The Welfare Workers

After their first experience in action and during the subsequent period of reorganisation the chaplains began to understand something of the work and value of the New Zealand welfare organisation. By a wise action of the New Zealand Government all the money collected for the Services was administered by one body, the National Patriotic Fund Board. Colonel F. Waite¹ was in charge

Church Service at Sea Nieuw Amsterdam

Rev, E. B Moore. Senior Chaplain, 2nd NZ Division, conducts Anzac Day Service, 1940 EI Staff

SENIOR CHAPLAINS
Rev. G. A. D. Spence (1944-45)

Rev. J. W. McKenzie (1942-44) and Rt. Rev. Bishop G. V. Gerard (1940-41)

Service Before BattleRt. Rev. Bishop G. V. Gerard and the Divisional Signals near KaterineGreece

Memorial Service, September 1945 Crete(L. to r.) Rev. G. A. D. Spence. Rev. Father L. P. Spring (Senior RC Chaplain). and Revs. F. O. Dawson and W. T. Huata at Suda Bay

Service Before BattleMen of the 25th BattalionBaggush

After a Confirmation—Rev. K. Harawira and the Rt. Rev. G. F.Graham-Brown, Bishop of JerusalemBeirut

page 31 of this fund in the 2nd NZEF and performed his task magnificently. He was a man who kept in close contact with the humble soldier and he allowed nothing to hinder his plans for the general welfare of the troops. He showed remarkable initiative, and at all times was most sympathetic to the work of the chaplains and supported their plans and ideas whenever possible.

The bulk of the Patriotic Fund was expended by the YMCA and the Church Army who organised the recreational huts in the camps, and in addition supplied a welfare officer and truck for nearly every unit in the Division. These welfare men were recruited partly from the home establishments of these two societies, and partly from men serving in the Army.

The Church Army is a Church of England society, and in the 2nd NZEF it consisted of a small team which ran a recreation hut in Maadi and worked with Artillery units in the field. The YMCA was a much bigger organisation and strictly undenominational. It ran excellent recreation huts, hostels, and canteens, and its Mobile Cinema Unit was an outstanding success. Both these societies were considered to be civilian organisations with civilian staffs, though they wore uniform and received Army allowances. On one or two occasions an exceptional act of courage by welfare workers could not be rewarded with a military decoration for gallantry because of this civilian status, and the award made was membership in one or other of the degrees of the Civil Division of the Order of the British Empire.

The YMCA and the Church Army are essentially Christian organisations whose members are expected to be professing Christians. As such they were of inestimable benefit to the chaplains. Every recreational hut and canteen became a centre for the chaplain's work, but in them he received not only a welcome but active cooperation also. Special places were set aside in their huts and canteens for religious services, and the staffs, besides always being present themselves, were prepared to lead the prayers in the absence of a chaplain. They kept supplies of New Testaments, religious books, and hymn books, and generally lived up to the high aims of their organisations. Their work was well controlled and inspired page 32 by the wise leadership of Mr. Shove² and Mr. Steptoe,³ and the service they gave in the field was splendid.

By dint of their brilliant and courageous efforts the New Zealand soldier was supplied with comforts in every campaign. Before action they gave chaplains supplies of comforts to distribute, and then themselves went into the line to give the soldier the things he needed. On these occasions their cheerful and zealous demeanour was much appreciated. Probably no more amazing sight was seen in the war than the Maori Battalion YMCA truck lumbering over the desert to its battalion in the middle of the Alamein battle. The chaplains were deeply indebted to these men and the organisations for which they worked, and all chaplains are concerned by the suggestion that the soldiers could have been better served by an official Army welfare unit, recruited, inspired, and directed by the Army itself. The chaplains have their doubts about this proposal and consider it unlikely that such an organisation could triumph over the problems of ‘officialdom’.

Certainly the civilian status and methods of these two organisations were often the cause of ‘administrative headaches’, and no doubt one or two of the men were failures, but could an official welfare unit ever have produced a ‘Snowie’ Watson⁴—surely one of the best-loved men in the Division—or others like him such as Riga Blair⁵ and Geoff Gray?⁶ Moreover, would an official Army welfare unit ever supply that strong Christian influence which was so apparent in the whole outlook of the welfare men?