The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1885-08-29 00:00:00

OLIVIER PAIN.

A Paris correspondent, writing on Sunday night,
says: The followirp, official denial of the assertions
made by M. Selikvitseh concerning the death of
Olivier Pain has been given:
"Sir John Walshain, English Plenipotentiary
Minister in Paris, to M. de Freyeinet, Minister for
Foreign Affairs.
"Paris, August 22._
_ _

"The French journal L'lntransigeant published in
its number of Sunday, August IG, a letter containing
an alleged account of the death of Olivier Pain,
asserting him to have been killed by order of the
military authorities in Egypt. As the account con-
tained in this letter is of a detailed character, and is
signed n/ a person who styles himself ex-interpreter of
the English Army in the Soudan, and as it has more-
over been repeated and 'commented upon by other
journals, the Government of the Queen has
telegraphed on this subject to its represen-
tative at Cairo, and has received from him
the answer which, by order of her Majesty's
Principal Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs,
I have the honour to communicate to your
Excel!ency. According to this reply it will be seen
that the account of the death of Olivier Pain given
in the Intransigcant is a pure invention, and if there
were need of any new proof of this assertion it would
be found in the energetic denial given by Major
Kitchener to the accusations against him. This dis-
tinguished and gallant officer denies having received
from the English Government any instructions con-
cerning Olivier Pain, or ever having attempted to
make him prisoner. A copy of a telegram that I
have received from Major Kitchener himself is en-
closed with the communication from the English
Government."

The enclosures alluded to by Sir John Walsh=
are: First, a telegram from Mr. Egerton, dated Cairo,
August 21, 1885, which is as follows:
"rain went up the river in the spring of 1884,
with the avowed purpose of joining the Mandi. He
was obliged to return to Halfa and Esnela ; but he
succeeded in the month of July, thanks to the
influence of the Bedouins, of a French Inspector o!
the sugar works at Ermant, in starting for Obeid,
w.here he arrived last year. Then he started to join
the Mandi at Rahad. He did not go to Khartoum
with the Mandi, but died last autumn upon the
White Nile, when en route for Omdurman. This is
confirmed by several independent witnesses. Thus
the account reproduced by your telegram of adven-
tures which happened to Pain six months after his
death is an absurd invention. Sclikovitsch was in the
English service, but be was discharged for irregularity
and bad character. Another individual of the same
kind, who passed under the namo of Berti, has also
circulated similar stories concerning Pain. This
person says that a letter for Rochefort was handed to
him by Pain in the month of June this year at
Korosko."

Secondly, the following telegram from Major
Kitchener, received by Sir John Walsham :
"Junior United Service Club, London, August 22.
"The story of Pain's death is altogether false. I
never received any instructions from her Majesty's
Government concerning Pain, and I never attempted
to capture him."
Notwithstanding this very clear statement that
Olivier 2ain died last autumn on the White Nile, the
ex-interpreter, M. Selikovitsch, has sent to the
Intransigcant a second letter in which he maintains
the exactitude of his previous assertions, and contends
that after all there is nothing in the dispatches sent
to the French Minister for Foreign Affairs which
disproves anything he (Selikovitsch) has affirmed.
Moreover, he accuses the English authorities of
seeking "to discredit the witness by perfidious in-
sinuations and calumnious imputations." Mr. Egerton
declares that Selikovitsch was in the English service,
but that he was discharged for irregularity and "bad
character." In proof of the contrary, M. Selikovitsch
translates into French the certificate which he
received from Colonel Lanyon. It is as follows:
"M. Selikovitsch remained my special interpreter
during the campaign in the Soudan from the 24th of
February till the 23rd of April. After ihat date he
gsimitLapatcs2B2 .12112,UpagJP 1i IBtairen
sojourn at my headquarters M. Selikovitsch was a
functionary with as much zeal as capacity.—Owna
LANYON, ex-Colonel of the Staff in Egypt."
As the Intransiyeant states that M. Selikovitscb
has placed the original of this certificate in the hands
of M. Rochefort, with the envelope addressed to
Selikovitsch in Paris, and bearing the London post-
mark, it is to be presumed that Sir Owen Lanyon,
not wishing to prevent M. Selikovitsch from obtain-
ing employment, gave him a better certificate than he
deserved. The Paris journals have all published
both the English denial and M. Selikovitsch's
second letter. In the meantime, the Olivier Pain
question is to be agitated at meetings of the
Revolutionary and Socialist Parties in Paris.
With this object in view, a meeting, with Roche-
fort its the chair, is announced for next Wednesday,
at the Salle Rivoli, Rue St. Antoine. Another is being
organised in the 13th Arrondissement. A third is
being prepared by the League for the Abolition of
Standing Armies. It is also announced that the As-
sociation of Republican Journalists is to convene a
general meeting of its members to discuss the Olivier
Pam question, and to decide on what measures should
in their opinion be taken. The French Press gene-
rally accept the statement of the Mitish authorities,
but even such journals as the Figaro and the Soir
urge that if the English authorities did not cause
Olivier Pain to be put to death, they certainly offered
a reward for his capture, alive or dead.