guarded Royalty right from the early days of King Edward's reign that he will be remembered. He had the gift of being unobtrusive. If the King was shooting on the moors there was nothing to single out that quiet figure iu shooting clothes close by as a detective; at a formal affair the mail in silk hat and morning dress standing among the others was Superintendent Mcßrien; on a railway platform he was the least conspicuous onlooker of all. But all the time his right hand was thrust negligently into his pocket. . . . Never “Given the Slip” The Prince of Wales, when young and high-spirited, often tried to give him the slip, but Superintendent McBrien was not to be slipped. At Glasgow once the Prince tiptoed out of the back door of his hotel; but along the street, like an unnoticed shadow, followed Superintendent McBrien. The Prince went into a cinema; two seats away, watching the big film, was Superintendent Mcßrien. He was only once beaten, and that was not his fault. The car in which he was following the King southward from the big munition factory at Gretna broke down. Bur. at Carlisle, in another car, he was orce more riding calmly behind the King. Superintendent Mcßrien, who at his suburban home has more presents from Royalty than any other man, could write a book of his adventures as thrilling as anything by Edgar Wallace. When he was a constable he heard cries of “Murder” from the Autonomy Club in Windmill Street, a haunt of anarchists. Ho drew his truncheon, went to the door, and asked what tho fuss was about. Down the stairs rushed a German, armed with a murderous knife. Ho attacked Constable Mcßrien. But the constable struck him a smashing blow across the arm and the knife went flying. Constable Mcßrien dragged him into the street and handcuffed him. London Shadowing He was only two years fn uniform. His gifts marked him out for work where his brains could be used to the full. He was transferred to tha C.X.D., and was sent abroad to learn the ways of the international agi .ator and the anarchist. He rose quickly, and his duties vere as varied as they could be. One day in the thick of a suffragette trouble; another at Biarritz with the King; yet another shadowing some suspicious foreigner who had turned up in London. Then came the war—and the spies. Before the war he had drawn up a list of suspected spies, and when tha crisis came he was working for days until they had all been rounded up. One of the spies was working iu Woolwich Arsenal. Another—the right hand man of the notorious Carl Lody —was a dentist, and committed suicide in his cell at Brixton Prison. With Sir Basil Thompson he interrogated many .spies. He and Sir Basil questioned Mata Hari, the beautiful woman spy who was afterward shot by the French. After the war, when the Sinn Fein trouble was at its worst, threats that he would be killed came to him by every pos'. Every day he went for lunch to the same restaurant near Scotland Yard; but he always sat facing the door, and under his napkin lay his revolver, ready for use. “Will they get von?'’ he was asked. “They’ll be lucky if they do," he said