GLOOMY CAMP NOW

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 898, 15 February 1930, Page 5

GLOOMY CAMP NOW

REAR PARTY CLEARING NARROW NECK STALWART TERRITORIALS Narrow Neck military camp is the gloomiest of places today. A rear party of Territorials is busily occupied in heavy weather in clearing the camp after its evacuation yesterday afternoon by the Ist Battalion of the Auckland Regiment. The work will take several days. Sodden tents by the score have to be taken down from their positions on flooded ground; all the paraphernalia of a military camp has to be transported.

But -the Territorials who stayed be-! hind for the work are makin? the [ best of troublesome conditions. They are living a camp life and are receiv- [ ing double the usual camp payment for volunteering for the task. A bedraggled crowd of young men, certainly, but they give an illustration of the observation of Colonel T. H. Dawson at the abandonment of the camp, that Territorials maintained an excellent spirit under adverse circumstances. The endurance of young Aucklanders has been tested fully enough during the camp. In preparation for the mock battle of Philcro. strenuous battle practices were a daily routine at the Devonport Domain and the Takapuna Raceourse. On the day before the night of the battle, 13 platoon of D Company, which was given the part of joining with naval marines and ratings in the invasion at Long Bay, was occupied m battle practices in the morning and practising the handling of massive surf boats in the afternoon. At midnight, the platoon was in a launch off Rangitoto with heavy packs, rifles and Lewis guns as a burden. The launch returned to Devonport and the men were marched to Narrow Neck. Followed a long bus journey to Long Bay and a scampering of sections of men over rough country and roads with bad surfaces to strategical points in the manoeuvres. Added to the strain of the bus journey home was a brief parade in the afternoon. Several Territorials did not have sleep to any degree for more than 36 hours. To surmount the near-hardships came Thursday night's rainstorm. Only a few occupants of the tents dug drains to carry the water away and most of the tents were saturated. Water in stream-like proportions rushed through one tent; in another, a Territorial rolled out of bed and had his head submerged beneath the flood. Military camps can be tests of endurance but they are good fun.