MAIN BODY MEN.

Marlborough Express, Volume LI, Issue 87, 14 April 1917, Page 2

MAIN BODY MEN.

APPEAL .FOR CONSIDERATION

"I am sorry to see that the Government has consented to the formation of an additional New Zealand Brigade at the front, because I believe that a better use could have been made of accumulated reinforcements," said a returned soldier to a Dominion reporter. "Dons anybody ever give a thought to the Main Body men, who fought through Gallipoli, faced the Germans on the Sommc last year, and are still within sound of the guns, with hearts weary for a holiday amid familiar scenes and friendly faces? There are hundreds of these fe-lows who have I ' stuck it' right through, and if we | have a surplus of reinforcements, why. not give them a veal spell, even a. trip back to New Zealand ? "I know how those Main Body men feel, because I have been with "them. Ldts of them arc very tired— mentally tired. They would wish to < be in it when the war ends, and if the finish is coming this year my suggestion is no good. But if the j war is not going Lo end this year, ! then New Zealand ought to say to !

every man who has had. say, two .years' service: 'Come home for a! spoil, and we will send a fresh man,l to take your place.' "I remember reading a letter from one of t^hose veterans last year. He had been right through the Gallipoli campaign, except for a brief spell in hospital. Then he went to France with the New Zealand Division and fought there. This is what he wrote: " '.I seem fit enough, and am glad to be on the job, but * would dearly like a rest from it all—just a rest from the strain and the effort. Ii never knew what nerves were before, now I am nervy, and just a bit depressed. . . . 1 wonder if some of the chaps I used to know in the good old days in New Zealand are coming along to take our places for a while.' "Well, nobody took his place. He. stayed at the work in spite of the weariness, and he -was killed in action after two years' hard service. It seems to me that man ought to have had his holiday, and I wish-New Zea- j land to realise that there are lots ] more like him with the New Zealand Forces at the present time. They have done more than their share already."