ANNUAL R.S.A. REUNION

Press, Volume LXXXVI, Issue 26093, 21 April 1950, Page 8

ANNUAL R.S.A. REUNION

AUSTRALIAN VISITORS ENTERTAINED

More than 200 Christchurch returned servicemen of the two world wars gathered in the Jellicoe Hall last evening to meet old friends and make new. The occasion was the annual reunion of the Christchurch Returned Services’ Association.

Guests were seven members of the Australian Anzac Day delegation, officers of the Navy, Army and Air Force, and members of other returned servicemen’s organisations. Since arriving in New Zealand the Australians had been overwhelmed by hospitality, said Mr C. V. Anderson, leader of the Australian party. When they returned home the Australians would report to the Australian Returned Servicemen’s League and he would say that Australia should send as many men to New Zealand for the Anzac Day visit as New Zealand could take. Nothing did so much to cement the friendship of the two countries as the exchange of visits by old soldiers. Toasts were proposed and responded to as follows:—The King and “Absent Comrades,” Mr H. E. Batchelor, president of the association; the Australian visitors, Mr P. V. H. Maxwell, vicepresident (Mr Anderson); the armed forces, the deputy-Mayor (Mr J. N. Clarke), (Brigadier G. B. Parkinson); kindred associations, Mr D. W. Russell (Mr M. C. Naffin, president of the Christchurch branch of the A.I.F. Association). The entertainers were the Christchurch Workingmen’s CJub’s orchestra, Messrs Claude O’Hagan, Dave McGill, and Arthur Owen.