PERSONAL.

Taranaki Daily News, 22 July 1921, Page 4

PERSONAL.

Sir Richard Butler has been unanimously elected Speaker of the. South Australian Assembly. A cable from New York announces the marriage of Lord Queensborough to Miss Edith Starr Miller.

The death is reported from Wakefield, Nelson, of Mr. F. Bird, who was for many years a storekeeper at Raglan. Admiral Sims has been awarded the Pulitzer prize of £250 by Columbia University for the best book of the year on American history for his work, “The Victory at Sea.”

At Wednesday’s meeting of the Taranaki Hospital and Charitable Aid Board a resolution of sympathy was passed with the chairman, Mr. M. Fraser, in his illness, and the board expressed its hope for his speedy recovery.

At the last meeting of the Council of the Taranaki Acclimatisation Society a resolution of sympathy was passed with the relatives of the late Mr. W. L. Newman, who held office on the Council of the Society for some twenty years. Mr. Henry Humphries, an old resident of Greytown, died on Monday evening at his residence, Humphries Street. He was 64 years of age, and leaves a widow and large adult family. The late Mr. Humphries, with a number of other Grey town young men, went to the Kimberley gold digging some 30 years ago. Mr. W. F. Brooking, of New Plymouth, has been indisposed for the past few weeks, and at a meeting of the New Plymouth Bowling Club last night it was decided to write to Mr. Brooking conveying the sympathy of members and best wishes for his speedy recovery. Mr. Bertram Mackennal, the Australian sculptor, who designed the statue of King Edward Vll., which was unveiled on Wednesday by King George, has been knighted He proceeded after the ceremony to Buckingham Palace, where the honor was conferred on him private-

Mr. Harold Kirkby has severed his connection with the legal firm of Messrs. Johnstone and Croker, New Plymouth, and joined Messrs. Roy and Nicholson, New Plymouth. An indication of the esteem in which he was held was the presentation of a gold watch by Mr. Croker and a silver cigarette case by the staff.

A Waihi message reports the death on Wednesday of Mr. Alexander Aitken, formerly engineer for the Thames County and the last of the surviving members of the search party which sot out and found the bones of the wellkndtvn Australian explorers Burke and

Wills in the heart of the interior in the early fifties. Mr. Aitken was 90 years of age. He served with the Government engineering staff at Kumara during the Atkinson Ministry, which service he relinquished in his 73rd year. The death occurred at Tikorangi yesterday of Mr. A. K. Arthur Worsop. The late Mr. Worsop, who was well-known in New Plymouth, was engaged in the building trade. He had seen considerable military service, and in addition to being a South African veteran was one of the New Zealand Expeditionary Force Main Body in 1914. He was a member of the New Plymouth R.S.A. and took an active interest in their activities, and was also associated with the Legion of Frontiersmen. Mr. Worsop, who was 38 years of age, was a married man. The funeral at Waitara to-day will be a military one, and a number of New Plymouth returned men will attend as a tribute to the memory of a deceased comrade.

Lieut.-Colonel Sir Edward Grigg, who visited New Zealand and Australia as j advisory secretary to the Prince of l Wales last year, has been appointed secretary to the Prime Minister of England (Mr. Lloyd George). “Un Diplomats,” commenting in the Paris Matin on the appointment, says that Sir Edward Grigg will bring to Downing Street the point of view of the Dominions. “This is an excellent method of facing European problems,” the writer adds, “for the foreign policy of England cannot be separated from the interests of the Dominions, and it is a question of associating the whole British Empire with the Entente.’?

Mr. John Coom, who died suddenly at his residence. Birkenhead. Auckland, last week, at the ago of 77, was a well known member of the engineering staff of the New Zealand Railways. He was born in Cornwall, England, in 1844, and received his early training in civil engineering in England and Northern Italy. At the age of 31 he came to New Zealand and joined the Public Works Department at Wellington. Among the important work carried out in this Department he surveyed portions of the country for the construction of the railway lines in the Manawatu and Wairarapa districts, and also in Murlborouyh.