H.M.S. NEW ZEALAND

Taihape Daily Times, Issue 220, 7 March 1917, Page 5

H.M.S. NEW ZEALAND

i battered in battles, visited by a Wellington ANZAC. MAT AND TIKI AS MASCOTS. Bombardier C. R. Bremner, of Wellington, who went with the Main Body of th e Expeditionary Force, has been spending his furlough from France Old Country. In a letter to his .sisters he describes a visit ,to H.M.S. New Zealand, while staying in Edinburgh last October. At that time Admiral Beatty's section of the North Sea Fleet was lying in the Firth of Forth. THE TRIP. We were to leave for Glasgow soon after lunch, but I picked up a couple more New Zealande'rs, and off we started for the Forth Bridge. While there we fancied a trip round Admiral Beatty's fleet and so chatted to a petty officer at the landing-place along side the bridge. He said that no one was allowed to "cruise round the fleet, but th e naval authorities had instructions to take New Zealanders or Australians either to H.M.S. New Zealand the Australia, or the Sydney. So we decided to go on to the New Zealand. As luck would have it, we struck the mail launch, and so were taken round the whole fleet before we reached the .one we wanted. New iron. places marked the spot wuere many of the ships had been hit in the Jutland battle, bui they were none the worse for it. We spent' four hours on board th e New Zealand, and were shown over every inch of it. It is an eye-opener to see ail the little im-

provements made from .experience gained in previous rights./' They showed us dozens ,of new ideas, and there must be dozens more which were too good to show us. Improvements' have been made on all the ships right down to the smallest detail. The New Zealand was not the show case she was when s- : ie visited the Dominion, but she is in good fighting trim, and looks A.I. She received a shot through one of the big-gun r- > rets in the Jutland scrap, which knocked a piece out from 3ft to 4ft in diameter. From the outside only a new iron plate can be seen, but inside one could see that an iron ..plate some 7in thick had been knocked right out Tie piece is on show on deck."*; Of th e original officers' and crew only a few remain, as.. many were transferred to other ships, and great many lost-their lives in the Jutland battle. When in New Zealand Captain Halsey was presented with a Maori mat and tiki by one ..of the Maori chiefs ,who told him that if he . wore these when fighting his ship would pull through safely. - She has a new captain now, but on each occasion when they have gone into action—at Heligoland, Dogger Bank and Jutland—the captain has always donned his mat and tiki! And they all have a lot of faith in these things now. It sounds absurd, bur, nevertheless, quite true. We had tea on board before leaving, and landed back at" 6.30 p.m.