Government Refuses To Aid Gallipoli Men
(NZ. Press Association —Copyright) LONDON. British Gallipoli veterans would not take part in anniversary landings on April 25 because the British Government was unwilling to provide the £lOOO to £l5OO needed to help meet the cost, says the “Sunday Times.”
Mr Rex Palmer, a 60-year-old veteran of both world wars who was organising the British contingent, wrote to the Foreign Office last June asking for help. “They were to get in touch with the Ministry of Defence or the Treasury," he said. “They never actually wrote to me to say no. They just kept me hanging on.” Mr Palmer started planning in August, 1963. By September he had 200 replies and the number rose later to 400. Turks Agreed With Foreign Office assistance he got the Turkish Government to agree to the landings on the beaches at Helles and Suvla where they hoped
to meet some of the Turkish veterans who fought the British.
Mr Palmer, who was a 19-year-old subaltern in the sappers when he landed at Suvla Bay. wrote hundreds of letters to veterans in Britain, Australia and New Zealand. He said he was £2OO or £3OO out of pocket. Ship Arranged He asked Thomas Cook and Sons to arrange an itinerary for about 100 veterans and negotiated with a shipping company in Istanbul for the use of the vessel, Izmir, from which the landings could be made. The total cost to each veteran would have been just over £lOO, but 20 found they would have difficulty raising
the money. Mr Palmer thought the Government would meet half the cost for them.
“We waited and waited but I was then told that the Izmir could not be held for 20 people,” he said. The deposits had not been returned to those who booked to go. The Foreign Office said that Mr Palmer was told in January that there was no possibility of public funds being made available. The Australians and New Zealanders are going ahead with their own anniversary landings.
They will board a Turkish ship at Athens, go to Malta, Tobruk, Alexandria and Beirut, and arrive at Gallipoli on April 24.
Government Refuses To Aid Gallipoli Men
Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30724, 13 April 1965, Page 9
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