ESCAPE TO SPAIN

Wairarapa Times-Age, 19 November 1943, Page 3

ESCAPE TO SPAIN

BRIGADIER HARGEST CROSSES FRONTIER. GRANTED PARTIAL FREEDOM. (By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright) BARCELONA, November 17. Brigadier Hargest, who escaped from a prisoner-of-war camp in northern Italy, arrived here yesterday after crossing the Franco-Spanish frontier on foot. He reported immediately to the Spanish authorities, who granted him partial freedom. Brigadier Hargest was taken prisoner in. the Libyan campaign in 1941 when his headquarters were overrun by Geriri’ai’i mechanised forces and he was transferred along with other captured New Zealanders to a prison camp in Italy. About the end of March he and Brigadier R. Miles, whose death in Spain was announced last month, escaped into Switzerland. Brigadier Hargest, who is a member of Parliament for Awarua, was appointed to command the Fifth Infantry Brigade of the 2nd N.Z.E.F. in January, 1940. He has had a distinguished military career, dating back to 1914, when he left New Zealand with the Main Body with the rank of second-lieutenant. He rose rapidly, and at the age of 26 was lieutenantcolonel in charge of the 2nd Battalion of the Otago Regiment. For his services in the Greek and Cretan campaign in this war, Brigadier Hargest received the Greek Military Cross (first class) and a Bar to his D.S.O. He also holds the Cross of the Legion of Honour, awarded to him by the French Government in the last war.

The Deputy Prime Minister, Mr Nash, said in Wellington last night that the cabled report from Barcelona concerning Brigadier Hargest’s escape to Spain was delightful news. “It is to be hoped,” he added, “that he will be back again at a reasonably early date.”