DLA163-0013 Transcription

DE LASZLO.

FURTHER INSTRUCTIONS

COUNSEL is sent herewith –

(1) Statement of Charges against Mr. de Laszlo.

(2) Print of Mr. de Laszlo’s Case.

(3) Bundle of Foreign Correspondence. (Notes in red ink by Mr. de Laszlo)

(4) Table of Dates.

(5) Copy of the letter of 14th June, 1917, and telegram of 16th July 1917.

(6) Copy selected letters from the correspondence between Messrs. Charles Russell and Co. and the Treasury and Home Office.

(7) Case laid before two Counsel and their Opinions with reference to the law bearing on the matter.

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(8) Bundle of Statements of the following witnesses as to character: -

Miss Agnes E. W. Taylor.

Mr. J. C. St. Quintin.

Miss Gerard Eleanor Little

Miss Margaret Warrender.

Mr. Emile Remy.

Mrs. Jean Hall.

Miss Eva Frances Guinness.

Mr. Alfred. Lys Baldry.

The Rev. Thomas Yates.

Mr. A. S. Lund.

Mr. A. S. Bowlby.

Mr. Arthur Rhuvon Guest.

Prof. Frederick Thomas Trouton.

Mr. Frederick. Cullen.

Prof. L. F.S. Oppenheim.

The Rt. Hon. Austen Chamberlain

(9) List of Foreign Ambassadors whose names commence with “G”, taken from Whitaker’s Amanac 1914/18, with remarks of Mr. de Laszlo.

(10) Statutory Declaration of Madame van Riemsdyk.

(11) Who’s who in Correspondence.

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COUNSEL is familiar with the facts of this case, which is not proposed to recapitulate.

The chief interest in the case would appear to be concentrated upon the documents now produced by the Treasury, dated 14th June and 16th of July 1917. From Mr. de Laszlo’s remarks, it will be seen that these documents are a complete fabrication.

Mr. de Laszlo at first thought that they might have been written by a lady called Madame Nicholls, who was in Switzerland, with her daughter, and to whom Mr. De Laszlo thought he might have given offence, but this has been dismissed from his mind, because Madame Nicholls could have no possible means of knowing that he was sending letters through Holland.

He then thought that they might be the work of a Mr. Alexius Lippich or a Mr. Terey. These were men connected with the State Department of Art in Austria whom he had the greatest regard for, but who eventually became his enemies.

As to Mr. Lippich, he used to manage all Mr. de Laszlo’s money affairs, and apparently was not very

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correct in his dealings with them.

Mr. Terey might have been feeling bitter against him on account of his having become an Englishman.

He has, however, dismissed this idea from his mind, and at the present moment, as will be seen by the copy of his remarks, he seems to think that they may have been fabricated by the Rev. Mr. Hankinson, whom he describes as a very deceitful kind of man, and whose acquaintance he has ceased. He is a Unitarian minister, who was a good deal in Hungary, and is now resident in England, and he once told Mr. de Laszlo that he could do a good deal at Scotland Yard by reason of having a Unitarian friend there.

We do not share Mr. de Laszlo his view of this, but we cannot help feeling that the letter and telegram have been fabricated by somebody in the Secret Service, and who was residing in Switzerland at the time they were written.

No explanation has been offered as to how they came into the possession of the English government,

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and we have no means of knowing what the facts are as to this. We only received a copy of the document on the 11th of June, and therefore, there will be no time before the Inquiry is held for taking any steps to get to the bottom of the matter.

The letter purports to be written by a friend of his youth, and therefore, presumably a Hungarian.

Dealing with the second paragraph of the letter, Mr. de Laszlo owing to the use of the phrase, “services to the monarchy”, does not think it is written by a Hungarian as such a phrase is not employed in Hungary.

Dealing with the third paragraph, Mr. de Laszlo says he has never heard from anybody that German prisoner in France were badly treated. The statement is a complete novelty to him, and he never took the least interest in the matter.

With reference to the fourth paragraph, attention is drawn to the fact that the writer speaks of “your “report of yesterday”. He could not possibly have received a Report in Switzerland, written the day before by Mr. de Laszlo.

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With reference to the fifth paragraph, Mr. de Laszlo cannot make out to whom this observation applies. We send herewith a list taken from Whitaker's Almanac of all the Foreign Ambassadors in London, whose names commence with “G”, and there is only one whom he personally knew, and whose wife he had ever met. This lady was the daughter of the late Mr. Samuel Laing, M.P. Mr. de Laszlo only met this gentleman, Mr. Gennadius, once, when he called to see about his passport. He never had any political discussions with them.

With regard to the sixth paragraph, of course it is simply absurd to suppose that Mr. de Laszlo could ever give the exact dates of the losses of ships or that he ever knew anything about the mining industry, nor had he any means whatever of ascertaining the views held by His Majesty. It should be remarked that in the copy supplied by the Treasury the seventh paragraph in which His Majesty is referred to is omitted.

With reverse with reference to the eighth paragraph, Mr. de

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Laszlo says he never entertained for one moment the idea of recovering his Hungarian Nationality after the war, and never desired to do so.

Counsel is requested to read this paragraph in connection with the concluding paragraph in the letter, in which it says that life has been made impossible for Mr. de Laszlo in Hungary. The idea, therefore, of his trying to recover his Hungarian Nationality, is quite absurd and contradictory.

With reference to the ninth paragraph, Mr. de Laszlo never made any Reports, and therefore, of course, did not send forty. All the letters that he sent abroad were sent through the post, with the exception of about six letters sent through the Dutch Minister’s bag between December, 1915 and August, 1916. After that date, he never sent any letters in that way. It is, therefore, ridiculous to suppose that a man should send forty reports through the ordinary post, where they might be opened by the Censor.

with reference to the tenth paragraph, Mr. de Laszlo in March of 1899, went to Potsdam and painted

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the German Chancellor Hohenlohe. In November of 1899, he made a sketch of the German Empress and her child at Potsdam, but never saw the Kaiser.

In 1900 he went to Rome and painted the celebrated portrait of Pope Leo XIII.

In 1908, eight years later, he painted the Kaiser.

It may also be pointed out how absurd it is for an official to be writing giving Mr. de Laszlo’s career to the Austrian government, if the letter was intended for them, because they would know this a great deal better than their informant.

With reference to the telegram of the 16th July, 1917, Mr. de Laszlo states that to his belief he never knew anybody of the name of Gomperz.

It is to be noted that at the time that both the letter and the telegram was supposed to have been sent Mr. de Laszlo was not sending letters through the Dutch bag, but all his letters, going to Madame van Riemsdyk or anybody else, went through the ordinary post.

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Application has been made to the Treasury to give inspection of the original documents, but a reply has not yet been received. We propose to take to see them an expert, Mr. Gurrin.

With reference to the list of charges,:-

(1) The date given here -- November 1915, -- would appear to be a mistake. The letter in which the expression “severe mental conflict” occurs is a letter written in July of 1914.

(2) Mr. de Laszlo’s statement is that Mr. Max Muller was British Minister at Budapest at the outbreak of war. His wife is a Norwegian. In April of 1915, not the autumn, the Max Mullers came to lunch at 3, Palace Gate. Mr. Max Muller was very offensive in his manner, and during lunch, before a large number of people, he addressed Mr. de Laszlo saying, “I suppose you know that the Russians will soon flood into Hungary, burn all the crops, and starve the Hungarians.” Mr. de Laszlo was very much annoyed that he should have said this, as he knew perfectly well that Mr. de Laszlo, although naturalised and a loyal Englishman,

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still naturally treasured a strong love for the country of his origin, and that it would cause him pain.; but he restrained himself, and merely said, “I hope not”. Max Muller upstairs in the drawing room again addressed Mrs. de Laszlo in a way, which she considered offensive going up to her and saying, “I suppose you know, de Laszlo’s pictures have been “taken off the walls, the Gallery in Hungary”. Mrs de Laszlo complained to her husband of the spiteful and malicious way in which Max Muller said it. He has the reputation of being singularly offensive in his manners.

At a subsequent date, Mrs. Max Muller asked Mr. de Laszlo to allow Max Muller to come and see all his pictures in his studio and Mr. de Laszlo said, No, he did not wish to receive him as he had been so very offensive on the occasion of his visit to lunch.

(3) As regards the conversation with Mr. Harry Higgins, Mr. de Laszlo cannot remember ever having had any conversation with him, and does not know to what the reference is made but he has a letter written by

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Mr. Harry Higgins, asking him to paint a friend of his and saying that he will come and see him, written in 1917 which does not look as if he had formed a very bad opinion of Mr. De Laszlo.

We will endeavour to see Mr. Harry Higgins and find out what it is he is going to say.

(4) As to the charge of sending money to his family in Hungary, facts are fully dealt with in Mr. de Laszlo’s statement.

(5) The facts as to the Hungarian Officer, are also set out fully in Mr. de Laszlo’s statement. The fact that he had given the address of another Hungarian to Horne, the Officer in question, was forgotten at the time of making the statement by Mr. de Laszlo.

The name of the Hungarian was Boyser.

He did inform the police in 24 hours. The incident took place about half past 12 one day, and he reported it to the Police at the same time, perhaps a few minutes later, the next day. With reference to this statement, Mrs. de Laszlo informs us that on the return of her husband to

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Datchet on the day in question, her husband immediately told her what had happened, and she urged him very strongly that he must report the matter to the Police, as he was bound to do so by his Oath of Allegiance. She felt, on the other hand, naturally, that it was a terrible thing to give any man up to the Police, but to use her own words, she spent many hours in prayer as to what was her duty, and in the morning told her husband he must immediately search for the missing envelope and go to the police at once.

The facts dealing with Charges (6) and (7) are fully explained in the printed Case.

StdeL

10/02/2023