OUR WOUNDED.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXII, Issue 11, 7 December 1916, Page 5

OUR WOUNDED.

NEW ZEALANDERS !N ENGLAND. (From our own Correspondent). London, October 10. There are never any Xew Zealanders in the United Kingdom who are quite without friends for long, for the hospitality of the British people has never allowed our men to feel like strangers for long. Most of them are “adopted” in a more or less casual manner by visiting ladies who happen to meet them in the wards; and they rarely want seriously for any comforts. It is the business of the Xew Zealand War Contingent Assn-, elation to see that they don’t, and that this chance of hospitality is made a certainty The Association has more than 160 visitors, who are mostly Xew Zealand ladies, and they call regularly at military hospitals throughout the. British Isles wherever they are any Xew Zealand patients in the wards. Where there are, they are visited regularly, supplied with newspapers 'and smokes, writing material and any small comforts winch they require, such as shaving kit, tooth brushes, soap, stationery, etc. In the case of patients who are confined to bed they also get a regular supply of fruit, cream, etc. This attention continues until the men are discharged well and fit. Any single month’s report of the Visiting Committee of the War Contingent Association will show how widespread the work is and what the organisation means. In August—before the capture of Flers—there were 1938 Xew Zealand wounded in the United Kingdom. Most of them were concentrated in the New

Zealand hospitals at Brockenhurst, Walton, Codford and Hornchurch, but'the problem was the remaining 582, who were scattered over 110 British hospitals as far apart as Dundee in the north and Netley in the south. Yet every one of'these, thanks to the organisation of the War Contingent Association, was regularly visited,supplied with necessary comforts and reported to the head office. There, each case is recorded hy card index, with every visit and requisition and the progress of the cure.

ABOUT CIGARETTES. The soldier’s “fag” has become so well recognised a weakness that it takes a hold man to attack it on the ground that smoking is injurious to tin- health. Yet such a man has now arisen. Most people will he quite ready to believe that unlimited cigarette smoking is detrimental to the health of men in the trenches—where life is semi-sedentary—hut particulaily of hospital patients. One of the regular activities of the M ar Contingent Association is the distribution of smokes through its visitors to New Zealanders in British hospitals. The

allowance is limited to 40 cigarettes per week. Medical opinion here and there says that this is too much,' but the hospital regulations often do not restrict smoking at all. Everybody knows the soldier is- attached to his fag and that no amount of regulation can keep him from it. 1 have known | a hospital patient spend as much as j 10s a week on additional smokes. If there was an average of 2000 New j Zealand soldiers in hospital and convalescent camp, the bill of the Association for the modicum of 40 fags per week would run to more than £SOOO per year. As a matter of fact, it is possible by getting them in bond to save a good deal of this sum. TIRED NURSES. With two or three hundred nurses on service—most of them now in England—there was an obvious need of some provision for occasional rest and convalescence for them if they were to keep fit and strong. This has been met by a very generous offer from Mr Astor to place at the disposal of the War Contingent Association his fine home at Rest Harrow, near Sandwich. Miss Tombe (Dunedin) who was the first matron of tho Xew Zealand Hospital at Walton-on* Thames, has been appointed to have charge of the new home and already several of our nurses requiring rest have spent a few weeks there with much benefit. Though nurses qf the N.Z.E.F. will get preference in case the accommodation is overtaxed, the home will be open to any New Zealand nurse on duty in England.

THE SOLDIERS’ HOSTEL. “I always stay at the New- Zealand hostel in Russell Square,” wrote a trooper to me the other day, quite unsolicited; “I think it is an ideal place for our soldiers to stay at.” This refers to the residential club which has just been opened in Bloomsbury. Anyone who knows anything of his London —or any great city for that matter—will appreciate what this sort of place means to a young man. in a strange land. The path of the soldier on leave is beset with dangers, and he would be a very smart sort < of man who did not fall into any of . the traps set with diligent care to entrap our soldiers and their money. War conditions favour the harpy and the sponger, and consequently, ever since our men went to France, members of the War Contingent Association have regularly met the leave trains arriving in London and taken iu hand those of our boys who were new to London and could do advice. If they want a bed they are taken to the Hostel in Russell Square. At any rate they can always go there for cheap, good food cooked by Xew Zealand ladies, for billiards and all the conveniences of a rendezvous. At any time of the night they can get warm meals cooked and served by New Zealanders. Mr Arthur Russell, who is about to nav a visit to Xew Zealand, is chairman of the Hostel Committee, and Mr R. H. Nolan (Hawera) has been throughout a most capable and thor-

ough organiser. Sir James Mills, chairman of the Finance Committee of the Y\ ai Contingent Association —a watchdog for the subscribers —left London this week on a visit to New Zealand, where he will he able to give first hand information as to what the Association has been doing. The High Commissioner (who is chairman of the Association) gave a farewell luncheon to Sir James and to Mr and Mrs Arthur Russell, who are leaving in November to spend the winter in New Zealand. Mrs .Russell as honorary treasurer of the Visiting Committee, was one of the most capable organisers in the early days and also did excellent service as buyer at a time when buying was most difficult and important work. Mr J. H. B. Coates, the vice-chairman, will preside over the Finance Committee during Sir flames Mills’s absence. Miss Ida Russell has joined the Y isiting Committee, and** Mr Caccia Birch (Rangitikei) has consented to become honorary organiser to the Association, a very necessary post where the work of so many committees has to be co-ordinated.

ENTERTAINM ENT. In August the YVar Contingent Association arranged theatres for 779 soldiers and drives for 229—the theatre tickets being nearly all given free hy the managers. It is hardly necessary to say that considering howmany men wore then in and about London this did not entail excessive expenditure. “Over indulgence in pleasure-giving” is a bogey frequently held up as a warning to welfare associations. Subject to the approval of the Patriotic Leagues in New* Zealand, a Christmas gift will be given this year to all members of the X.Z.E.F. at a cost not exceeding one shilling per head. It will probably be a small pocket book as last year, containing special information of service to the men.