RETIRED ON SUPERANNUATION

Evening Post, Volume XCIII, Issue 28, 1 February 1917, Page 8

RETIRED ON SUPERANNUATION

MAJOR JAMES O'SULLIVAN,

At his own request, Major James O'Sullivai), Inspector of Equipment and Ordnance, Stores, yesterday retired from active duty in the Defence Department, after nearly thirty-nine years continuous service, during sixteen years of which he was in charge of the Defence Stores Branch. Trained as an agricultural student in Ireland, Major O'Sullivan was attracted to New Zealand in 1876. After spending a year at gold mining on the West Coast, he came to Wellington and joined the Native Department, but disliking the close confinement of an office, he obtained a transfer to the Armed Constabulary, and in December, 1878, ho was sent to Opotiki. In the following year the Taranaki Natives began to be troublesome, and Major O'Sullivan, with other A.C. men, was sent, after a month's training in Wellington, to New Plymouth in the Stella., Captain Fairchild. The capture of Te Whiti and'Tohu at Parihaka followed. Trouble with the Natives at Taupo occurred four years later, and Major O'Sullivan, with about 100 fellow members of the A.C. force, was despatched from Taranaki to preserve'law. and .order there. The Russian scare occurred in 1885, and the Armed Constabulary were sent to Wellington and Auckland to build forts and mount guns, chieHy 64----pounders. This was really the foundation of our coastal, defensive system. In that year Major O'Sullivan became clerk to the late Capt. S. C. Anderson, Officer in Charge of the Defence Stores, and on the fetter's death he was ap-. pointed temporarily to the position. Mr. Seddon subsequently made the appointment permanent, as a ■ recognition of Major O'Sullivan's good work in equipping tho contingents sent to the Boer War. Under the Council of Defence he was made a captain, and he became honorary major on the recommendation of General Godley. Two of Major O'Sullivan's sons are in the non-commissioned officers' class at Trentham, and the other is in the machine-gun section at Fcatherston.