RETURNED SOLDIERS' ASSOCIATION.

Taranaki Daily News, 29 January 1917, Page 8

RETURNED SOLDIERS' ASSOCIATION.

Only nine months since, a,.'body of returned soldiers mot in Wellington to diiscuss problems afeting their lives nml aspirations. To-day the result is seen in the New Zealand lieturned Soldiers' Association, with twenty brunches throughout the Do'ininion and a membership of over 'JOOO men. The Xew Zealand Returned Soldiers' Association is well established and has a policy which is simple in its aim, «iamely, the protection of all returned soldiers' interests. This policy cannot be particularly denned at the present moment, as there are so many thousands who will tome back- and infuse new ideas into tihe Association. Suffice it to say I>hat meanwhile the Association concerns itself with immediate needs and allows room for improvement as occasion arises.

[ Nearly every town Ims a dub where men gather for social intercourse, and thus perpetuate the friendship gained, in far-off lands. In the near future other agencies will bo employed to foster enthusiasm and carry on the brotherhood which the battle-field alone can produce. Each time a draft leaves for France "or Egypt, some returned soldiers are amongst its numbers. They have sufficiently recovered to face the foe once more. As members of the New Zealand Returned Soldiers' Association, with their well-known .Association badge, they proclaim to those who are still in the field that those who have been knocked out in the game are alert and are preparing for them a. bond of nnitv which will be worthy of (ihe Anzitc tradition.

Although the Association works, so to speak, in obscurity, yet it is facing problems every day. As time goes on it will become a great national organisation in its truest sen-e, and hence a great national asset. Thq question will not be what the'people will do for the returned soldiers, but what the returned soldiers will do for the State and. for themselves.

'When the war is over, and the men return home once more, their experience will stamp themselves upon the future generation, and they will he an instrumnt for the making of a virile nation.