BASE RECORDS

Evening Post, Volume XCI, Issue 146, 21 June 1916, Page 5

BASE RECORDS

.WORK IN NEW BUILDING,

Few people have an adequate conception of the tremendous amount of work preformed at the Base Records Office in time of war. To keep a complete'record of each soldier who leaves the Dominion, with his possible subsequent sickness, wounds, or death, and to be able to supply the information to any enquirer inside a couple of minutes, is indeed a task of magnitude, but it has apparently been successfully overcome under the control of Major Norton Francis, Director of Base Records. When the war commenced .and the first bodies of soldiers had left New Zealand it became evident. that proper provision had not been made for the keeping of records, anil the small rooms at Bucklestreet soon became altogether too small to cope with the work. Larger premises were acquired in the city, but they in turn proved all too small. ' Following on a reconstruction of this branch of the Department, a large new building has been' erected immediately at the rear of , Government.-Buildings, and it became the home of Base Records from Monday last. The new. building is an exceedingly simple but convenient one. It is as nearly fireproof as a structure can be, composed as it is almost entirely of galvanised iron, lined with asbestos sheets. Comparatively little timber has been made use of. It is estimated. that when the time comes for the building to be dismantled the materials available for use again will represent' half the cost of construction. The. new structure is roomy, well lighted, and well ventilated, conveniently divided up into, sections for the efficient prosecution of the work. Provision has been made for ; that 'extension which it is thought' may be rendered necessary by the increase in the work to be handled as time goes on.

Moving into the new. building must have been quite a smart piece of work. The staff was' busily employed up till noon on Saturday, and. at that hour a commencement was made with the work of transfer.. This was undertaken by the Brigade Supply, arid expeditiously carried put. So much so that the great masses of documents were all in their places before 9 p.m., and all was ready to commence work as usual at 9 a.m. on Monday. Thus it will be seen that no time was lost, and the work was carried out without cost to the Defence Department, except a little overtime for civilian clerks. The transfer arrangements were attended to by the chief, clerk, Mr. B. A. Harris, to; whom the Director of Base Records pays a high tribute. .

In the records room the working of the system is most apparent. HeTe aro kept on file the personal records of over 50,000. men who have left New Zealand, in addition to a huge quantity of general correspondence. When it ig understood that any one of these files may include up to 30 or 40 documents some idea of the extent of the work may be obtained. And yet so.admirable is the system that everything works smoothly, ajid the record of any man is available for perusal in a remarkably short space of time.

At the other end of.. the building is the large public office, which is provided with a long counter, divided into three compartments :—General enquiries, hospital records, and' returned soldiers. Here, too, information can be very speedily obtained. Upstairs there is the casualty room, where cablegrams receive prompt attention, and sheaves of telegrams are sent away notifying the next-of-kin of soldiers whose names are included in the casualty list. The correspondence of the office necessitates the employment of many typistea. On an average 500 letters per day are received and dealt with, a,nd this in addition to very many telegrams.

What impresses a visitor most is the system. While necessarily' elaborate and somewhat complicated, its completeness, and the faithful manner in which attention is given to detail, tend to extremely smooth working. Major Norton Francis and those associated with him in the work of direction have, every reason to 'bo proud of the manner in which 'a smooth-running and complete system ha-s btsn evolved fwrta ft ewiAltvoa tt «»m>