Seamen aboard the North German Lloyd liner Stuttgart were obliged to seek their recreation and do their reading elsewhere than in the seamen’s recreation room and library yesterday because the doors of these chambers were decorated with impregnable-looking padlocks.
United States customs officials, on the tip of Federal agents, swooped down on the steamship and, according to Customs Inspector Soyne, found more than 300 books, pamphlets and instruction sheets containing Nazi propaganda.
Such an action is unprecedented in customs annals. Assistant Surveyor Milton P. Jackson of the port of New York denied that the library and recreation room were padlocked. He explained that only rooms containing souvenirs were sealed, an action which he said is not at all unusual.
Be that as it may. Inspector Soyne said that the two rooms were padlocked and would remain padlocked until the liner left its berth at Pier 86, North River.
Officers of the Stuttgart refused to comment last night, although, according to members of the searching party, they protested the padlocking.
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