A " VINDICTIVE " HERO.

Hokitika Guardian, 6 July 1918, Page 2

A " VINDICTIVE " HERO.

LETTER TO HIS PEOPLE

Mr John Campbell, engineer on the s.s Paeroa, haw received u letter from luh son Dugald Campbell, who liad the good fortune to be one of the crew of the Vindictive on her famous raid on Zeeb’rugge. The following is what he has to say :—11.M.5.,' Vindictive, 1/41918: My Dear Mother —By the time you receive this 1 will either be no more or have done, or rather helped in the greatest deed of the War—l am not at liberty to say any more about it, sufficient. to say that the Navy has at last come into it, its her chance. I am the only R.N.R. Warrant Engineer going on this special service and it. is mv duty to go. We will get either promotion or decoration, or of course a pass out. Best, love to Dad and yourself, Doris and Charley.” Opt. Carpenter’s story of the enterprise is:—“Every officer and man I saw behaved so splendidly tha really even now, with everything a" over, the whole thing seems life a dream and it would be invidious to mention any particular officer or man. The ‘Germans seem to suffer from an extraordinary imagination, but if they ever suggest that the Vindictive did not get alongside the mole, that statement may be easily be refuted by the fact that we have brought away a piece of the Zeebrngge mole, weighing a quarter of a ton which fell on my ship; I intend to have it set up ns a memorial to the men who fell.”