COMBATING TANKS

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20108, 30 November 1939, Page 8

COMBATING TANKS

TRAINING IN ENGLAND "SUICIDE SQUAD" When the New Zealand Division of the Army reaches England it will be joined by a special unit of 13G New’ Zealanders now in England who are being trained as an anti-tank .section, which has been given the title of the “Suicide Squad.” Included in this unit are several Taranaki men, among them being Messrs. T. C. Bellringer, M. G. Nevin. J. Garcia, of New Plymouth, and Mr. W. B. Malone, of Stratford. Some of the doings of these men and the training in which they are engaged is related in letters recently received from them in Taranaki. “I am now’ a member of the Ist New Zealand Anti-Tank Battery,” wrote a New Plymouth boy on November 1 in a letter received by his parents. When he was being sworn in at London photographers were present. “There are 13G of us here and after we have done some rifle duty we are to be taught the use of an anti-tank ’gun, which fires a two pound shell and w’ill destroy all but the largest tanks at close range,” he adds. “Anti-tank batteries were now known in the Army as the suicide squads.” Same Pay as New Zealanders They had the best quarters in the command, wdth central heating in the dormitories, plenty of hot water and plenty of wash basins, showers and several baths. They were to be paid 2s a day in the meantime and would have the other 3s 7d a day paid to them when the New’ Zealand expeditionary force arrived. That would bring their pay up to the 7s a day New Zealand currency that the New’ Zealand soldiers were receiving. There was a New Zealand flag flying over their quarters and a New Zealand team w’as being formed at the camp. They were to start classes in French in the evenings and hoped to start learning German later. Their battery was to be increased to four times its present, strength when the other New Zealanders arrived in England. He sla'ed that the reason they w’ere being trained in the “suicide squad” was because those anti-tank guns were new and there were none in New Zealand.