PERSONAL ITEMS

Dominion, Volume 8, Issue 2489, 16 June 1915, Page 6

PERSONAL ITEMS

The Right Hon. W. F. Masßey, tho Hon. W. H. Herries, and the Hon. W. Fraser all returned to Wellington from the north yesterday.

Mr. James Coates, formerly general manager in New Zealand of the National Bank of New Zealand, Ltd., haß been elected a director of the bank. The bank thus retains the ripe experience. -of Mr. Coates, who retires after forty odd .years spent in its service. He has been general manager since 1893.

Cablo advice has just been receiv? that "Sergeant Edgar do I/a tour, of tht Light Australian Horse, was killed iu action. He is the third son of Lieu-tenant-Colonel do Latour, formerly P.M.O. of the Otago district, and now resident in Wellington. The deceased was born in Oamaru in 1882, and was educated at the Waitaki Boys' High School and the Otago Boys' High School. He served with the Eighth New Zealand Contingent in the South African War, and soon after the outbreak of the present conflict joined the Australian Light Horse at Adelaide. Lieutenant-Colonel de Latour has five other sons at present serving the Empire in various portions of the fighting line.

When Dr. Martin, of Palmerston North, who has been at the front {somewhere iti France), returns to New Zealand he will bo entertained in Wellington by the New Zealand Club. The club intends, also, to invite Sir Francis Bell to address the members at an early date,

Trooper J. Fitzgerald, who was valided from' Egypt and returned _ to New Zealand by one of the troopships, died in the Wellington Hospital on Sunday. The deceased will be-buried this morning, and will be accorded full military honours.

The staff of Messrs. Murray, Roberts and Co. made a presentation on Saturday morning to Lieutenant AY. H. Johnston, of t'he Howitzer Battery Reinforcements. Lieutenant Johnston is tho fourth jnember of the staff of Murray, Roberts and Co., Ltd., to leave for the front.

Melbourne papers that arrived yesterday confirm the news of the death of Mr. Frank Musgrove, the well-known theatrical manager, Mr. Musgrove was in excellent health on his arrival in Melbourne from New Zealand, but some ten days later he contracted pneumonia, and he collapsed suddenly on Sunday morning (June 6) at the residence of Sir. A. J. Thurgood, Artnur Street. Fairfield. He was 42 years of age. Mr. Frank Musgrove was in his day the champion athlete of the Scotch College, Melbourne, and was a capital footballer. In 1892 and 1893 he represented Fitzroy, and in the latter year was a State representative against_ South Australia. He was also a good cricketer.

News has been received in Sydney of the death in Berlin last month of Mr. John Marshall Irving, who was well known in Sydney. Mr. Irv.ng, a son of the late Rev. William Irving, of Scotland, was 31 years of age, and had been a civil prisoner of war in Germany since' the outbreak of hostilities.

Mr. Charles C. Reade, organiser and lecturer of the Australasian town-plan-ning tour, on behalf of tho Garden.Cities and Town Planning Association of Great Britain, who is at present conducting a campaign of thirty lantern lectures throughout New South Wales, under the auspices of the State Government in favour of town-planning legislation, has been appointed to advise the South Australian Government on the preparation of a Town-planning Act. Mr. Reade returns to Adelaide for this purpose in July, in which city he lectured with conspicuous success last year. Lord Islington, ex-Governor of New Zealand, and patron of the Australasian town-planning tour, has written congratulating Mr. Reade on the Buccess achieved by the town-planning tour. "You, and those who work with you," he writes, "are ceitainly to be congratulated on the progress you have succeeded in making in this movement."

The condition of Mr. Walter Leslie, of the Hansard staff, and secretary of the National Reserve, is still said to he serious.

THE B.S.A.—FAVOURITE WITH MILITARY DJSFATCH EIDERS—AND WHY.

It lias sometimes been said, with much truth, that the business test i 6 the be;t test ot any motor.. War is the grimmest business of mankind, and the military motor-cyclist stakes bis life, very often, upon tile reliability of his mount. Here is what Sergeant li. E. Schofield, K.E., senior instructor of tho Motor-cycle Section at Aldersliot, has to say:—' iScarly every dispatch rider that lias gone to the front lias passed through my bancs, and I am therefore in n position to judge how the different makes of machine are in favour. The B.S.A. is by far array the favourite, and it has yet to happen that a B.S.A. has failed to net up to its well-earned repute. ... I may state that 50 per cent, of the machines here are B.H.A.'k." A motor-cvelist with, the Second Cavalry Division, British Expeditionary Force, writes in a private letter: "Tho roads aro hellish. . . • My B.S.A. is the Hoods. I never have to touch it. They are the bikes, my boy. They knock the and any other make you like to mention into a cooked hat." There are plenty of other letters from the front, all to the same effect. We are landing 20 of the latest model B.S.A.'s ex s.s. Marlborough this weok, and can eivo immediate daliverv. They are ideal machines for either «010 or side-car service, and their reliability is famous. The h.p. is 4}, and the three-speed countershaft gear is ffiOM proof and wonderfully efneient. Adams," Ltd., Christchuroh, Wanganui, Palmerston North; Sutherland and R-ankihe, Wellington i Tourist Motor Co., Hastings, Agents for B.S.A. Motors.—Advt,

The annual report of the Petone Bowling Club has the following reference to one of its late members:—"We regret to record the death of one of our most esteemed members, the late Mr. T. Maynard, who was a consistent player and a regular attendant on the green, and one who took a keen interest in all matters of the club."

, ..Mr. Basil Wm. Muter, who died in Wellington on Friday last, at tiio age of 86, was buried at the Karori Cemetery on Mondav, the service being read bv the Rev. William Shirer. Amongst those present at the funeral frere the Government Life Commissioner (Mr. J. H. Richardson), the Secretary (Mr, W. B. Hudson), and other principal officers .of the Department.

. Corporal Donald Lane, reported killed in action at the Dardanelles, was a son of Mr. Wm. Lane, editor of the "New Zealand Herald." He was an

•Auckland Grammar School boy, studied agriculture at Lincoln College, and was gaining surveying experience at Hamilton when the war.brolce out. He joined the First Expeditionary Force as a private, but was appointed a corporal of the Waikato Company before the Force left. . .

A . very old identity of Wellington .in the person of Mts. James Smith, widow of the late Mr. James Smith, died yesterday morning at the residence of'her son-in-law, Sir. H. W. Kersley, Kelburn Parade. During her long residence in this city, extending over a- period of 62 years,_ the late Mrs. Smith applied herself with rare devotion to the work of visiting the sick and assisting the poor, paying special attention for many years to tie comfort of those laid aside in the general hospital. This work she carried on continuously until, a few years ago, since when she was confined to her room. She will be held in grateful remembrance by many in this city. She was one of the oldest members of St. John's Presbyterian Church. The late Mrs. Smith leaves two sons, Messrs. A. P. Smith and J. G. Smith (of James Smith, Ltd.), and two daughters, Mrs. H. W. Kersley and Miss Smith. The funeral mil leave the residence of Mr. H. W, Kersley, 20 Kelburn Parade, at 2.30 this afternoon, for the Sydney Street cemetery.

During the course of a sermon at Knox Cnureh, Dunedin, the Bev. R. E. Davies made reference to the fact that one of the office-bearers of the congregation—Mr W- Downie Stewarthad volunteered-for tile front. From his ohildhood Mr. Stewart had been connected with Knox Church, and his father had been an office-bearer in it before him. The fact of a man of such exceptional attainments and brilliant prospects giving up everything to .tho cause of the Empire would bo certain to act as a stimulus to all, nerving them to greater sacrifices. .It would probably lead to very many others following his example and going out to fight for their Empire.

Trooper Kenneth Gould (killed in action at the Dardanelles on May 26) was ; the youngest son of the late Charles Gould, of Christchurch, and nephew of Mr. George Gould, of Gould, Beaumont and Co. He was born in Christchurch, and educated at Christ's College. On leaving college at about sixteen, years of ace, he went to the North Island to engage in farming. He took up land at :Te Kuiti, where he was living when he joined the Auckland Mounted Riiles . with the Expeditionary Force. Trooper i Gould is a brother-in-law of Mr. M. J. Greason, solicitor, of Christchurch. He was twenty-seven years of age, and a 'particularly fine type of young New Zealander. He stood about 6ft. 2in., • and was as generally liked as he was Respected.

Advices from state, that Mr. W. ?S. Marris. of the Indian Civil Service, ,has been on special duty with the Gov;ernnient of India in connection with the , revision of the Criminal Procedure Code. He was to have returned to the '■'.United Provinces last month. Mr. (Marris is a graduate of Canterbury Col•lege, and has many friends in that part of the Dominion.

Private James Dilworth Bradley •Mossman, reported as having been wounded at the Dardanelles, is the son of Mr. W. G. Mossman, late of Ellerslie. and now of Gisborne. He was educated at the Auckland Grammar School, and is now twenty-one years of age. After- leaving school he went to nis father's sheep run in the Gisbomo district. In June last he took a trip Home, and war rumours being then very thickly in the air, he enlisted in the King Edward's Horse. Subsequently he transferred to the British section of the New Zealand Expeditionary Force, and on arrival in Egypt, after a period of training at Bulford, he was attached to the Auckland Regiment of the Mounted Rifles Brigade. Thomas Mossman, a member of the Legion of Frontiersmen, who died in Egypt from pneumonia, was a brother of Private Mossman.

/ Mr. W. E. Butler, the chief clerk of the Defence Department, who was run ' down by a motor-car and severely injured some three weeks ago, is now able to get about with the aid of a stick. He hopes to be fit to resume his duties on Monday next.

Lance-Corpo:al E. D. Cogan (Canterbury Battalion), kilLsd in action, was 26 years old and was educated at the Christchurch Boys' High School, where he was a member of the Cadet Corps and took a prominent part in 6ports. After leaving school he joined the staff of the Bank of New Zealand. He rowed for the Canterbury Rowing Club, being a member of its successful crews and played football for the Old Boys' Club, being a player in the club's junior fifteen when it won the Junior Flag,He played half-back and was noted for his solid and unflinching play. He left with_ the Main Expeditionary Force as a private, and from information received_ also left for tho Dardanelles as a private. He apparently won a stripe on the field of battle.

Private Lawrence Winks (Wellington Battalion), who died of wounds on board a hospital ship, was a son of the late Mr. John Winks, of Hawera, uad was in partnership with Mr. Tocker, farming at Hurleyville when he volunteered for service. He had lived all his life m the Hawera district, and took an active part in all interests, business and games; in the latter respect he was a prominent member of the Hawera Football Club.

Sergeant William Richard Bowden. New Zealand Artillery, who was killed at the Dardanelles, was the eldest son of Mt. John Bowden, of Spicydon, and ' was born in Cardiff, Wales, 25 years ago, and educated at Plymouth. Sergeant Bowden, who was one of the first to enlist when war broke out, was for ten years prior to leaving with the Expeditionary Force a member of the E Battery, Christchurch,' rising to the rank of sergeant. He left New Zealand ! with a corporal's stripes, but was quickly promoted to the rank of sergeant. Sergeant Bowden was a member of tho senior team of tho Addington League Football Club, and belonged to the Order of Druids. His father was a soldief, being a sergeant-major in the artillery at Home, and his fat-har was also in that branch of the service. A brother of tho late Sergeant Bowden, H. G. Bowden, is at present at Trenthom with the Severn! Reinforcements.

Corporal William Earp, of tho Ok go Battalion, reported lulled in yesterday s casualty list, was the eldest son of Mr. and Mrs. E. W. Earn, of Ta'.ya Flat. He was 22 years of ago, and the first Expeditionary Force. Previous to Ilis enlistment, he was an account-ant in the employ of Messrs. .Millar auci Ahearne, of. WakeiiclH Street.

Mr. Frank Goldberg was the recipient of a. presentation by tho members of his staff on the eve of his marriage- Mr. S. J. Wills, who made 'he presentation, referred to the e&teem in which the recipient was held by the staff, and wished him and his future wife uvery possible happiness.