Convicts Defeat Oxford Debaters

Two inmates of the Norfolk Prison Colony last night succeeded where Harvard. Yale, Princeton, and Columbia men failed. They downed the English debating team from Oxford, on the topic of free national health service. Bill and Murt (prison officials would not give the inmates' last names) upheld the negative.

The verbal joust was one of a series held at the Colony during the winter. Former Governor William S. Flynn of Rhode Island, Law School Dean Griswold, and Massachusetts Supreme Court Justice Harold P. Williams '03 judged the contest.

The two teams bandied words, politely, before some 400 inmates, who listened attentively and applauded, with equal politeness, the telling points scored by either side.

The Oxonians enjoyed themselves immensely, in the words of one of their number, Richard Taverne. "The boys deserved to win," he added.

Bill is a high school graduate. A man in his low thirties, he also attended law school. He is what his fellow prisoners team a "repeater," one who is back in prison after serving time. Murt, around 40, educated himself in the prison library.