Press Tribute To Miss Gertrude Drayton

Northern Advocate, 27 May 1941, Page 5

Press Tribute To Miss Gertrude Drayton

LONDON, April 24

A tribute to Miss Gertrude Drayton, C.8.E., secretary of the Victoria League, who lost her life through enemy action, is paid by “The Times”. “By her death not only has the Victoria League lost a quite invaluable secretary, but the Empire has lost one whose services to the promotion of goodwill among the citizens of our w r hole Commonwealth of Nations were of outstanding quality,” it stated.

“Beginning her work during the last war, when she organised hostels for overseas soldiers, the value of which was widely appreciated, throughout the years of peace she was the mainspring of the Victoria League’s work in organising hospitality for visitors to this country from the Dominions and Colonies.

“To an intense activity and administrative energy she added a remarkable memory for persons and faces whereby she established personal relations with the representatives of the league’s overseas branches which were greatly widened and strengthened by visits paid shortly before the war to Australia and New Zealand. She also maintained an active correspondence with the branches so as to keep alive their interests with the central work of the league, and in all ways to promote the feeling of fellowship .among the members of our common Empire. “One particular branch of this work was the care df students who came from all parts of the Empire to. study at our universities, and she was especially successful in building up, in .collaboration with the Colonial Office, an organisation for the welfare of coloured students from East and West Africa, Malaya, and' elsewhere. “With the outbreak of the present war she threw herself heart and soul into the oi'ganisation of the King George and Queen Elizabeth Club for Service men from overseas in Malet Street, where accommodation was provided for over 400 men. The best evidence of the success of her work is found in the stream of gratitude which has flown in from the men who have experienced its hospitality amid constant difficulties and the necessity of improvising solutions for unforeseen problems. She was never dismayed and never spared herself in any emergency. Her zeal pervaded everything and inspired everybody. In this cause she laid down her life. Thousands of friends at Home and overseas, and thousands of sailors, soldiers, and airmen of the Empire will lament the passing of a gallant soul who lived and died to serve them.”