An Elizabethan New Zealander

New Zealand Listener, Volume 8, Issue 191, 19 February 1943, Page 5

An Elizabethan New Zealander

} (From a tribute broadcast by 2YA) RANK WORSLEY, the New Zealander, who died the other day in England, will always be associated with that great explorer, Ernest Shackleton, whom he accompanied on two voyages, including the ship’s-boat journey of 800 miles in an Antarctic winter. But there was much more in Frank Worsley than all this. The man himself might have strayed out of the Elizabethan age. He was by nature an adventurer in the old sense of that word, Not for him the routine of a soldier’s job on set routes. He thirsted for work off the beaten track. He revelled in difficulties and hardships. His spirit was gay, humorous and infectious; he was always out for a lark. Over 40 years ago, as second mate of’ the New Zealand Government steamer Tutanekai, Worsley brought off something that might have caused _ international complications. James Cowan, who was a close friend of Worsley’s and sailed with him more than once, tell the story in his book, "Suwarrow Gold." One hot afternoon in Apia, Samoa, he and the ship’s carpenter walked past the German Consulate, where the flag of Germany flew on a tall mast. A German sentry with rifle and bayonet, paced up and down in front of the staff. There was a German cruiser in the bay. The Tutanekai’s carpenter growled that he would like tu see the flag hauled down. Germany was not popular. "Right you are," said the irrepressible second mate. "I'll. get it down for you!" The two men waited. Presently, it being a hot afternoon, the German sentry went inside for his accustomed glass of lager. Worsley dodged round to the foot of the mast,

-- hauled down the flag, took it off the halliards and brought the line down, When they got back to the waterfront, they didn’t wait for their own boat, but went off at once in a native canoe, Curiously enough, the loss of the German ensign was not noticed till next morning, and then, of course, there was the dickens of a row, but by that time the Tutanekai was on her way to Auckland. Weeks afterwards, Worsley confessed to his skipper. The Old Man talked very sternly to his second mate, but as he

turned away, he said to himself: "The young son of a gun! I’d have done it myself if I’d been a youngster in his place!" Worsley had another point of resemblance to the Elizabethans..He could write. He left a good deal of the story of his career in a number of books, which show a real literary gift. An English critic said of one book that it was far above the average of its kind, and that this man of action must have spent as mucl pains in becoming a writer as our modern writers sometimes spend in emulating men of action.