COSTLY GOLF HOLD.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXI, Issue 18601, 8 January 1924, Page 9

COSTLY GOLF HOLD.

THE UNLUCKY THIRTEENTH.

The most expensive golf hole from the point of view of lost'balls must be the thirteenthan unfortunate number— the Wanstead course, writes Mr. G. W. Greenwood in a London paper It is a dog-legged hole of 296 yards, played from left to right round a sheet of water known as Finnis' Pond, which in some places is 30 feefc deep. At the point where the scratch man • drives over the lake the carry is 155 yards, but the smallest slice will mean a watery grave, with the ball gone for ever. In 1914 the lake was dredged, and over 3000 golf balls we're fished up from the bed. What awful tragedies these thousands of balls represent ! And it is computed that in the nine years that have elapsed another 5000 at least have been driven into itIn cash alone these figures represent a sum of £1000.

Having seen with my own eye 3 tho members of the Essex Golfing Union playing in a tournament at Wanstead', I can well understand what a destructive hole the thirteenth can be. Not less than 150 balls were lost in the pond, surely a record for the number of lost balls at one hole in a day's golf. The tragedies were many. For instance, Mr. T. W. Bangs, a 6-handicap man, put five balls one after another into the lake, and only gave up the attempt af getting across "it because he had used up all his ammunition. So for the remainder of the round his card was a horrid blank.

Mr. F. Thomas, the secretary of Wanstead, was doing remarkably well until he arrived in front of the fatal pond. Ho played six from the tee, and thus J<» stroyed his chances. Then came a scratch man, Mr. B. 0. Randall, of Romford, who, with a degree of calmness quite heroic, put three balls — was it four into this wretched pond. The ominous cry of "In again!" hecame so confusing that I lost count. What struck me as being the most remarkable thing about it all was the philosophical way in which everybody took their misfortunes. There was no display of temper such as the hurling of the club after the ball and saying, " You might as well have this as well.". It would have been excusable in the circumstances.

What Mr. A. Bishop thought of it all T can only conjecture; he took twelve for the hole. He must have come with his pockets positively bulging with golf balls But Mr. Bishop does not hold the record, it belongs, so far as I could gather, t» Mr. F. G. Dunmore, of Wanstead, who onco drove thirteen consecutive balls into the lake. And Mr. Dunmore can still afford to play golf., I envy him. But whatever anyone says about the thirteenth at Wanstead, it is a, good, sporting hole, calling for decision and nerve in the playing of it.