HUMOUR IN THE WAR

Hokitika Guardian, 7 November 1931, Page 6

HUMOUR IN THE WAR

THE BUTLER WHO ENLISTED

STORY OE A HALF A CROWN

A humorous incident in connection with the early days ol ! the Great War is mentioned in his book by Brigadier-eneral-John Charteris, chief of Intelligence to Field Marshal Sir Douglas Haig. He writes:— “The butler' at the Government House wa s determined that lie, too, would see war at close quarters. Sir Douglas Haig decided to take him as mess servant to the Corps Headquarters mess. The trouble was to get him into khaki. Regulations were not then relaxed. “Ti enlist, attest, and enroll takes time in normal circumstances. For all we knew the war might be over before the butler’s reuruit training was finished. I apealed to my friends in the Royal Engineers at Aldershot for their benevolent assistance. A!;l things are possible when a command-er-in-chief wants things done. “After .breakfast one morning, I took the butler, immaculate in morning coat and bowler hat, to the Royal Engineers officer, saw him enter the quartermaster’s stores, and waited in the car to take him hack. “In an incredibly short time, less than half an hour, the new recruit emerged, in khaki, puttees neatly tied, a full-fledged driver of his Majesty’s Royal Engineers. He gave a somewhat amateurish salute and then lapsed again into.the butler and said: “I beg your pardon, sir, hut have you such a tiling a iS a half a crown on you?” “I asked him why lie wanted the half-crown, to which came ..the .reply: ‘Well sir, the quartermaster-sergeant has been very good to me, and I would like to give him' something.’ “This was too good to he missed. I climbed out of my car and followed at a. safe distance to see the v driver recruit of 10 minutes’ seniority tip a quarter-master-sergeant grown grey in service for civility.

“And the to his credit he it related, did not hurt the recruit’s, feelings by declining the solatium,”