C.O.’s Christmas Greetings

Observation Post, Volume 1, Issue 30, 11 December 1942, Page 3

C.O.’s Christmas Greetings

To All Ranks. We conclude twelve ..months of mobilised training. The year has been an eventful one in the history of the Regiment. From the first hectic days of sorting and issuing equipment and vehicles, the selection and forced training of personnel, to find the specialists, signallers and various tradesmen required in a technical unit. Our brief residence in local schools, the extreme'kindnesses of the local residents when our cooking was bad and administration poor, combined training with the other splendid units of the Brigade on manoeuvres through sunny Hawke Bay, live shell practice at Foxton and in the Ruahines and Tararuas, living under primitive conditions through an extremely wet and muddy winter, to our present comfortable quarters. Throughout the whole period the spirit of the Regiment has been excellent, only falling below normal on the occasions when we have farewelled gunners transferring to other units with an apparently better future. My task in command has been made easy by the loyalty, cheerfulness and a keen desire to play hard and learn, continually displayed by Officers, N.C.O. and all ranks throughout the whole of the year. lam grateful to our late 2 I/C, Adjutant and Q.M. for the long hours they have worked and the very real assistance they have given in administering and training the unit. . ■ , A' j A From before and during the war the Regiment has given hundreds ot gunners their initial training, has recently provided large numbers oi Officers and N.C.O. to form new Batteries, and has always hud the ' ambition to serve together as a unit. We hope we will, but although we train in Batteries, Regiments and Divisions, the real unit is the Royal Regiment of Artillery, and our duty as gunners is to serve the guns anywhere and everywhere the other arms require our assistance. What the future has in store we do not know except that the hard part is waiting. Many thousands of regular soldiers in Britain have waited throughout the whole of the war and are still waiting. Our period of waiting is short compared with theirs. - Kipling’s best poem, which sets out the essentials required in a man, opens with the lines, ‘ L. you can wait and not be tired by waiting.” Don’t get tired, boys, there is a ways a lot to learn, even learning to wait. A Japanese will cheerfully spend a week tied to a tree waiting for a shot, and there are still millions of J ups and millions of Huns alive who have to be eliminated before our beautiful little country, our homes and our families can be assured of a futuie. The 25pdr. with you as its servant, and every other gunner we can train will be required to play a laijge part in assisting our friends the infanteers to decide the final issue. Keep at it, make our Batteries and Regiment one of the best among gunners, and don t be tired by wait g. To each one of you, your parents, wives, families and sweethearts, 1 wish you all the best in the coming year. CHAS LOWE