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MITCHELL OILS GUNS FOR HUNT IN DARK AFRICA

Friends Look for Material in Proposed Trip in 1926 to Boom Him for Presidency

IT'S "BOSH," HE ASSERTS

Interested Only in providing Nation With Air Defense, Flyer Says; Asked to Speak

BY CHARLES B. PARMER
Universal Service

In the shadow of the army court-martial which convenes Wednesday, Colonel William Mitchell is completing plans for a hunting trip in Africa next year, which in all probability will be used by his friends to put the flyer before the nation as a possible presidential candidate in 1929, most likely as a Democrat.
Mitchell has contracted to write a series of articles on his travels for the National Geographic Society - Just as Roosevelt the elder did.

Well Equipped
All this week news and feature agencies have sought to be included in his official party - just as they tried to accompany Roosevelt.  To all requests he has said: "I'm not going to repeat any 'return from Africa' as a distinguished gentleman before me did.  I'm merely going to hunt -- and say, look at these guns will you?"
In his study he had groups of huge elephant guns with which he hopes to bring down some of the beasts with one shot apiece.  On the walls hang maps of the Dark Continent, the unexplored potrions marked.  There is where his party will go.
Mitchell expects to obtain army leave - no matter what action the court-martial will take against him - early in 1926.  His friends say that during his absence Congress will prove his charges true - that America is defenseless because of inadequate and obsolete aircraft.
These friends say he will be hailed on his return as "the great champion of national defense," and that he will be called on to make speeches throughout America.

206 Bids to Speak
Already invitations for such are pouring in.  He has more than 200 listed now; and within two hours a fortnight ago he received nine requests to speak in Baltimore, and two in Norfolk.  He could accept none, as the army is making him stay in Washington until after his court-martial.
Of his talk that he will be considered as a presidential possibility, he invariably answers:
"Bosh - I'm a flyer: that's the language I speak.  I'm interested in only one thing - providing an adequate defense for my country.  I've been in the army since my teens, when I enlisted as a private in the Spanish-American war.  I like the flyer's life."
Colonel Mitchell never has taken the smallest part in partisan politics.  He frankly states he does not know how he would class - as Democrat or Republican - in politics, if he classes at all.
He does not even remember ever having cast a ballot.
But all this is apparently making little difference to his admiring friends, not a few of whom are themselves in national politics.