ROYAL GREETINGS

Auckland Star, Volume LXXII, Issue 284, 1 December 1941, Page 7

ROYAL GREETINGS

POPULAR LEADER Mr. Churchill Receives Many Birthday Gifts Britisii Official Wireless. Rec. 12.30 p.m. RUGBY, Nov. 30. Mr. Churchill received birthday greetings and good wishes from the King and Queen, Queen Mary, Queen Wilhelmina, the Grand Duchess of Luxemburg, representatives of Allied and friendly Governments, Dominion Prime Ministers and colonial Governments. Messages came also from the Army of the Nile and many official bodies, as well as public and private persons in all parts of the world.

"Mr. Churchill is to-day the spirit of Old England incarnate, with its unshakable self-confidence, its grim piety, its unfailing sense of humour, its underlying moral earnestness, its unflinching tenacity. Against that inner unity of spirit between leader and nation, the ill-cemented moral fabric of Hitler's perversion of the German soul must be shattered in the end."

This tribute to Mr. Churchill on the occasion of the Prime Minister's 67th birthday to-morrow was paid in a broadcast by Mr. L. S. Amery, Secretary of State for India.

Among the presents which Mr. Churchill received for his birthday are planes from South America and tanks from the West Indies and the Dutch East Indies. His birthday will not interfere with his work.

"Best wishes for the continuance of your difficult but magnificent task," wrote the Belgian Premier, M. Pierlot, in his message, while the Premier of Norway thanked Mr. Churchill for "his untiring efforts in the pursuit of victory."

All three of Mr. Churchill's daughters are now with the forces. Sarah (Mrs. Vic Oliver) is in the W.A.A.F., Diana (Mrs. Duncan Sandys) is nursing, and the youngest, Mary Churchill, is in the A.T.S. His only son, Major Randolph Churchill, is in the Middle East.

On his first birthday last year as Prime Minister, Mr. Winston Churchill was described as "the youngest 66-year-old in England." He still enjoys excellent health and is carrying out his stupendous task with the utmost vigour. Fortunately for the Empire and the world at large Mr. Churchill inherited not only abilities fairly to be described as genius, but also a first-class constitution. Sound health carried Mr. Churchill in his early years through four wars—in Cuba, on the North-west Frontier, with Kitchener to Khartoum, and in South Africa. In 1914 ne personally accompanied the hastilyraised force which he sent to defend Antwerp, and after the close of the illfated Dardanelles campaign he spent .some months as a combatant officer on the Western Front until he was recalled to new Ministerial office. Early in 1940 he went through the full programme of a visit to Paris and the British front, regardless of a bout of gastric influenza. To-day. thanks to the unobtrusive watch kept over him bv Mrs Churchill, he is in excellent form, constantly smokes large cigars, takes moderate exercise and enjoys a bottle of champagne with his dinner. NEW ZEALAND MESSAGE

(PA.) WELLINGTON, this day. The Prime Minister, Mr. Fraser, v? s 5^ nt the following message to Mr. Churchill:—"My colleagues and ♦u W !j you , ma "y happy returns of the day, and offer you our warmest greetings and congratulations. Wp trust you will long maintain all your health and vigour, and that under your inspired leadership the democratic countries will continue their march to victory."