SIR JOHN DUIGAN RETIRES

Southland Times, Issue 24440, 21 May 1941, Page 6

SIR JOHN DUIGAN RETIRES

NEW ARMY CHIEF FOR NEW ZEALAND

LIEUTENANT-GENERAL SIR GUY WILLIAMS

(P.A.) WELLINGTON, May 20. The Minister of Defence, the Hon. F. Jones, announces that LieutenantGeneral Sir Guy Williams, late General Officer Commanding, Eastern Command, Britain, succeeds General Sir John Duigan as Chief of the General Staff. Sir John Duigan’s retirement is announced. _ “It is with greatest reluctance, said the Acting Prime Minister, the Hon. W. Nash, “that the Government has acceded to Sir John Duigan s request that he should be permitted to retire. While he has for some lime been anxious to go, he consented to remain at his post at the special request of the Government. But now he feels that his health, which has been indifferent for some time, will no longer stand the severe strain which the duties of Chief of the General Staff demand. “I would like to take this opportunity on behalf of the Government, of paying a sincere tribute to Sir John Duigan’s outstanding services,” said Mr Nash. “Because of its confidence in him and because of his experience and sound grasp of the defence problems of New Zealand, his term has been extended on several occasions. It was his duty to plan and to organize the mobilization and training of the New Zealand Forces and this task he and his staff performed in a manner which must earn them the appreciation and gratitude of the people of the Dominion. His wish to do his duty at whatever cost to himself is, I know, the mark of a good soldier, and I am voicing the opinion of all who have been associated with him in saying that no soldier could have served his country better than has Sir John during the four years of his term as Chief of the General Staff. Before his retirement, Sir John proposes to visit the main camps throughout the Dominion.” SIR GUY WILLIAMS’S CAREER The New Zealand Government had asked the British Government for the loan of a senior military officer for a few months to advise the New Zealand Government on problems relating to the organization and training of the New Zealand military forces, said Mr Nash. The services of LieutenantGeneral Sir Guy Williams had been placed at the disposal of the New Zealand Government and he was on the way to New Zealand accompanied by a small staff. Born in Bangalore in 1881, Sir Guy Williams entered the Army in 1900 and served throughout the last war. He was promoted to the rank of lieu-tenant-general in 1938. Sir Guy has held many important military posts. He was general staff officer at the military college at Quetta from 1922 to 1923, deputy military secretary at the War Office from 1923 to 1927, army instructor at the Imperial Defence College from 1928 to 1932 and chief engineer of the Aidershot Command from 1932 to 1934. In 1937 he was appointed to command the sth Division. He gained the Distinguished Service Order in 1915 and during the last war was mentioned in dispatches seven times.