KITCHENER’S FOREBODING.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 1592, 1 August 1916, Page 4

KITCHENER’S FOREBODING.

“KNOW I SHALL DIE AT SEA.” STORIES CONCERNING FAMOUS SOLDIER. “One remarkable revelation may without impropriety ho made about Lord Kitchener,” says the Manchester Guardian. “It is that he had a sort of foreboding of an accident at sea. So much was this the case that he never crossed from Dover to Calais without wearing a lifebelt waistcoat, one that he had specially made for him in Egpyt before lie made his famous advance on Khartoum.

“Though so often on the sea and an excellent sailor, he detested a sea passage, and never felt comfortable on hoard any ship. He always complained that the sea affected his otherwise excellent sight —excellent, that is, considering his age and how much he had been exposed to a tropical sun. “Another curious point was that, whilst he always acquired curios in any part of the world in which he might be, he took care never to allow his purchases to he on the vessel on which he was a passenger.” In connection with the above, the Petit Journal quotes the following concerning the late Lord Kitchener; —“When Lord Kitchener came, some three months ago, to the British front he met at Dunkirk Commandant de Balancourt, to whom he mentioned that a Jack Johnson had dropped not far from him. ‘That did not alarm me,’ said the Field-Marshal, ‘because 1 know that I shall die at sea.’ ”

PAID HIS DEBT TO FRANCE,

KITCHENER’S EARLY CAREER

Everyone knows that Lord Kitchener fought, for France in 1870. It is perhaps not so generally known that he was strongly tempted to remain in (he French Army and to pursue his career in France, writes a Paris correspondent.

Lord Kitchener confided this at the Mansion House banquet in April last to Senator Jenouvrier, who recalls in the Petit Journal his conversation with (he Field-Marshal.

“After the war,” related Lord Kitchener, “General Chanzy wanted to keep me as a captain in an engineers corps. But I realised that, after having paid my debt of gratitude to France, I owed myself to my country. I left France, therefore, but with the promise to Genera! Chanzy that if I was not wanted in England I would return. The British Army did receive me, although I was reprimanded by my chiefs.” Lord Kitchener added that the Anglo-French alliance was a great joy to him and that he found in it something like the consecration of his life. “A PLACE TO DIE IN.” LATE COLONEL FITZGERALD AND THE ORKNEYS. Lieut.-Colonel Oswald A. Fitzgerald, Lord Kitchener’s personal military secretary, who perished with his chief, paid a visit shortly before his death to some friends in the Orkneys whose home commands a wonderful view of the sea in which the Hampshire sank. On the day after his arrival, Colonel Fitzgerald strolled along the shore with some other members of the house party, and remarked on the beauty of the land and seascape. “It is the kind of place that one would choose to die in,” he said, quietly. “A place to live in, rather!” protested one of his companions, “No,” said Colonel Fitzgerald, there is a sort of stately grandeur “there is a sort of stately grandeur at.es with solemn things.” A few days later, when he was in London, Colonel Fitzgerald wrote to his friends; “I shall he sailing past you to-morrow, and shall think of my pleasant visit and of our talks.” On the day after the arrival of his letter his body was washed up on the coast which he had admired.