Down and Out

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 641, 18 April 1929, Page 16

Down and Out

CITY’S FLOTSAM AND JETSAM Help for Human Derelicts ALONG Albert Street, is a dirty, disreputable looking hall. But in it a lot of good work is done, for it is the headquarters of the Down and Out Mission. Here, on Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday evenings, drift the flotsam and jetsam of Auckland —broken, despairing men—workless —tattered and penniless. Here, they will get a warm meal and perhaps a bed ticket.

The missioner in charge is Mr. F. Williams. He is a gardener by trade and his hobby is helping the broken people of the city. But he is handicapped by lack of funds. He is helped in his work by social workers from other churches and funds are entirely by voluntary subscription, and the help given by the Shop Assistants’ Charity Club. Clothing is distributed and help is given to very poor families in addition to the men’s mission work. The vagrants of the city are rounded up on three nights a week, and their drab lives are brightened. A Sun man made a call at the mission last evening. The hall itself w r as a bleak place, inside and out. Twenty years ago it was the Central Mission Hall, but today it is tottering into decay. Inside, the walls were stained with rainwater and the bareness of the hall was shown up by the electric lights set high against the ceiling. At the far end was a raised stage. The body of the hall was filled with rows of chairs and benzine boxes. On the Walls were crude illustrated texts urging sinners to redemption. Over the inside of the entrance flared a huge coloured sign: “Get Right With God.” CHEAP LIQUOR Over thirty down-and-outs were seated when the service commenced, and odd ones straggled in throughout the meeting. Many of them were drunk and garrulous. “Methylated spirits,” said the missioner. “It keeps the cold out and is cheap. They drink cblorodyne and painkiller, too. Some of the men who come here have been doctors and lawyers, but now they are down in the pit. They feel the hand of every man is against them.” The meeting opened with prayer. An old man, tattered, unshaven and dishevelled, rocked himself as ho prayed, punctuating the missioner’s words with loud “Amens’” A hymn, “Where Is My Wandering Boy To-night?” followed. The men were cold and took the refrain up feebly. “Now put some ginger into this, and let’s hear from you!” cried the missioner. Once again the hymn was taken up; but the missioner stopped the music and urged them again; “Really, you’d think you were going to a funeral! You don’t want to be down and out! You want Co be up and in!” The hymn was sung with vigour. A few verses from the Bible were

read, followed by another hymn, the missioner stamping his feet to keep time. An old man, with grey hair and beard and a high, scholarly forehead, sang with gusto, his face tilted back and his eyes shut. A hopelesslooking man with a bandage over his eye sang nervously, looking sideways at his fellows.

“Now we’ll have, some testimony,” said the missioner. A stout elderly man got up and told how “God had lifted him out of the pit.” Four months ago he was down and out. Now, he was doing well. A tall, thin young man followed, speaking with his eyes shut and urging his hearers to repentance. He seemed sincere. “Rescue the Perishing” was sung with a swing, and then a short* dumpy man, speaking with a strong foreign accent, told how he had left home at 18 and sailed the seven seas under the flags of five different nations. He had been converted in a mission in Chicago, U.S.A., when he was sailing the Great Lakes. Hymns and Bible readings followed. The men seemed restive, though they bore the long service patiently in the cold room. A man with a yellow coat with a six-inch split across the back entered during the singing of a hymn, and began a loud conversation with a small man. “I don’t give a darn for anything ” could be heard as the singing stopped suddenly. The missioner frowned at the interruption. A bleary-eyed man in the back of the hall began to interrupt the service. “That’ll do! Au! » That’s enough!” he kept saying. “Boys, is it fair that one man should interrupt our meeting?” the missioner appealed. The “boys” huddled closer together for warmth, and with heads down, chorused “No!” The missioner told the interrupter he must go out. He would not, and there was a scuffle in the back of the hall, the breaker of the peace being pushed out of the door. There was peace for a minute, then the door pushed open again and the red face of the interjector appeared. “I’ll stop you! I’ll stop you!” he screamed. The door was shut again and he drifted away into the cold night. MORE BEDS WANTED Then came an address by the missioner himself. He told how he had been a drunkard and opium-smoker and how, when he was down and out, he was converted in'that very hall 20 years ago. Since then he had worked ! for the furtherance of the Kingdom of

Godf He pleaded with his hearers to cast their burdens on the Almighty. A fair-haired youth, with a silky, fair moustache and no chin, suddenly discovered the top of a beer bottle was sticking out of his hip-pocket. He hastily pulled his coat over it and huddled himself with his face between his knees. All the men were shivering. Then came the star turn of the evening. Tea and bread and biscuits were brought out and distributed, the men falling to hungrily. A little Scottish-speaking fellow came up to the Sun man with a complaint. Fie was smoking a cigar. “One of those mission coves asked me why I was smoking a cigar,” he said. “Just because I’m a fireman, is that any reason why I can’t smoke a cigar as well as the skipper? If a blooming toff gives me a cigar, can’t I smoke it?” The missioner came to the door to distribute bed tickets. There w r ere only 12 to go round 50 men, and there was a fierce' struggle to get them. Some of the men pleaded pitifully for a bed, but had to be turned away. The mission did not have the funds to deal with them. The lucky ones departed and the rest drifted into the darkness of Albert Street, some to go to the parks, there to lie huddled in papers through the long, cold night, some to find their favourite alleyways and some to the shacks they called “home.”