IT WAS the big night for the Southampton Public Grounds Cricket Association and the winners arrived to collect their medals – perhaps oblivious of their near loss because a bored schoolboy played truant.

The t29 enamelled silver medals for leading individual and team performances addressed to W Lewis, St Mary’s Street, Southampton, had been dispatched by their manufacturer in Birmingham and put on a Birkenhead express at Snowhill Station.

When the service arrived at Eastleigh, a porter took took the box from the guards van and placed it on a trunk to go on the next train to Southampton.

But then it vanished.

However, within a few minutes Montague Etheridge was found to either giving them away to passers-by or endeavouring to sell them.

The 10-year-old was quickly detained but after giving various explanations as to how they came into his possession, police had to release him as they did not know at that stage the medals had been stolen.

Having not learnt his lesson, Etherirdge the following day went to a cycle shop in Eastleigh to buy a pint of paraffin. He then produced two medals from his pocket and tried to sell them for a penny. The assistant asked how he had acquired them and while she was writing down his answers, he walked out leaving behind the trophies which she took to the police station.

Hours later, Etheridge was arrested and within a week appeared before Southampton magistrates in 1913 charged with theft from the London and South West Railway Company.

The court heard from Sgt Deacon how the boy eventually confessed and he had recovered all the medals.

“I will tell you the truth now, everything before was lies. I stayed away from school that day... I went to the railway platform and took a box very close to the steps “I waited there until the ticket collector went into his house, and when I saw the coast was clear I ran out into the street. I opened the box and found it full of medals. I threw the box away into a dustbin on the Southampton road.”

His aunt said Etheridge was on the whole a good boy but enjoyed playing truant.

He was ordered to receive three strokes of the birch.