Early on the morning of
Friday 16th August 1935, the telephone rang in Gareth’s home at Eryl, Barry.
His father, Major Edgar
Jones, answered the call from a Press Association reporter who told him that,
according to a telegram from The Daily Telegraph special correspondent,
his son had died.
Friday 16th
August – Glasgow
Times (from Reuters):
He [Major Jones] was almost
too overcome to speak. “Oh! How
terrible”, he whispered after along pause. “Thank you for letting me know.”
Then he went with heavy step to break the news to his wife. Mrs Edgar Jones, who was stunned by the
blow, was comforted by her two daughters, all of whom had waited so anxiously
over the past few weeks. Major Jones
later told a reporter: “It is a
terrible business. We were hoping
against hope until the end”.
An unfortunate
misunderstanding between two Chinese magistrates during a critical period may
have had something to do with the tragedy. While one of them was conducting the negotiations for handing over the
ransom, the bandits moved into the jurisdiction of his neighbour. The neighbour had
not been warned of
the negotiations and had sent troops to intercept the band. This it was felt may have destroyed the
bandit’s belief in the sincerity of the negotiations and may explain why the
bandits never got the ransom money that had been sent.
Saturday 17th
August - Daily
Mail:
From information obtained
locally, the militia believed that Mr Jones was shot by the bandits last Monday
– eve of his thirtieth birthday.
Saturday 17th
August – Sheffield
Independent:
On
the Wednesday 7th August, the Chahar Provincial Government had sent
a messenger to maintain contact with the bandits, but he himself had been taken
prisoner. From that moment there was no
news. The Chinese authorities were
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