PERSONAL ITEMS'"

Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2777, 22 May 1916, Page 4

PERSONAL ITEMS'"

Lieut. Stcnhouse, . .K.N.R., has \ gons south to rejoin the Antarctio expl'onntf 6hip Aurora, which may, after a a cVerhaul, be recommlssloned to act as a Je* lief ship to proceed ii' M'Murdo Sound again in September or dctober next. , Sir Rider Haggard is to leave Sydney" fo>i New Zealand next weetr, Mr. Ashmead Bartlett is at present in-. Auckland, and is staying at the "Cargen." Tho Inspector-General' of Hospitals and Chief Medical . Officer (Dr. Valintine) has returned from Dunedin, wjiere Us has been . superintending matters ir. connection with the Willoclira. i Dr. F. AV. Ward, foraicrly editor of.tluC Sydney "Daily Telegrapli," was a passen-. ger from England by thtf Bemuera as far:! as Hobart. ; ' 1 i Mr. C. H. Hughes, -jvho has filled tin* position of secretary of tho Union_ Steam Ship Company of Now Zealand for tk« past five years, arrived .here en route to tnlce temporal charge of t:h«; Melbourne branch. On Thtitsday evening 1 tho head office staff presented him witß a case- of cutlery, and, iii making thtf presentation on behalf of 'tho staff. Mr.. Holdsworth (managing director) referred to the very cordial relations which had always existed betwen Mr.! Hughes and the staff. Sir. Hughes feelingly responded, and expressed regret that circumstances had rendered it necessary for him to leave Dunedin. • Captain 3. M'Donald Johnston of WeW lington, who left with the i'id Battalion* N.Z. llifle Brigade, has foen promoted to. tho rank of Major Field -Officer, fieadr quarters Staff, 3rd Battalioi, N.Z.E.B. Colonel Walter Wright, an old Dunedin boy and an old boy of the Otago BoysHigh School, was, says ftio Londoa "Times," .'warmly this week bv' Field-Marshal Lord Frenfiltj General Sir Archibald Hunter, and General Siri Francis Howard on the occasion of a Tlsl * to the headquarters gymnasia at Aldershot. 'When war broke out the. gymnastic staff of the Army was. auto uiatically dispersed, the officers and instructors rejoining their regiments in the fighting line;-but within three weeks .tolonel.,Wright , was ordered to re-organatf'o th o whole thing, .and form a new stiW'- He did this by re-enli6ting old graduates of the school who had left the service, wounded men who had returned fr<wn the front, and.: candidates.'selected bj" commanding officers from their battalia, ns. By compressing a four months' curriculum into 21 days the school can now train., ,6000 regimental instructors per annua . ay with 360 before the war. * D jview of the great enrolment of civ) Bans in the new armies the work of the \ instructors became of supreme imports Wee, especially as hand-to-hand fighting dt Weloped. Canada has adopted Col. »nel Wright's scheme, of training. Cole wiel Walter Wright is a brother of Mr. F. E. Wright, of Levin. Ho is a son of two late J. T. Wright,. founder of the fiiim of Messrs. Wright, Stephenson and - Cb., Dunedin, and was chiefly educated. _-fci Christ's College (Christchurch), and f; lington College, Enelnnd. and was only : the Otago Boys' High School for a verj; short period. 1 Mr. S. T. Talboys, tramways engineer - ' and manager at Wanganui, was in -Wei-i lington on Saturday. He has been accented as a member of the Flying Corps, which has been instituted under Govern- 1 ' ment auspices at Auckland, and he will' go into camp at Auckland for three months' training in the art and mechanics of fiying. On qualifying at Auckland,,, candidates are granted a commission and: sent to England, where they become attached to the Royal Flying Corps. Twelvecandidates are now in training, and next month, a further dozen arov to take up the work. The Wanganui Borough Council has. generously given Mr.. Talboys three months' leave of absence on full pay, and leave of absence- for the duration of the war, during which' time he will receive i! 100 a year from the council. Presentations were made Mr. W. M'Hutcheson (Chief Postmaster at Dun-; edin and'H. Ferens (chief, mail clerk), on' Thursday evening, last, on the occasion of their retirement from the service. In 1898 Mr. M'Hutcheson (who has been 50 years in the service, with only three days' absence on sick leave), was selected to take tho first- New Zealand mail from Vancouver to Chicago, and,report on the A merican . railway ' connections as they affected the mails. Mr. M'Hutcheson was presented with a roller-top desk and two eaby chairs, and Mr. Ferens received a gold wateli.

Mr. A. F. Graham, assistant clerk in the office of the Otago Hospital and Charitable Aid Board, has been appoint, ed secretary to the Taranaki Board,', at New Plymouth; His resignation, .which came before the meeting, of the board recently, was accepted with regret, and a minute of appreciation of Mr. Graham''? 1 services Tecorded. The chairman added that it was proposed to fill the vacancy t>y promotion from the present staS. Lieutenant W. K. Eady, son of the lat« Mr. W. Eady, of the staff of the Auckland Harbour Board, has' been promoted to the position of captain. Mr. Gordon Eady received the news that he had been fighting with the British Expedition n Mesopotamia for the last three months. Call tain Eady left Berlin for London ju«t poor to the of war. He then joined-. the ambulance, but was later trans.feried to the fighting line. '

Ast Godber's Rooms, on Saturday evenin« a send-off social was tendered by the employees of Messrs. Wright and Carman nnd' their friends, to Mr. Rby Halliburton ,(a member of the staff), who shortly goes' on active service for the Empire Mr. ',W. Carman presided. During ovenitng Mr. I?. A. Wright, M.P.. sented the guest of the evening, on of tUe staff, with a houdsomo watcli and in the coursn of speec.lt stated that he was lrnt vol opinions of all present in wishi: Godspeed and a safe return. The 'death occurred in Auckland on Friday l of Mr. Job Coldicuttv ■ a wel - known'and highly respected resident, who lias lwfed in Auckland for just on thre<>nuarterei of a century. ■ Mr. Coldicutt was torn in Birmingham 11 years ago, and reached Auckland with; in Mav '1842. He was farming at Epsom in 1563,' jvhou.he volunteered for servic# in the Maori War, but was invalided from camp ,' liter lie was for many years on the staff of Messrs. Owen and Graham, merchant;and with Win. M.Arthur and Company till that hrm gave up their "Auckland business. Ihe deceased is survived by his widow and adult famiuy of four sons and fout daughters. ' ' Mr. J. J. Ivinsey, a Christchurcli merchant 'who 1 is well-known m New Zen* land, having acted as agent for'various Antarctic exploration expeditions, include in'" the Scoilt and Shackleton parties, was a passoiiier by the Eemuera, wlncli arrived in Auckland on Friday. He was accompanied Iby Mrs. Kinsey_ ami Miss Ivinsey. Mr. .Kinsey has been in England fov the last tvf-o years on a pleasure trip. Captain W. Gordon Barker, of the Connaugiit dangers, arrived at Aucklntl from Ungiand py tne Bemuera on lfn. day. He was' taken prisoner by the Germans in the. retreat from Mons, and is visiting the ISlomimon to. recover-his shattered health ".after being m a German prison camp for \sn months, at the end of which period was exchanged.