MAD RAG.

Manawatu Standard, Volume XLVII, Issue 9, 8 December 1926, Page 9

MAD RAG.

STUDENTS SMASH A TRAIN. ORGY OF DESTRUCTION. LONDON, Nov. 28. How 120 Oxford undergraduates smashed a train until it looked as though it might have been bombarded, is revealed by the Daily News. The undergraduates, who were returning from Cambridge after witnessing the relay inter-’Varsity races, indulged in good-humoured horse-play and rough and tumbles with cantabs on the Cambridge platform, which continued as a free fight among themselves. “Up guards, and at ’em, ’ shouted one, smashing a window, after which the battle spread throughout three corridor carriages, in which almost every window and mirror was smashed with beer bottles and boots. Luggage racks were wrenched down and flung out of the windows, while lamps were broken, and the fight continued in the darkness. The undergraduates broke down the door of the guard’s van, which had been locked to prevent them reaching the train controls, but the guard drove them out. One of them, however, seized the guard’s cap and perambulated the corridors wearing it. WOMEN RESPECTED. The only compartments not disturbed were two occupied by women, whom the guard, fearing trouble, had collected. The undergraduates stormed in, apologised, and withdrew. The cold wind, blowing in the windows, sobered the majority of them, while others slept drunkenly, many without their coats, owing to these, garments having been flung from the windows. The last act of defiance was to pull the communication cord when in the enighbourhood of Oxford, but tho driver refused to pull up. Meanwhile the University authorities had been notified and awaited the undergraduates at the station. The railway authorities took possession of window blinds and other souvenirs which the culprits attempted to carry off. The affair is now in the hands of tho Vice-Chancellor, Mr J. AVells, M.A., Warden of Wadham College.