N.Z. COMMANDER ON MONO ISLAND

Press, Volume LXXIX, Issue 24095, 3 November 1943, Page 2

N.Z. COMMANDER ON MONO ISLAND

CAREER OF CHRISTCHURCH OFFICER The commander of the New Zealand troops on Mono Island in the northern Solomons, Brigadier B. A. Row, is a well-known Christchurch officer, who commanded battalions of the Canterbury Regiment in the Great War, and has served in Greece in this war. As an officer of the New Zealand Staff Corps he was stationed in Christchurch for several years after the last war. Brigadier Row, who was born in Christchurch, was educated at Christchurch Boys’ High School and Canterbury University College. He left New Zealand with the Main Body of the N.Z.E.F. and served on Gallipoli and in France, commanding the Ist and 3rd

Battalions of the Canterbury Regiment. He was mentioned in dispatches three times and won the Distinguished Service Order in 1918. After the war he was G.S.O. 11, Southern Command, and then Assistant Adjutant and Quarter-master-General. In 1933 he was transferred to Wellington as QuartermasterGeneral at Army Headquarters. In 1940 Brigadier Row was in command of the Central Military District. Later in the same year, when the home defence forces were reorganised, he was appointed to command the Northern Field Force. He was then sent to the Middle East on a special mission. to prepare a report on conditions of modern warfare, and in this capacity went through the campaign in Greece, He was on Crete for 10 days before the German attack was launched. Brigadier Row returned to New Zealand, and after a period of duty, went to Fiji, where he was second-in-com-mand to the late Major-General 0. H. Mead. After further service in the Dominion, he assumed command of a brigade of the 3rd Division in New Caledonia.