Lillian Adler, Baroness of Huszar: How she landed in Montreal jail

Lillian Maria Adler Baroness of Huszar busted in Montreal

    Lillian Maria Adler, 40, the widowed former Baroness Huszar of Hungary, came to Montreal in September 1954 and her visit was not short on drama. 

  Things unraveled fast for the glamourous member of the ruling elite.  

  The Baroness had apparently come to Montreal on honeymoon with  her new husband, the British MP Harry Pursey, although there's no record of him being with her in Montreal with her when she got into her big ugly mess.

Harry Pursey and the Baroness

   Lillian first married at age 19 to Baron Huszar of Hungary, a union that made her a Baroness. He died in Germany in 1951. She then married a Greek lawyer who also died. 

  Her third marriage was to Commander Harry Pursey, Socialist M.P. for Hull. It was his second marriage.

  On 18 September 1954 Lillian checked out of her room at the Laurentian Hotel at Peel and Dorchester and went to Gustave Ducas' fur store one Sherbrooke W.  She bargained and haggled and left a deposit to purchase a fur. She never returned for it. 

   On 4 October Lillian was still in town for unknown reasons when she visited Albert Brander's fur shop at 4160 St. Catherine W.

   Lillian introduced herself with a fake name and made a lowball offer without making a purchase. She later phoned to order one of the furs at full price. The suspicious Brander called police who sent an undercover cop to be present on her next visit to the store. 

   When she returned, the RCMP officer opened the Baroness' purse and found $1,730 in counterfeit US currency. 

  She said she got the cash from her husband, which didn't reflect well on the British MP, although it appears she meant that she got it from her previous husband, the dead Greek lawyer. 

   The officer arrested the Baroness, who was tossed into the grimy Fullum Jail. This all took place less than a month after her wedding to the powerful Member of Parliament. The Baroness claimed to be sick and was rerouted to stay at a hospital. 

 Lillian's lawyer Meyer Gross argued that there is no proof that her cash was counterfeit. After a pair of trials, Judge W.B. Scott acquitted her on 23 March 1955. 

  Her husband Harry Pursey held a press conference at the Berkeley Hotel on Sherbrooke near Peel to shed light on the situation. He said her legal defence cost $11,000 which she paid with her own money.

   Lillian was finally slated to return to London on 13 April with her hubby Harry but he too off alone because her lawyer John A. Long refused to release her passport and jewelry, claiming he hadn't been paid in full.

   Six months after it began, the Baroness' Montreal ordeal was still ongoing.  

      "I'm being forced to say here, a tearful Lillian Pursey told reporter Alain Stanke in perfect French. "After living a six month nightmare I'm still forced to stay on Canadian soil. I still couldn't get my passport back in spite of all of my efforts and my acquittal." 

   And just when things looked like they couldn't get worse, they did.

   Lillian was still in Montreal in August 1955 when RCMP agents searched her room and found illicit drugs. She claimed that she had a prescription for the drugs but prosecutors were unconvinced and charged her with a half dozen charges, including conspiracy,and forging a false prescription.    

    A judge sentenced her to six months in jail for the drugs on 3 February 1956.

   Little was heard from her thereafter, although Pursey apparently split with her and the marriage fizzled into divorce.