TROOPS AT WAIOURU

Wairarapa Times-Age, 5 December 1939, Page 4

TROOPS AT WAIOURU

PREPARATIONS FOR COMBINED MANOEUVRES. CAMP IN MAGNIFICENT SETTING. iP.y Telegraph—Press Association.l WAIOURU. December 4. With snow-clad Ruapehu standing guard a few miles off from its height of 9175 feet. Waiouru camp today shelters in its 434 tents 1582 soldiers of the Special Force, the main body of whom moved in yesterday to undergo indivual training, preliminary to the combined manoeuvres, which will be their final test before they sail to serve the Empire in foreign fields. The air is that of a health resort. There was brilliant sunshine today, but a cool night, which made the men turn to Rugby, instead of cricket for recreation while light lasted. Those too tired for games could find pleasure in a magnificent panorama of bill, dale and white mountainside. Today the troops went into individual training with a swing—engineers, divisional cavalry (mechanised) and the 19th Wellington Rifle Battalion. The mechanised units of divisional cavalry covered the manoeuvre country, nearly 20 miles square, in a preliminary to the combined exercises to be carried out later this week. Tomorrow the infantry will split into two groups—attackers and defenders —for exercises near the camp. The camp itself is well set. A belt of pines encompasses it and locallygenerated power supplies the tents and buildings. Rugby football was the order tonight. Among the footballers in camp are J. L. Griffiths, All Black, J. Wynward, All Black, Bailey, an exBush forward, Aitken, a Poverty Bay representative. Taranaki and Wellington teams have already arranged a match.