UNITY OF NAVY

Evening Post, Volume CVIII, Issue 81, 2 October 1924, Page 5

UNITY OF NAVY

THE ADELAIDE AT HOME

MEN MARCH THROUGH LONDON

WELCOME BY ADMIRALTY.

(UNITED PRESS ASSOCIATION.—COPYRIGHT.)

(AUSTRALIAN-NEW ZEALAND CABLE ASSOCIATION.)

(Received 2nd October, noon.)

LONDON, Ist October. Three hundred and sixty officers and men of H.M.A.S. Adelaide have arrived in London on a two-days' visit. They deposited their- kits in the morning at the Union Jack Club, and marched to the Admiralty, laying a handsome wreath of begonias, lilies, yellow roses, and lily of the valley at the foot of the Cenotaph as they passed Wliitehall. Alter the reception at the Admiralty the men of the Adelaide spent the rest of the day at Wembley. Admiral Field desired to participate in the ceremonies, but was unable to leave Portsmouth.

. The men of the Adelaide marched tothe Horse Guards Parade, where Lord Chelmsford and the members of tha Board of Admiralty inspected them. Lord Chelmsford shook each officer by the hand. The company then formed three sides of a square around Lords Chelmsford, and the high-hatted officials of,the Admiralty were accompanied by the less conventional Mr. J. H. Thomas and Sir Joseph Cook. Lord Chelmsford, in officially welcoming the party, recalled being in Australia at the birth of the Australian Navy, since when the Navy had received its baptism in war. The world knew how it had acquitted itself. He was confident that the new arrangement for. an annual exchange of British and Australian warships would be to the benefit of all. He declared it impossible to give the Adelaide's men a better reception than the right royal reception accorded the British Squadron in Australia, but they welcomed them from the bottom of their hearts. "We want you really to feel at home," he said, "and return and tell your friends you had a good time." Mr. J. H. Thomas reminded the naval men that their task was a common one. Although they represented the Australian Navy, the interchange arrangements indicated that the defence of the great Commonwealth was a national concern undertaken by all Mr. Thomas humorously refused to ask, even privately, the men's opinion of the British weather, as it could only be expressed in naval language, which was the only thing Britain could not control. "You have good weather. We have a good country. Wo are proud of you and your past, and we are assured of your future. We hope you will take back the pleasantesfc recollection of real British hospitality."

The ceremony concluded with ringing cheers by the naval men for the Board of Admiralty. Mr. Thomas's references to the weather were due to the fact that the men ou their arrival found London shrouded in a fog typical of November.