RIPPED HIS STRIPES OFF.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 3175, 28 April 1909, Page 3

RIPPED HIS STRIPES OFF.

o. AN INDIGNANT CORPORAL. SEQUEL TO EASTER CAMP INCIDENT. Since their inception as a volunteer corps the Johnsonvilla Rifles have not been an altogether happy family. As the pubile is, no doubt, aware, some time ago the company was almost disintregated over a controversy concerning the seniority of one of its subaltern officers. Now fresh trouble has arisen over an incident which happened at the volunteer camp at Oringi during Easter. The facts are stated to be as follows: — On the evening of Easter Sunday an orderly reported to Lieutenant Merrilees, officer commanding the company at the camp, that a member of the corps had been taken violently ill. As that officer had just retired to bed, a subaltern officer of another company, who happened to be visiting his tent, offered to investigate the matter, and ascertained that the ailment was sufficiently serious to warrant the man's removal to the field hospital. A stretcher was procured, and the sick man's comrades in the tent were requested to furnish a bearer detachment for his conveyance to the hospital. They refused, and the sufferer, who was subsequently found to have been taken with severe cramps in the stomach, had ultimately to be taken to the hospital by a detachment from another company. The sequel happened at the first company pradae of the corps, after its return to Johnsonville, when the men who had occupied No. 2 tent at Oringi were severely censured by ' Lieutenant Merrilees for their conduct in refusing to turn out for the elief of a sick comrade. Thereupon the non-commissioned officer (a corporal), who had been in charge of No. 2 tent, stepped forward from the ranks arid asked to be allowed to make a statement. This was refused. He then, it is stated, ripped his corporal's stripes off, and threw down his rifle. He was arrested, and placed under arms, so the report goes, and the others who were under criticism have since declared their intention of resigning from the corps. Is is probable that more will be heard of the incident.