AUSTRALIAN OFFICERS

Wairarapa Age, 15 November 1919, Page 5

AUSTRALIAN OFFICERS

EMBARKINIJ FOR HOME.

(By Electric Telegraph.—Copyright.) (Auatralian-NJS. Cable Association.) Received hast Night, 9.15 o'clock. LONDON, Nov. 12. Generate--. Bird wood, Monash, McGlynn, and Wisdom, together with 250 other Australian officers and men, with many dependents, are sailing for Australia aboard the Ormonde on Saturday.

The Australian Press Association interviewed General Monash, who said: "''l am» jo Jy glad to find myself on the eve of departure. I have been away from home for five years, but the last nine months have been much more strenuous than the four years of war. Demobilisation has proved a stupendous task. It would be difficult enouch in neace. .Tim«. with the help of a, trained staff, to transport a city of 200,000 people to the Antipodes in nine months. We have succeeded in completing the bulk of the embarkation in eight months. In enlisting the sympathy of the men, I have followed the principle of conduct that Has animated me throughout the war, based on the experience that if you give an Australian a fair deal he will do anything in the world for you. The mutual confidence of the men and officers was the bedrock of the success of the Australians in the war. One is almost tempted to think that, as against the terrible losses Australia has suffered, there are very substantial benefits in the moral uplifting and vast educational expert ences gained by the young men of Australia." J