NEW ZEALAND AT SEA

New Zealand Listener, Volume 20, Issue 512, 14 April 1949, Page 10

NEW ZEALAND AT SEA

NEW ZEALAND SD NAVAL SAU. Dy Fe \D. Taylor, A. H. and A. W. Reed, Wellington. Price, 22/6. EW ZEALAND’s Naval Story, as told by T. D. Taylor, is a large and handsome volume of some 300 pages. It contains most of the ingredients that go to the making of a first-class book, but, it must be said, their handling leaves something to be desired. The plan of the book divides it into three sections, with consequent overlapping and repetition and a lack of continuity

and balance. Nevertheless, the book is of considerable interest and importance and fills an important gap in the recording of New Zealand history, with the reservation that obvious inaccuracies in dates, as well as in the notes on some ships mentioned, detract from its value as a work of reference. In the first section, headed "Naval Policy and Practice," Mr. Taylor gives an interesting, if somewhat sketchy, survey of the important and constantly beneficent part played by the Royal Navy in New Zealand’s domestic affairs during the turbulent infancy of the colony from the whaling days of the 1830’s to the end of the Maori Wars, and of the evolution and development of the country’s naval defence policy from that time down to the present day. Harking back to the discovery of New Zealand by Abel Tasman, the second section, entitled "Naval Occasions," recounts the visits of Captain Cook, and French, Spanish, Russian, and American explorers. Later chapters tell of the visits of the American Fleet in 1908 and again in 1925, of H.M.S. New Zealand in 1913 and 1919. It is difficult to judge why the visits of ships of the Royal Australian Navy in 1935 and of the special Service Squadron of the Royal Navy in 1924 are included in that order in the chapter headed "The Maori War Era’; or why Mr. Taylor credits the Australian destroyer Stuart with most of the success achieved in the Battle of Cape Matapan (page 118). Much of the material in the interesting chapter, "World War to World War" might well have been included in the first section of the book. Nearly ‘one-half of the book is devoted to an alphabetically arranged catalogue of notable naval ships that have visited New Zealand since the time of Captain Cook. ‘These include Argentinian, Austrian, Chilean, French, German, Spanish, Dutch, Italian, Russian, American, and other foreign vessels, as well as mafiy British ships. Seven pages devoted to the New Zealand training ship» Amokura (as well as six pages of pictures) would appear to be unduly generous when compared with the treatment of many more important ships. Since a number of exploring ships are included, as well as such vessels as the Awatea, there seems to be no excuse for the omission of Captain Scott’s Discovery, Morning and Terra Nova, which were largely Navy- manned. The 48 pages of illustrations grouped in the middle of the book include many of great historical interest, but some could have been replaced by

others of greater value.

S.D.

W.