PERSONAL.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 9664, 1 December 1909, Page 5

PERSONAL.

Rev. V. H. Kitcat will be licensed by B«shop Wallis at Marton on December 15th, The Rev. J. Dawson, secretary of the New Zealand Alliance, is on a visit lo Auckland.

Guards Barrett and Brooks, of the Masterton Kailway staff, are tu be transferred to Wellington.

The Rev. E. H. Taylor, M.P. for Thames, who has been seriously ill, is improving, and will soon resume his Parliamentary duties

Owing to the complete breakdown of his health, Mr Wade, Premier of New South Wales, has been ordered to take two or three months' rest.

Mr Sid Callaway, the well known ex-Außtralian nnd Canterbury repre sentative cricketer, has been transferred from Christchurch to the traffic department in the Government railways at Dunedin.

A very old identity of the West Coast, Mr Patrick O'Dea, passed away in the Westland Hospital last week at the age of 68 year?. He arrived on the.Coast early in 1865, and followed the various gold rushes up and rl< wn the Coast with a fair amount of success. The rush to the Haaat, in South Westland, was the last one he participated in, staying in that locality for a number of years. He also took up a catil2 run in the same neighbourhood, often sending cattla to the local market. At the time of the Klondyke rush he sold his interests in South Westland,and being joined by Hugh McFetrich, the t*o set off to try thtir fortunes in that frozen region. After some months hardship lie decided to come back to New Zealand (Air MeFetrich having succumbed to the privations), and lar.ded in Auckland very much broken in health. Mr Alexander Sligo, a prominent and much respected resident cf Dunedin for a great many years, is dead. The deceased gentleman, who was 78 years of age, was born in Perth, Scotland, and" was educated at the old Guild School in that city. He served an apprenticeship to the stationery and bookbinding trade in his native city. In 1854 he went to Australia and worked in Melbourne fur some time as a bookbinder and paper ruler. He alterwards went to Ballarat, and was there during the riots. In 1863 he arrived in Dunedin, and settled down there after he had some experience of life on the Otago goldfields. He worked at his trade in Dunedin, and then, in 1871, he began business there as a bookseller and stationer on his own account He tgok a lading part i'l connection with the Oddfellows' Order (Manchester Unity), and was for many ye.ars corresponding secretary for the Otagi district. He sat on school committees for a very long period, and for some years he was a member of the Dunedin Licensing Committee. For three years he was chairman of that body. He was also a director of the local Caledonian Society, and of several jcint stock companies. Mr Sligo contested the by-election for Dunedin in 1897, necessitated by the death of Mr H. S. Fish, and was returned.