NEW ZEALAND’S PART IN THE WAR

Dominion, Volume 33, Issue 101, 23 January 1940, Page 6

NEW ZEALAND’S PART IN THE WAR

Deeds Stirred Australia

AIR AND SEA BATTLES The part New Zealanders had already played in the present war was referred to by Senator P. A. M. Mcßride, assistant Minister of Commerce, representing the Government of the Commonwealth of Australia, at the Wellington provincial centennial celebrations in I’etone yesterday. References to the war also were made by Lord Willingdon, representing the Government of the United Kingdom, and the mayor of Wellington, Mr. Hislop. One appreciated the prompt manner in which New Zealand jAj ne( l with other parts of the EmpireTn the conflict in which they were now engaged, said Mr. Mcßride. Australia looked with very great pleasure at the noble deeds the men of New Zealand already had achieved overseas. New Zealand airmen were in the fray from the start and their deeds stirred the people of Australia as no doubt New Zealand had been stirred. One of the great things of the war was the naval engagement with the Graf Spee in which New Zealand was again to the front, and Australia offered her congratulations.

Mr. Mcßride said he hoped that in the not far distant future Australia’s men would co-operate with New Zealand’s to help finish the war and bring about a lasting peace. He said that well knowing that a lasting peace was the ideal In the last war. “Because of that experience we will foe able to make a peace on this occasion more lasting than the other peace,” he said.

Lord Willingdon said he trusted with all his heart that “this great Dominion, which is doing so much for us in these difficult times, will progress an'd prosper exceedingly after we have won the war, which I am confident we shall do.”

“It is when we look into the history of the past hundred years that today we know what we are fighting to save,” said Mr. Hislop. “This is a time when the nation can best gain the inspiration that it needs—when it can look into its past history, know its story, know how step by step the spirit of liberty and freedom has grown—surely that is .the time when all of us can well celebrate the past with the firm resolve that we will be worthy of that past. AV hen we look l\t what has been done, can we not, more strongly than ever, resolve to do what we can, whatever ithe cost, to uphold the principle of Christianity and ordered liberty and freedojn against the powers of darkness and bestiality? Let us be resolved that we will be worthy of the monument to the people whose memory we shall ever keep green.”