A DESCENDANT OF BLUCHER.

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 226, 24 September 1928, Page 16

A DESCENDANT OF BLUCHER.

AUCKLAND RESIDENT’S CLAIM. At the mere mention of the name of Blucher the echo of the war drums of Waterloo seems to come before our imagination. It was a happy moment for the British soldiers when they heard the sound of Blucher’s men coming up in the rear, which enabled them later in the day, through the combined efforts of th* British and Prussian armies, to win one of the greatest battles in history. There is living in Auckland to-day a man of soldierly appearance, whose name is Blucher, and who claims direct descent from Marshal Blucher, Wellington’s great ally on that famous Sunday in June, 1815. He has reached over three score years and ten, and says that he has still hopes that before he dies he may be able to participate in the family estate which was dissipated after the great marshal’s death, but which has new accumulated again to a considerable extent. He says that the family has progressed a long way since his ancestor made the remark, when he was taken to London after the war and saw the wellstocked warehouses and shops of London, “What a splendid place it would be to sack!” Mention has often been made of the similarity of the profile and particularly the noses of the faees of the generals at Waterloo, and if heredity mean# anything the Auckland Blucher has the chief characteristic of the fighting marshal of a former d a y< a nd in that respect would be an outstanding personality in any city street. He still likes to smoke the strong tobacco characteristic *of his race, and candidly says that while watching the clouds of smoke which he puffs from his pipe he dreams dreams of days when he will, with others of his family, come into his own.