GIFTS FOR TROOPS.

Auckland Star, Volume XLVI, Issue 280, 24 November 1915, Page 9

GIFTS FOR TROOPS.

DISTRIBUTION DIFFICULTIES. COL.- CHARTERS'- SUGGESTION^ The following letter 'has been received •by her Excellency the Countess of Liverpool from Lieutenant-Colonel 'A. B. Chartere, officer commanding the New Zealand Base Depot, Alexandria:*— "I have the honour to notify you that the gift goods forwarded by the Maheno were duly collected, and are now gradually being distributed. Unfbrtuntely, just as the goods arrived, our f6rces suffered very severe casualties, and it has .been most difficult to trace many of the men for whom personally addressed parcels have been 6ent, and I do not send out sneh parcels on any offchanee. All units at present in Egypt have had their gifte banded to them, and those at the front are receiving bhem as 1 quickly as their requisitions come in. "Owing to our heavy losses, it was simply waste to think of sending over to Anzac 1,000 gifts per battalion when such unit could muster only 200 men— the goods not immediately issued would have been destroyed by enemy's shells or wasted in other ways. Consequently I sent a circular to each commanding officer of company, etc., asking him to let mc know the number of men left in his unit from different districts. Here wa_ delay again, as the fighting was so heavy that I have not yet received replies from all officers written to. ' However, as those arrive tb.cy.arc immediately attended to. ;~,/7''""Sv''i r 7' ,'i..:?7-7:'" "I am sure everybody- appreciates very highly your thought fulness in supplying our brave lads with comforts, and it is a matter for sincere regret that so many of our poor fellows will not receive those 6ent to them. "Would it not be possible in future to make goods for 'general distribution'? I do not wish to dictate or interfere in the very slightest, "but our men arc now »o scattered, and are likely to be so in the future, that it i 6 most difficult to trace them; also cases addressed, for example, fourth reinforcements, sixth Tcinforccmenfcs, etc., arc practically impossible to deliver, because immediately these reinforcements join our force tbey arc split up among the original troops, and 60 absolutely lose Uheir identity. 1 make these suggestions not only for convenience in distribution, but also for the sake of quicker delivery. If all goods came for 'general distribution,' they can immediately .bo dispatched 'en Woe,' according to the average number of men in a unit. "Please accept my sincere thanks on behalf of officers and men of the New Zealand Expeditionary FoTce for the tboughtftrlness of tbe promoters of your fund; the ladies may rest content that none of the results of their 'labour of love' is wasted, and—as far as possible— everything goes where it is intended." =====