Army Officer To Retire After 27 Years’ Service

Press, Volume XCIX, Issue 29263, 22 July 1960, Page 10

Army Officer To Retire After 27 Years’ Service

Lieutenant-Colonel S. B. Wallace, 0.8. E., director of electrical and mechanical engineering at Army Headquarters, will retire shortly after 27 years’ service with the Regular Army. He has been head of the corps of the Royal New Zealand Electrical and Mechanical Engineers since its formation in 1946.

Educated at Timaru Boys’ High School and Canterbury University College, he graduated with degrees in both electrical and mechanical engineering. After practical engineering experience with the Works and Railways Departments, he was commissioned in the Regular Army as assistant ordnance mechanical engineer and inspecting ordnance officer. From 1936 to 1938 he studied a wide range of electrical, mechanical and optical equipment at the Military College of Science and Woolwich Arsenal. He supervised the installation of most of the fortress-control equipment for New Zealand’s coastal defence before and in the early part of the Second World War. During the campaign in Italy,

Lieutenant-Colonel Wallace commanded the Armoured Brigade workshops. Towards the end of the war he went to Britain to study at the School of Tank Technology before being attached to the Department of Tank Design. Lieutenant-Colonel Wallace was a member of a Commonwealth intelligence committee which had the task of interrogating important enemy\ngineering and scientific leaders in Europe. On his return to New Zealand late in 1945, Lieutenant-Colonel Wallace was appointed director of mechanical transport and on the formation of the new corps of Royal New Zealand Electrical and Mechanical Engineers in 1946, became its first director.