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No.22
(& 2 copies) Copied to:- B.E.Shanghai No. 31
(& 2 copies)
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British Consulate-G neral,
CANTON
6th February, 1939
8
1727
เ
The Right Honourable
My Lord,
22 FEB 1939
With reference to my despatch No. 121
of November 8th last and to Your Lordship's
telegram No. 27 of December 19th in reply,
authorising the purchase of a silver cigarette
box for presentation to Mr. Fritz Gustav Paechnatz,
I have the honour to report that I duly presented
the box to him on February 4th, privately and unoffi-
cially.
2.
Mr.
I made this private presentation, because
in the interval between November and now,
Paechnatz has had difficulties with the German
community, and neither my German colleague nor
representatives of that community wished to attend
any ceremony in regard to any presentation to him.
It is unfortunate that this appreciation of Mr.
Paechnatz, which was partly intended as a gesture
towards a deserving German community should in this
respect have failed. But the facts remain that in
October Kr. Paechnatz was recommended to me by my
German colleague, Dr. Altenburg, and that at that
time he undoubtedly rendered signal services directly
and indirectly to the British community, and, I
should have thought, also to his own community.
Under the circumstances, I decided that the presen-
tation was deserved and should take place, but I
confined those present to an intimate friend (who
Viscount Halifax, K. G.,G. C.S.I.
His Majesty's Principal Secretary of
State for Foreign Affairs,
LONDON. SW. 1
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