HOWSE, V.C.

Sun (Christchurch), Volume II, Issue 593, 4 January 1916, Page 11

HOWSE, V.C.

A PERSONAL SKETCH. MODEST HERO. (By 6 I. B.) Surgeon-General Howse, V.C., C.8.! What a record for a New South Wales country doctor! Yet I verily believe be does not care much about his decoration for valour. And I am quite certain that he does not care twopence about the Surgeon-General and the C.B. Howse should never have been a doctor. „His taste is for fighting. At anyrnte, if he cannot fight he likes to be where it is. And he does not take advantage of the fact that he is a doctor. He saw fight in South Africa, in German New Guinea, and in Gal- ; lipoli, where he still is. Yet, although, he is a non-combatant, he will not wear a non-combatant's badge. The red cross, although he should wear: it, is not for him. He .simply refuses to put it on. I was up at New Guinea, too, and as time dragged I tried to drag out of Howse the story of how he gained the V.C. in South Africa. I was the more keen to get it, because no one else had succeeded in doing so. He was a colonel then. Thet first time I tackled him I said, "Tell me how you got the V.C, Colonel." "I haven't got time just now," he said. "I'll tell you to-morrow." He fled. I followed him. The Bcrriraa is a big boat, but not so big that one man can lose another. A Kindly Thought. I found him downstairs. A group of soldiers surrounded him. He was handing out books. "When you've read 'em," he said, "pass them on." As you are sitting at your ease reading this story you will not perhaps quite realise how his action was appreciated. "What are you giving them?" I asked. "Well," he said, "I am not so sure about it, but I believe there's something by Charles Garvice, a couple by Marie Corelli, and three or four by Victoria Cross.* 1 "But fair dinkum, Colonel?" The eyes of the P.M.O. twinkled. "Well," he said, "I didn't have time to buy all I should have liked but I knew the boys would not think to bring any reading matter for themselves, so in the last hour I had to myself I slipped up town and got some stuff by Henry Lawson—both prose and poems. You have read, of course, his 'When your pants begin to go?' Yes, I knew you had. And I had to get something by Kendall and Gordon, and Barcroft Boake —you know him, don't you?—and Banjo Patterson,, and but excuse me."

And the colonel was gone. ; I saw the wireless operator later. "Sawbones," he volunteered, "is always waiting for the message that the Germans have got into Paris." I saw Howse next morning. "The Germans haven't got into Paris yet," I started. "They will, though, I am afraid," he said very gravely. "Will that end the show?" 1 asked. "No," he said. "It will he only the start." We sat together mute for some minutes. "What about that V.C.?" I asked, as if it had just occurred to me. "No, I don't think it will rain," said the colonel. I didn't get a chance at him for some days. Then I tackled him again. But he got in first. "You are here for the Sun," he said. "If there's any scrapping, are you going to see it for yourself, or are you going to get the stories second-hand?" "First hand," I said promptly. "flow?" he said. That got me. "I don't know," I said. I am afraid, rather lamely. "I am with the staff, they must not get in the firing-line. Perhaps there will be some way out." "There is," he said. "Follow me." "But are you with the staff, loo?" I said. He laughed—that is, as far as he will permit himself to laugh. "I used to think that, too," he said presently. "But all you have to do is to walk on. If a staff man asks you —I mean me—where you are going, you say, 'There is a wounded man ahead needs attention,' and on you go. You get up to the firing-line, and then see the whole show. All you have to do is follow me." One night I was having a whisky and soda. "Have one?" I suggested. "I have yet to taste my first drink," said Howse. But he has his vice. He smokes cigarettes incessantly. He is one of the lost crowd who inhale before breakfast. He smokes cigarettes between courses at dinner. When he is not sleeping he is smoking—a very had example, some will say, for a medical man to set. The Story at Last. One night I got the story, or rather his version of it.

"I was going along on horseback," be said,."when something happened, and J was on Hie ground away from my horse. Then 1 lost consciousness. When I came to again I tried to make out what bad happened. I Cell myself all over. There were no bones broken, nor were there any bullet wounds. I staggered ever to my horse, about 10 yards away. He was dead—and minus his head. It bad been blown oil' by a shell. Out in the open I saw some wounded men lying under a heavy fire. In a dream, I walked out and carried one to cover. Then I brought in another. It was when I was out after the third that I began to collect my scattered wits. I must have, as for my third journey I.deliberately picked out a bugler, because he did not weigh so much as the others." j ."They all recovered from their) wounds, I am glad to say," the

colonel concluded. "I slill get letters from two of them." Indifferent to Death.

I never met a man absolutely indifferent to death until I met Howse. When young Dr Pockley died a hero's death in the attack on the German wireless station Howse commented, "What tough luck for the youngster! Shot an hour after being in the real thing. It would not have been so bad if be had had a day of it!" When Howse saw there was to be no more fight in New Guinea he became restive. He remarked one night, "There's nothing more for you here." "No," I said. "I'm off tomorrow. lam permitted to go back on the Berrima." "Perhaps I will be with you." The colonel was very busy for the rest of the night. He called upon Rear-Admiral Patey on the Australia, and came away with permission to do something the admiral had not permitted before. It was to use the wireless to get into communication with the Australia. I had vainly tried to get it to send the story of the loss of the submarine AEI. Howse was on the Berrima when she sailed. "How did you do it?" I asked. "I got a message away," he said, "which induced the Australian authorities to believe that my services would be more valuable in Gallipoli than in Rabaul." On arrival in Australia Colonel Howse did not have time to see his relatives before he was off to a front where there was more scope for his activities, and where his deeds have not only earned him promotion, but have called forth the recognition of the King. Now I am waiting for him to come back to tell me the story of how the Turks shot a bit of his ear off.