POST AT WAR OFFICE

Otago Daily Times, Issue 25428, 8 January 1944, Page 8

POST AT WAR OFFICE

AUSTRALIAN’S APPOINTMENT SYDNEY. Dec. 30.

Major-general S. F. Rowell, Australian liaison officer in the Middle East, and formerly commander of the Australian troops in New Guinea, has been appointed to an important post at the War Office. He was lent by the A.I.F. at the request of the War Office, and will leave immediately to take up his new appointment, says the Sydney Morning Herald’s Cairo correspondent. Major-general Rowell is a regular soldier, and one of the original graduates of the Duntroon Staff College. He served in the 1914-18 war as a subaltern in the Light Horse at Gallipoli. In this war he has served in Libya, Greece, and Syria as a brigadier He was a member of the General Staff of the First Australian Corps from June, 1940, to August, 1941, and then returned to Australia as Deputy Chief of the General Staff. He commanded the New Guinea forces during the critical period from August to September. 1942. He returned to the Middle East in February this year as Australian liaison officer, in which capacity one of his principal tasks has been to arrange for the repatriation of Australian prisoners. . Military officials in the Middle East welcome his appointment, and point out that his experience in active warfare against the Japanese will be very valuable in the reorientation of the British Army for service against Japan. The new post, which is regarded as very important, carries the rank of major-general.