THE PENGUIN STEWARDESSES.

Marlborough Express, Volume XLIII, Issue 59, 5 March 1909, Page 6

THE PENGUIN STEWARDESSES.

DESIRE TO PERPETUATE THEIR

MEMORY

(New Zealand Times.) The sympathetic and spontaneous response following the suggestion made in these columns on Saturday with reference to the late Mrs Hope, and Mrs Jacobs, the stewardesses who were lost in the Penguin wreck, leaves no room for doubt that the public is only too anxious to be given the opportunity of proving its .sympathy with any movement having for its basis the honouring of the memory of those two heroic souls. Lady Ward, with characteristic kindness, is among the many who have expressed sympathy with the idea, along with an offer to subscribe to a memorial. Asked to give an expression of opinion as to what form she considered a memorial should take, Lady Ward said she thought the public wish would be better served if instead of a monument the funds accruing from a public subscription were devoted to the founding and maintaining of a children's cot in the Wellington Hospital. "It seems to me specially appropriate," said Lady Ward, "in view of the fact that the last moments of those splendid women were spent in succouring and cheering the helpless little ones."

The suggestion made in Saturday's columns that each of the New Zealand Mayoresses be circularised and asked to institute a fund in their town, met with Lady Ward's entire approval. The subscriptions she considered should be limited say to a shilling, so that everyone should be given the opportunity of subscribing. Asked if she thought subscriptions should be limited to women, Lady Ward said she hardly thought that men, wishing to show respect and admiration of the heroic conduct of Mrs Hope and Mrs Jacobs, should be debarred from so doing. Whatever form the memorial should take would have her hearty co-opera-tion.

Mrs Findlay, while expressing her entire sympathy, also offers to cooperate in any organised effort that may be decided upon. "As far as I can hear," the Attorney-General's wife said, "the desire to do something to perpetuate the memory" of these noble women is very widespread, and the article appearing in Saturday's Times has crystallised public sentiment. To raise some lasting memorial to the women* who typified our highest ideals of womanhood is our manifest duty."

Mrs Findlay thinks that to found and endow a children's cot in tho Wellington Hospital would be a very suitable memorial. She also expressed the opinion that there should be no delay in inaugurating a fund. It was one of those occasions when if anything were to be done, it were well it were done quickly.

The Mayoress (Mrs T. W. Hislop) had, it seems, prior to the suggestion appearing in the Times, been in communication with the Town Clerk (Mr Palmer) with reference to the matter, and for the proper" organisation of a fund for the purpose of a memorial. On the subject of what form such memorial should take, Mrs Hislop was reticent; but on this head, something will probably transpire when she returns from a short sojourn .in the country, whither she goes today in the interests of her health, which has latterly been very indifferent. In the meantime those intending to contribute to a memorial may send their subscriptions to the Mayoress's fund, care the Town Clerk, Wellington, by whom they will be acknowledged. !

Letters and verbal expressions of sympathy with the object, coupled with a desire to render assistance, have continued to flow in..