INVALIDED HOME

Wairarapa Times-Age, 4 January 1941, Page 4

INVALIDED HOME

OVER FIFTY MEN FROM EGYPT PARTY REACHES WELLINGTON. ONLY TWO HOSPITAL CASES. (By Telegraph—Press Association.) WELLINGTON. This Day. Invalided home from Egypt, a party of 52 New Zealand soldiers reached Wellington yesterday. Only two were hospital cases. All had left Egypt before the offensive began, and the only action they had seen was enemy air raids and bombing. There were no men from the Wairarapa district in the draft. Major D. M. Robertson, of Army Headquarters, Wellington, and Captain R. D. Stronach, New Zealand Medical Corps, met the party in Sydney and conducted them to New Zealand, making a preliminary classification to assist the medical board in Wellington. On arrival at Wellington, the men .vere taken by motor bus to Garrison Hail, Buckle Street, for examination by the medical board, and the issue of new clothing where necessary, y, lunch, £4 advance on pay, travelling warrants, meal tickets, and rail passes for their journeys to their homes on iceve. They were also examined, by X-ray at the Wellington Hospital, Those recommended for discharge were given 28 days' leave on full pay, and were interviewed by officials of the Pensions Department and State Placement Service to consider their rehabilitation in civil life on their discnat ge from the army.

Several of the men expressed regret at having to come home just when the war in the desert was beginning. They were bitterly disappointed io have gone so far, and then to have had to come home just when the offensive was about to begin. A number, particularly engineers, had taken part in the preparation of forward positions in the desert. However, they had been some weeks on the voyage home, and had spent some time in hospital before being sent home, and had therefore left the advanced posts before the present campaign was launched. The party spent Christmas in Sydney. where they stayed ten days, and were given a gay reception by hospitable Australians, and by members of the New Zealand Club and New Zealand Auxiliary War Unit there.