LAST SINGLE MEN BALLOT

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 4, Issue 189, 5 December 1941, Page 4

LAST SINGLE MEN BALLOT

LAST issues list of the final single men available for military service ballot from this district came as something of a surprise to the majority of readers, who were under the impession that the last draft had already been called. From the Paeroa (No. 2) military district a further 251 men were drawn, 38 being direct from the Whakatane district. Those medically fit will thus go to swell the active list of men already in camp or overseas. While it is difficult without going- to considerable trouble and enquiry to obtain correct or reliable figures, it is estimated that there are over a thousand men from the Whakatane County who have already joined the colours. This record from a county of 11,000 population is just under 10 per cent, and constitutes an achievement of which the people as a whole may justly be proud. The married men's ballot has been promised early in the New Year. It will not be long before the country is once more climbing the painful ladder of sacrifice so vividly remembered from the last war. We are however £ at war and the sooner this fact is realised by the majority of us, the better. The task on hand demands sacrifice and courage. For two years New Zealand has known peace and plenty, and comparatively little heartache. Faced with war's grimmer aspect as news comes home and as the last of our eligible single men pass on for medical examination we know a little more of its reality and a little less of the newspaper and radio puppet show, hitherto so unreal to most of us and so comfortably distant.