UNRELIABLE BULLETINS

Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 3070, 4 May 1917, Page 6

UNRELIABLE BULLETINS

ERRORS THAT CAUSE DISTRESS TO RELATIVES. Sir,—l should bo very grateful foryour aid in an effort to stem the flow of unreliable bulletins issued by the. Defence Department (and reproduced in most of the. colonial papers), specifically as regards the deatli causes' ofi Now'Zealnnd's soils in war. We (and I speak feelingly, being myself a sufferer) do not grudge, our flesh and blood' i? the struggle of nghti against might still proceeding, indeed it is but our duty to "pass our children through tho fire till Moloch is conquered," but most assuredly we do demand when the fortune of war has ! deprived us of those we valued much,, that at least a true account of theiir ending be presented to a.critical pub-? ic and not a garbled (and occasionally absolutely false) statements to substituted. ,•-.,-,- A caso within my own knowledge, may render my meaning plain. Let us. hope it be an isolated oue. Rather over a month ago, serving, with the Imperial Forces, was a- certain. New Zealand officer, whose end cam® suddenly from "wounds received in action at sea." This'much by private cabin. Of this" the Defence Office knew nothing until several days later* Any ordinary mortal would imagine that in tho interval trustworthy information could have been gleaned, andi failing the accurate news, it were surely better on all counts to have remained dumb. Judge of tn&. surprise and indignation of tho dead man's relatives on learning from the. daily papers that his death resulted: from ''sickness; ,, or, as a second-issue stated, "died of disease- ! ~■.,.' In the instance under consideration, more improbable conjectures -could hardly have been made-the former implying a possibly weak constitution the latter anything from the pomof evil-living downwards-both. ..or which, utterances, as applied to the deceased, were unmitigated lies. Death, smft and complete, was alone likely to teimiute (as in fact it did) his career. To the man in the street the discrepancy will be of-small moment. i« those more closely concerned it is a> matter.of very material importance. Whether the Department contemplates correcting in some future notice % impression created tune will .how The harm, however, wrought by, its first bulletin is not now to Be effaAdstroii" remonstrance from, yoii m:mm sb£ of some bumblenndividuaL -lam,etc., AS .^ SZAOpAKEST .