Enclosure 1.
СОРТ.
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Sir,
Hongkong, 11th June, 1915. Reef 3 SEP.15]
293
We bag to approach you in the following matter:- Houers. Vilkinson and Grist wręte to you on our behalf with respect to 23 cases Umbrella frames of German origin, which arrived here on 26th. April.
They sent us your reply, directing us to return these goods to Lindon. As they informed you, these goods were
by ies
bought before the war broke out. They were ordered from an Austrian
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firm in Vienna and our headoffice in Rotterdam had to accept them, when tendered, and pay for them. Holland not being in war with Austria, they could not cancel the contract. One of our directors in Rotterdam, before shipping the goods to Hongkong, called upon the Consul for Great Britain at that city, who supplied him with a certificate of œrigin, stating that the goods were of German origin but at the time of shipment, more bona fide Dutch property. This document was handed by us to the Superintendent of Imports and Exports. We may mention that at the time our Headoffice inform- -ed us that the goods would have to be shipped to us, we wired them not to do so (our wire dated 19th. January). Our headoffice, having had to pay for the goods and probably knowing that we had sold them to our Chinese buyers, decided differently. The goods are now here and as this article is liable to get rusty and be- -comes then unsaleable, we fear that the voyage to London, will result, not only in a total loss of the invoice-value, but also in the loss of the additional freight, storage and other expenses. We stimate the loss at about £5,000.
Thirteen cams of the same article, shipped on
the 29th. January, were detained in London, but were afterwards released and also duly came forward to Hongkong and we take it, that the Authorities in London considered it permissible to ship them.
Our firm, being of a neutral country, was in a