RUMOURS OF COWARDICE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LII, Issue 16032, 25 September 1915, Page 5

RUMOURS OF COWARDICE.

REPLY TO MR. HORNSBY.

SERGEANT-MAJOR'S STATEMENT. [BY TEXEGKAPH. —OWX CORSESrOSDSST.^ Chbistchubch, Friday. A statement was made by Sergeant-Major Whitaker to a Christchurch Press reporter * >-' concerning Mr. J. T. M. Hornsby*s per- — sistence in talking: of . " rumours" of '"■■- cowardice amongst New Zealand . soldiers, 1 ",J~ and in demanding an inquiry. "What," * asked Sergeant-Major Whitaker, " does he * mean by persisting in interfering that there was, and demanding an inquiry? I have come at the request of wounded men here ; } : to say once more, most emphatically, ithat'-,.' there was no man on the Tahiti " who was I w not as worthy as any other soldier of fa *~* public reception. As I said before, the * * sufferings of the men who hare had enteric, '" pneumonia, meningitis, dysentery, or acute rheumatism, in ' the terrible temperatures - - of Egypt, are infinitely greater than those >~f of us who escaped with bullet and shell-, t*" wounds, and they have the additional ,; suffering that they have been* unable to '"* get to the front. . They enlisted for th« ■'■'■ front, they worked for montfes to fit them- - J|J selves for the front, they are heartbroken because they have had to come back without getting there, and then they; are in- Tsuited by Mr. Hornsby. - Surely Mr. '■.■:'. Hornsby must know that the army people ' would not send a man back here because * '--" be lost nerve.' They would simply send Whim to Malta or Lemnos for a couple of weeks, where he would recruit with the ; . men from the trenches, and go back as - ' goad as the best. We have no cowards "'" among the New Zealanders, and we do nob thank Mr. Hornsby for • spreading:" silly I. rumours and persisting in making out that'* •* there is something to inquire into. He '■•'*- wants, we .hear, to divide the men"-who W # came by the Tahiti into three classes—the V . wounded, the sick, and the " 'others.'Tl There were no'others'on the Tahiti" The "3" wounded men, Sergeant-Major Whitaker " continued, were tired of hearing of Mr. - Hornsby posing as their champion. Let him leave the soldiers to mind their bnsiiiess till he has done something to justify him in speaking on their behalf. "We didn't fight and suffer for men of the Hornsby type," he concluded. "We enlisted and did our best, just as the returned sick men have done thefr best, and the sick men who died have done their best for oar country, yet he wouliJ apparently deny a place on the roll of honour to all these poor chaps who have been stricken to death in Ecvot. I sneak feelinelv. because my familw has suffered, and suffered uncomplainingly, just as have many other families. All of my family enlisted. Three first cousins have already been killed, my brother and myself have been badly wounded, three other first cousins have been wounded, as well as 'a host of other relatives." -