MESSAGE TO BRITAIN

Evening Post, Volume CXI, Issue 34, 10 February 1931, Page 10

MESSAGE TO BRITAIN

GOVERNOR'S TRIBUTE

ADMIRABLE SERVICE

British Official Wireless. """(Received 10th February, 11 a.m.) RUGBY, Bth February. Tho Governor-General of New Zealand, Lord Bledisloe, who, with his wife, spent the week-end in the earth-quake-devastated Hawkes Bay area, in a telegram to the Dominions Secretary, London, refers to' the "quiet courage, mutual helpfulness, resourcefulness, and discipline of the whole population, including tho Maori race, amid a scene of, wholesale destruction and .bereavement." Ho adds that the medical and relief services, organised admirably, are working smoothly. With improved transport the majority of the population have left Napier, and its well-equipped field hospital has evacuated the most serious casualties to other hospitals in the North Island. The unovacuated homeless people arc accommodated comfortably under canvas in public parks and elsewhere. Essential supplies are fairly adequate, and deficiencies, chiefly of clothing, are being rapidly made good. The prompt, efficient, and indefatigable services of the naval officers and men continuously from the time of the initial disaster aro beyond all praise. The sailors were engaged on the demolition of precarious buildings and the recovery of bodies from beneath great • piles of debris. The scene of ruin is difficult to exaggerate.' Tremors continue, but are not serious."