WITH THE FORCES

Evening Post, Volume CXXXVIII, Issue 57, 5 September 1944, Page 3

WITH THE FORCES

WELFARE WORK IN PACIFIC O.C. WANGANUI, This Day. "The Church has every reason to be proud of the men it has sent overseas," said Mr. H. C. Veitch, recently returned from the Pacific theatre of war, where, as an Army educational and welfare officer, he was attached for most of the time to headquarters of the Third New Zealand Division. In an address to the Wanganui Rotary Club, Mr. Veitch spoke >of Lieutenant-Colonel- K. Liggett, senior chaplain to the New Zealand Forces in the Pacific, .Mr. George .Falloon, who had been awarded the Military. Cross and Mr. George Thomson, of the Salvation Army. Whilst the work of the men he had mentioned stood out the work of the padres in general was of the highest quality, he said. Speaking of the work of the National Patriotic Fund Board, Mr. Veitch said' that it was often unfortunate in affairs that organisations which paid the piper got the least credit. That was especially so of the "Natpat," the name by which the Patriotic Board was knowri 'Few of the troops realised," he said .the amount they were really getting from 'Natpat,' because 'Natpat' is a spending, not a distributing, organisation. Most of the comforts supplied were handed to the troops by padres or by V.M.C.A. or other similar secretaries, and the troops were apt to imagine that What was supplied came ±rom the organisation the particular giver represented. Behind all these supplies stood the National Patriotic Fund Board. One of the best things the Patriotic Board had done, Mr. Veitch said, was arranging a supply of daily newspapers from Auckland. This was handled for the board by the A.E.W.S. Due to difficulties in air transport the supply was sometimes erratic, but quite fre- v quently the papers arrived in the forward areas only three days old. On one occasion papers arrived at the field post office on Nissan only 32 hours after they left the press in Auckland. Forward troops then were reading them in some cases even before some farmers in New Zealand got them. Tea ran short on Nissan on one occasion, and the troops were given coffee (which was bad enough) and cocoa. Four degrees from the Equator cocoa was terrible. Mr. Veitch, who is a master at the Wanganui Collegiate School, came in close contact with the National Patriotic Fund Board's activities. The work went forward smoothly, he said. What was wanted in New Caledonia was not wanted at Guadalcanal, and the work differed at Vella Lavella and again at Nissan. Each officer of the board in these various theatres made a rapid survey of what was required and worked out his own field. In that way the work was made smooth.