ENLISTED AT 65

Hokitika Guardian, 16 May 1931, Page 2

ENLISTED AT 65

OLD MAN AT THE WAR

(By Telegraph —Fer Press Association)

WELLINGTON, May 15

The death has occurred of Mr Patrick Mulcahy at the age of eighty years, who served with the Rifle Brigade in the Great War. The late Air Mulcahy was an old resident of Wellington. He was for about twenty years an employee of the Ciity Council as gardener at the Botanical Gardens.

When the war broke out, his two sons went to the front with the early reinforcements. They were both killed. At this time Air Mulchay was employed at the Town Hall. One day he said to a friend: “I would like to go to the front and find the German who killed my sons!” “You are over age!. You have no chance of being accepted!” replied his friend.

One morning, however, Mulcahy asked to leave his work for a while. He came back with a certificate of “Fit A.” He then joined up as “Rifleman Patrick Mulcahy,” and he left for France with the Tenth Reinforcements, He was then sixty-five years of age. Being a very fit man, he had passed as forty-five years of age. At the end: of the war, Mr ATulcahy returned to New Zealand, and he resumed his old duties. Subsequently, he retired on a small pension, allowance, He leaves a widow and a grown, up family. Airs Mulcahy went to England shortly after her husband enlisted, and she did useful war service in the Alothorland.