SCHOOLBOY SOLDIER

Feilding Star, Volume 10, Issue 3998, 12 April 1933, Page 5

SCHOOLBOY SOLDIER

. . ENI/ISTEI) WITEN 15 NEW ZEALAND’S YOUNGEST (Pei Press Association), Auckland, April lii Believed to be the youngest member of the New Zealand Expeditionary Force to serve overseas during the Great War. Mr. F- J- Ewart, formerly' Private No. 12-975. is still smiling, even though to-day he is a unit, in Aucklan Vs regiment of unemployed. lie enlisted when only 15 years of age, and his certificate of discharge shows over four and a half years’ service overseas. Over at Birkenhead there is a relief worker who enlisted in the Imperial Army' at the age of 14 years. It. is claimed for Mr. Ewart that lie was llie youngest New Zealand soldier to serve overseas, and the claim is supported in writing by Colonel. A. Plugge. commandant of the Auckland Battalion, Main Body', who says that, as far as his knowledge goes. Private No. 12-975 is entitled to the recordPrivate* Ewart, who was born in Auckland, enlisted at Epsom on September 7. 1914. At that time lie , was one month under the age of 1(*» and at ten ling school. He was on board the steamer Waimana, as drummer bo.v with the Auckland Infantry' Band, when the ship sailed for Egypt with the Main Body.