OBITARY

New Zealand Mail, 15 February 1900, Page 53

OBITARY

■ * «- MR JOHN HOGGARD.

One of the most pop-alar and efficient officers in the postal service passed away at an early hour last Thursday morning in the person of Mr John Hoggard, Chief Clerk in the Circulation Branch of the General Post Office. Mr Hoggard was in his fifty-second year—and apparently robust and vigorous. , His ‘ death came unexpectedly, and as a great shock'to the members of a community in’which he had spent the best years of • an active official life. ■ The deceased may be’'said to :have died in harness. .. Attacked .by.influenza abouta week ago, but dreading to, allow work to accumulate in his important, department, Mr Hoggard continued to labour- .• on, and it was' only on Friday last, when from sheer physical. incapacity he, was obliged to take to bed, that it was realised hgw really ill he was. Pneu-* monia developed, then inflammation of the lungs, and medical skill being unavailable to check the ravages of the latter, , he gradually sank -and died. When intimation of the sad news was made yesterday morning, flags were flown at half-mast in all quarters of the city. r ' The- name of Hoggard has been associated with the Postal Department of this colony almost from its infancy. The late Mr J. F. Hoggard, father of the deceased,;; arrived in New Zealand .in 1840,’and was one of the first postmasters in Wellington, where Mr John Hoggard was born on the 18th July, .1848, . , At; the'age. of 16 the latter en- . tered the 'Postal Department ,as a junior clerk. . For. a, -time - he"acted as mail ’ agent on ’the steamers between Port Chalmers and Melbourne. In 1871 he was appointed chief clerk of the Hokitika_ Post Office, and in 1874 became Chief Clerk at Wellington, a position which he occupied ever since. When the late Mr Hoggard joined the service in 1865 the seat of Government had just been removed to Wellington. At that period the staff consisted of the- Chief Postmaster, three clerks, two letter-carriers and one messenger. Since his return to Wellington as Chief Clerk in 1874 Ee became so

identified with the department that ho naturally became as much an institution as the Post Office itself. Shrewd, farseeing, business-like, experienced, with an aptitude for the mastery of details and with a positive love for work, ho W ti A”T °L men whose place it will he hard to fill. : Mrs Hoggard and a family of threetwo sons and a daughter—are left to racurn their loss. : . mi . LONDON, February 8. Ino death is announced of Mr Martin the chairman of the New Zealand Loan ana Msccantile Agency Company.