PROMOTION ANNOUNCED

Evening Post, Volume CXXIV, Issue 135, 4 December 1937, Page 14

PROMOTION ANNOUNCED

GROUP CAPTAIN T. M. WILKES

LONG SERVICE IN DEFENCE FORCES

The promotion to the-rank of Group Captain of Wing-Commander T. M Wilkes, C.8.E., M.C., A.D.C., on his secondment from the Royal New Zealand Air Force to devote the whole of his time to the duties of Controller of Civil Aviation has been approved by the Governor-General, according to an announcement made last evening by the Minister of Defence (the Hon. F. Jones).

Group Captain Wilkes has had 26 years' service in the defence forces of the Dominion. He was appointed second lieutenant in the New Zealand Staff Corps in 1911, and promoted to lieutenant in 1914, and captain in 1919. He served on the staff of the Second Infantry Brigade, New Zealand Expeditionary Force, in France, and with the Royal Air Force in 1917 and 1918. In 1920 he was second in command of the special expedition to Fiji in connection with the disturbance among the Indian population there/and on his return to New Zealand he was appointed secretary to the Air Board. In 1925 he was appointed Director of Air Services, and in 1933 he received the additional appointment of Controller of Civil Aviation. He was promoted to Wing-Commander in 1934.

With the reorganisation of the Royal New Zealand Air Force at the commencement of 1937, Group Captain' Wilkes was appointed to the Air Board as Chief Staff Officer for Equipment and Controller of Civil Aviation. -The growing demands of civil aviation, however, have rendered it necessary for an officer to give his whole ■ attention to that position, and Group Captain Wilkes has relinquished the appointment of Chief Staff Officer for Equipment.