Returns Because Of Vietnam Call-up

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31142, 19 August 1966, Page 11

Returns Because Of Vietnam Call-up

(N.Z. Press Association-Copyright) MELBOURNE, August 18. A Welshman who was a prisoner of war for three years during the Second World War and whose English wife saw a queue of London children blown to pieces by a “buzz bomb” are taking eight of their nine sons back to England to save them from going to Vietnam.

They are Mr and Mrs Des Pugh, of South Dudley, a hamlet near Wonthaggi. Mrs Pugh said today she is prepared to give up their Australian friends, and face English winters and poorer working conditions “for the sake of the boys.”

Mr Pugh, aged 46, said: “If Australia were threatened my wife and I would volunteer, but we have not brought nine boys into the world to have them shot.” Their eldest, David, an apprentice butcher, will be 20 on Saturday. He has completed his national service papers and is remaining in Australia. He says: “I respect dad’s opinion. But my job, my friends, my future and the girl I have gone with for five years are here. I’ll take my chance on Vietnam.” His father says, “David can stay. I’m concerned about the others. “The war in Vietnam has been going for 25 years. It could last another 25. There is no point to it. “Australia and America are

out of step with the remainder of the world on Vietnam. “The Second World War was different: it was a just war. I volunteered. I need not have because I was a miner in a protected industry.”