SOLDIERS WHO "BUCKED."

Taranaki Daily News, 3 February 1916, Page 6

SOLDIERS WHO "BUCKED."

HANMER CAIIB TROUBLE. MEN RESENT BEING "TREATED LIKE CHILDREN." '(New Zealand Times.) 11l a Press Association telegram from Christchui'ch it was reported that twenty-sevcu men from the Hanmer convalescent camp had reached Christ church on Monday night. Three were under military arrest, and were sent on to Trentham, seventeen were discharged, and the remainder were sent to the ChristcUurch Hospital. "There has been a considerable amount of trouble at Hanmer lately (added the message). Men are alleged to have broken the rules and to have defied orders. The exodus was th& outcome of the trouble." Some of the \Vounded men reached Wellington on Tuesday with their discharges in their pockets. They are very bitter against the Defence authorities in consequence of the manner in which they have been dealt with. One of their number stated that they were under treatment at Hanmer, which is the soldiers' convalescent camp for the South Island. They were, accustomed in the evening to ..stay out until 9 o'clock, but they received orders that in future they were not to be out. of doors after 6 p.m. This regulation they considered to be a hardship after their experiences at the front and after al! they had suffered in the service of their country, more especially in a climate 'where it is intolerable to be confined indoors from 0 o'clock in the evening in the middle of summer. Therefore, resenting the order, they stayed out beyond 0 o'clock, as usual, thus bringing themselves into conflict with the authorities. As a resfilt, some officers went to Hanmer from Christchurch and held a court martial, in consequence of which certain men were discharged from the forces. If these were men who had misbehaved themselves in the service, it might have been possible to understand the action of the authorities, but the breach of discipline was such a trivial one.

It is held by the men to be an open question whether discipline ahould have been enforced so rigidly. The sympathy of the Hanme.r residents went strongly with them, and to such an extent that several cases of fruits \v#re received addressed to "The Boys Who Stayed Out Late," The 6 o'clock regulation was regarded by the civilians there as being irksome in the extreme, most unreasonable, and failing to give the' soldiers a decent amount of latitude. One of the men states that Mr. Duncan Rutherford, a big landowner in the neighborhood of Hanmer, met the coach in which they were going away from the camp, and invited some of them to remain as his guests. He is also said to have made a cash donation to their expenses.

"TREATED LIKE CHILDREN." "We objected to being traated like children," said another of the men when be was seen by a New Zealand Times' reporter yesterday. The soldier had received his discharge at his own request, after leaving the camp with other men. "There was a good deal of friction from the first, mainly 011 account of the rules laid down by those in charge of the camp. The final row was brought about by a demand that we should all be in by 0 p.m. every day and should not go out again. We did not think that an arbitrary regulation of that kind was a fair tiling in the case of invalided men who »:ere being oflered a little social enjoyment after our spell at the front. It* meant that we were to be cut off from the mild pleasures of Hanmer, and we 'bucked.' "Originally we were allowed to be out until half-past 9 at night, and I do not think there was any suggestion that our health suffered from attending an occasional card party or concert up to that early hour. Then one or two men broke the rules by staying

out later and in other ways. The authorities announced that everybody was going to be punished for the fault of the few by the withdrawal of all night leave, as I have said." The sol- . dier added, that he thought the trouble would have, been avoided if the camp ■had been entirely in the hands of military men from the first. 'lt seemed to him that there had been a division of authority, and that some of those in charge of the soldiers had forgotten they were dealing with grown men,