The Home Front Volume I

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Spine

Back Cover

Title Page

Official History of New Zealand in the Second World War 1939–45 THE HOME FRONT

Army personnel engaged in harvesting

Official History of New Zealand in the Second World War 1939–45 THE NEW ZEALAND PEOPLE AT WAR THE HOME FRONT VOLUME I NANCY M. TAYLOR HISTORICAL PUBLICATIONS BRANCH DEPARTMENT OF INTERNAL AFFAIRS

V. R. WARD, GOVERNMENT PRINTER,WELLINGTON, NEW ZEALAND—1986 ©Crown Copyright Reserved 1986 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be produced by any means, electronic, mechanical, electrostatic photocopying or otherwise, or stored in a retrieval system, without the prior permission of the Government Printing Office. ISBN 0–477–01259–0 Typeset in 12pt Garamond and printed on 85gsm Mataura Cream Opaque Printing. Book typeset, printed and bound at the Government Printing Office, Mulgrave Street, Wellington.

Foreword

THIS book is the final volume of the Official History of New Zealand in the Second World War. This fact in itself immediately conjures up sharply etched pictures of notable New Zealanders who were involved in the planning and production of that multi-volumed History: Prime Minister Peter Fraser, a man of large capabilities, who had led the country firmly and perceptively throughout the greater part of the war and who worked so hard for a just peace; Dr E. H. McCormick, who had been the archivist for the 2nd New Zealand Expeditionary Force and who was both an innovator and a prime mover in most of the proposals that led to the political decision to have the Official History written; Major-General Sir Howard Kippenberger, a great New Zealander who uniquely combined the highest soldierly and scholarly qualities, and who was appointed Editor-in-Chief in February 1946; Dr J. C. Beaglehole, that most peace-loving of men who in his role as Historical Adviser to the Department of Internal Affairs had made a challenging team-mate for that Department's far-sighted head, Joseph Heenan, and who now made available to a small, soon to become dedicated, staff the highest precepts of scholarly performance; Professor F. L. W. Wood, always ready to wrestle with the many professional problems that continuously surrounded a project of such size and who himself wrote the volume entitled Political and External Affairs, the only major title to be reprinted; W. A. Glue, who sub-edited—or indeed in some cases edited—the complete Official History with the exception of this final volume, a contribution which has often been overlooked.

It is into this context that this book must be fitted. The final plan for the Official History divided the work into four series. The major series, ‘Campaign and Service Volumes’, comprised twenty-four volumes (including an out-of-period volume The New Zealanders in South Africa, 1899–1902), covering in separate volumes the war in the Pacific, the major campaigns such as those in Greece, Crete, Egypt and on until the final North African campaign in Tunisia, and, in two volumes, Italy. It included volumes on medical and dental services, the Royal New Zealand Navy and the Royal New Zealand Air Force; three volumes covering the activities of New Zealanders with the Royal Air Force; and three volumes of documents that go far in revealing the political involvement of New Zealand in the war.

Then there is a series, ‘Unit Histories’, covering the units of the 2nd New Zealand Expeditionary Force in the Middle East and Italy, twenty-one titles in all. Histories of New Zealand units which had served in the Pacific were written under separate arrangement. In this series the regiments, battalions and companies are treated informally and in sufficient detail to do justice to those who served in them.

A third series, ‘Episodes and Studies’, in which there are twenty-four titles, was published with the aim of reaching a wide public with brief but carefully compiled and illustrated accounts of specific aspects of the war, such as life aboard a troopship, coastwatching in New Zealand and the Pacific, long-range desert patrols, aerial and naval combat, and so on. There is much good history in this series.

Finally there is the fourth series, ‘The New Zealand People at War’, of which two volumes, Political and External Affairs, by F. L. W. Wood, and War Economy, by J. V. T. Baker, are already published. The Home Front, to complete the series, is very much the story of a people at war, treating the people separately from the armed services which they supported so well, so skilfully, with both love and anguish, for six years of war.

When Brigadier M. C. Fairbrother, who had become Editor-in-Chief on General Kippenberger's death in May 1957, asked Wellington historian Nancy Taylor to undertake the research and writing of the ‘social history’, only two things were known for certain—that it was an enormous job and that Mrs Taylor was capable of doing it. Two impressive publications already stood to her credit, for she had edited Early Travellers in New Zealand and the Journal of Ensign Best. But no one had any idea of the interaction between Industry, persistence, perception, professionalism, compassion and vision, and the sheer bulk of the material that she examined. Her thoroughness, together with the many demands of her private life, explain the time it has taken to produce this book.

Mrs Taylor has arranged in orderly sequence the events that press upon civilian existence in a time of war. Some of these events are important, even dramatic, some in their gradual unfolding of seemingly slight significance. Taken together they represent elements that constitute the day-to-day preoccupations of a nation at war. Looking back, after a lapse of some forty years, we are aware that life then was very different from life today, in domestic matters, in political affairs, in religion, education and in much else. Whether as a nation we have changed for good or ill may be a matter for debate, but no one will dispute that Mrs Taylor has set out, always with clarity and often with wit, the nature of life during the Second World War.

The book presents a carefully documented evidential account of what that life was all about. It is largely left to others to draw conclusions and to formulate social theories from the evidence. In her long and patient collection and presentation of so much material evidence, Mrs Taylor has shown herself fully entitled to be numbered with those other ‘greats’ evoked at the beginning of this Foreword.

I. McL. Wards Chief Historian Historical Publications Branch 29 November 1982

OFFICIAL HISTORY OF NEW ZEALAND IN THE SECOND WORLD WAR 1939–45

Campaign and Service Volumes Gillespie, Oliver A. The Pacific (1952) McClymont, W. G. To Greece (1959) Davin, D. M. Crete (1953) Murphy, W. E. The Relief of Tobruk (1961) Scoullar, J. L. Battle for Egypt (1955) Walker, Ronald Alam Halfa to Alamein (1967) Stevens, Major-General W. G. Bardia to Enfidaville (1962) Phillips, N. C. Italy, Volume I: The Sangro to Cassino (1957) Kay, Robin Italy, Volume II: From Cassino to Trieste (1967) Anson, T. V. The New Zealand Dental Services (1960) Mason, W. Wynne Prisoners of War (1954) Ross, Squadron-Leader J. M. S. Royal New Zealand Air Force (1955) Stevens, Major-General W. G. Problems of 2 NZEF (1958) Stout, T. Duncan M. War Surgery and Medicine (1954) ——— New Zealand Medical Services in Middle East and Italy (1956) ——— Medical Services in New Zealand and the Pacific (1958) Thompson, Wing-Commander H. L. New Zealanders with the Royal Air Force, Volumes I–III (1953, 1956, 1959) Waters, S. D. Royal New Zealand Navy (1956) Documents Relating to New Zealand's Participation in the Second World War, Volumes I–III (1949, 1951, 1963)

The New Zealand People at War Wood, F. L. W. Political and External Affairs (1958) Baker, J. V. T. War Economy (1965) Taylor, Nancy M The Home Front, Volumes I–II (1986)

Unit Histories Dawson, W. D. 18 Battalion and Armoured Regiment (1961) Sinclair, D. W. 19 Battalion and Armoured Regiment (1954) Pringle, D. J. C. and W. A. Glue 20 Battalion and Armoured Regiment (1957) Cody, J. F. 21 Battalion (1953) Henderson, Jim 22 Battalion (1958) Ross, Angus 23 Battalion (1959) Burdon, R. M. 24 Battalion (1953) Puttick, Lieutenant-General Sir Edward 25 Battalion (1960) Norton, Frazer D 26 Battalion (1952) Kay, Robin 27 (Machine Gun) Battalion (1958) Cody, J. F. 28 (Maori) Battalion (1956) Bates, P. W. Supply Company (1955) Borman, C. A. Divisional Signals (1954) Cody, J. F. New Zealand Engineers, Middle East (1961) Henderson, Jim RMT: Official History of the 4th and 6th Reserve Mechanical Transport Companies (1954) Kidson, A. L. Petrol Company (1961) Llewellyn, S. P. Journey Towards Christmas (1st Ammunition Company) (1949) Loughnan, R. J. M. Divisional Cavalry (1963) McKinney, J. B. Medical Units of 2 NZEF in Middle East and Italy (1952) Murphy, W. E. 2 New Zealand Divisional Artillery (1967) Underhill, Rev M. L., et al. New Zealand Chaplains in the Second World War (1950)

Episodes and Studies Volume 1: Guns Against Tanks, E. H. Smith; Women at War, D. O. W. Hall; Achilles at the River Plate, S. D. Waters; Troopships, S. P. Llewellyn; The Assault on Rabaul, J. M. S. Ross; German Raiders in the Pacific, S. D. Waters; Prisoners of Germany, D. O. W. Hall; Prisoners of Italy, D. O. W. Hall; Prisoners of Japan, D. O. W. Hall; Long Range Desert Group in Libya, R. L. Kay; Long Range Desert Group in the Mediterranean, R. L. Kay; Wounded in Battle, J. B. McKinney Volume 2: Aircraft Against U-boat, H. L. Thompson; Early Operations with Bomber Command, B. G. Clare; New Zealanders in the Battle of Britain, N. W. Faircloth; Leander, S. D. Waters; Malta Airmen, J. A. Whelan; Takrouna, I. McL. Wards; Coast watchers, D. O. W. Hall; The RNZAF in South-East Asia, 1941–42. H. R. Dean; ‘The Other Side of the Hill’, I. McL. Wards et al.; Special Service in Greece, M. B. McGlynn; Point 175, W. E. Murphy; Escapes, D. O. W. Hall

(These 24 booklets were first issued as individual publications, 1948–1954.)

All titles were published at Wellington, those before 1966 by the War History Branch, Department of Internal Affairs, the remainder by the Historical Publications Branch.

Preface

NEW Zealand has industriously recorded its participation in the Second World War. Forty-four solid books about the forces, accounts of army, navy and air force operations, of medical matters and prisoners of war, of special military units, are rounded off with ‘The New Zealand People at War’, a series of three titles on civilian aspects. Professor F. L. W. Wood's Political and External Affairs (1958) and J. V. T. Baker's War Economy (1965), close-packed mines of information, perception and assessment, have long proved their worth. Straggling up years behind, but closely linked with both, The Home Front seeks to cover areas which may have been touched upon but were not dealt with. The term ‘grass-roots’ inevitably, if presumptuously, comes to mind in this attempt at a social history of a community during six years when its main energies were directed to war. Despite the comprehensive treatment, readers will certainly think of things that are untouched. The social elements of history invite almost limitless exploration, illustration and qualification. Even two volumes impose stringent limits: the original draft was cut by about 150 000 words. Most of this pruning was healthy condensation and trimming of illustrative detail, but a few background pieces had to join the scrap-pile. The topics treated and the extent of the treatment are to some degree subjective; another person could have produced a very different account. I have felt throughout that I have merely scratched the surface and further material will certainly be found to cast new light on dim or unknown places. I hope that this is but a start on the social history of New Zealand in the Second World War and that others will pursue further the many enticing topics merely touched on here, let alone those untouched.

Newspapers were a main source, and the liberal access that I was given to those held by the General Assembly Library has been vital. I am deeply grateful to successive Librarians, James Wilson, Hillas MacLean and Ian Mathieson, and their staffs, for use of this material and other assistance. In the war years, through the Press Association, many local reports appeared in very similar form in papers far from their starting places. Sometimes where a report of, say, a Wellington incident was first noticed in an Auckland paper, it may be attributed to that source if Wellington papers seen later showed much the same story. Occasionally, more distant papers even printed an extra detail or two; sometimes special correspondents gave a little more information. Investigative journalism had not arrived in New Zealand and the description of press censorship in the text indicates the limitations. But newspaper reports, editorials and correspondence taken together give something of the situation as presented to and understood by people at the time. In many cases, information now available from official sources has filled in the gaps and, wherever possible, events are depicted more as they really happened than as wartime restrictions permitted people to perceive them. Nevertheless, it has been part of my purpose to make clear both versions.

I am deeply grateful to Michael Hitchings and his staff at the Hocken Library, University of Otago, for making the J. T. Paul Papers available most freely. The Alexander Turnbull Library, under A. G. Bagnall and J. E. Traue, has been very helpful, as always. National Archives, under the late John Pascoe and Judith Hornabrook, assisted me greatly in lending the relevant narratives prepared by the War History Branch and in producing records of departmental war effort. From the latter I am sure that future and more specialised histories will find much that space would not permit to be probed here.

I thank the Department of Labour for the use of an MS register of strikes. I am indebted also to all the people who responded to an appeal made in the New Zealand Woman's Weekly in 1969 for ration books and recollections. The ration books formed a mosaic evoking domestic limitations that are hard to imagine or even remember when shops are crammed. Of the recollections, a few quoted directly are acknowledged in the footnotes; all of them added to my understanding and, often invisibly, have helped to shape presentation. Because so many are thus hidden, I have not included in the list of sources used those actually quoted.

Special thanks go to the late Reverend Ormond Burton, who gave much information and illumination on the pacifist movement, and to Professor J. R. McCreary, who read over and added to the section on conscientious objectors. Janet Paul's guidance in the piece on painting was almost the writing of it.

Finally, most profound thanks are due to the Historical Publications Branch of the Department of Internal Affairs. Penelope Wheeler is entirely responsible for the biographical footnotes, apart from a great deal of diligent typing and general editorial work. Ian Wards, as editor, has been infinitely patient, stimulating and exacting in the search towards clarity, accuracy and proportion. Adequate thanks are impossible, but it should be known that he has knocked out a great many faults and bulges, demanded checks, encouraged, worked over problems, and polished everywhere, his zeal lit always with understanding and humour. Any merits are much of his making.

Special thanks also go to Ian McGibbon, the current Chief Historian, and proofreader Maree McKenzie for their exacting labours in seeing the work through the press, and to the Government Printing Office staff for their contribution to the production of this book. The index was compiled by Debbie Jones.

N. M. T.

Contents

Page FOREWORD v PREFACE xi LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS xvii ABBREVIATIONS xxi METRIC CONVERSION xxix Volume 1 1 The End of Waiting 1 2 Impact of War 22 3 The First Moves 68 4 Response from the Home Front 133 5 Pacifism 171 6 A Dissenting Minority 209 7 Conscientious Objectors and Defaulters 244 8 Blood is Spilt 286 9 The Menace of Japan 314 10 War Comes to the Pacific 330 11 The Challenge is Accepted 372 12 Defence by the People 450 13 Russia and the War 574 14 The American Invasion 621 Volume II 15 Manpower is Directed 663 16 The Shoe Pinches 742 17 More Shortages 797 18 Aliens 851 19 Censorship 886 20 Camp Followers 1014 21 Women at War 1053 22 Education 1116 23 The Arts Survive 1183 24 Victory at Last 1219 SOURCES 1297 INDEX 1309

List of Illustrations

PHOTOGRAPHS (all held by the Alexander Turnbull Library)

Frontispiece Volume I Army personnel engaged in harvesting. War History Collection facing p. 194 Peter Fraser. Reeds Collection Conscientious objectors. War History Collection Conscientious objectors in a detention camp. Liberty Loan poster. Gordon Burt Collection Draught horses in Awatere Valley, Marlborough, 1945. War History Collection Sheep droving in the Wairarapa. War History Collection Parliament grounds dug up for air raid shelters, 1941. War History Collection Entrance to an air raid shelter in Parliament grounds. War History Collection Hutt Road, showing headlight restriction notices, 1943. Evening Post Collection Installing blackout curtains. War History Collection Race meeting at Trentham, March 1943. War History Collection Soldiers working on the waterfront at Auckland. War History Collection The Somes Battalion, Home Guard, on a route march from Petone to Eastbourne, 1943. War History Collection facing p. 418 Sir Apirana Ngata. S. P. Andrew Collection J. G. Coates. War History Collection Peter Fraser with New Zealand servicemen in England. War History Collection A school air raid shelter at Devonport, Auckland. War History Collection An air raid shelter under construction, Auckland, April 1942. War History Collection Four St John ambulance nurses at the opening of the Centennial Memorial meeting house, Tawakeheimoa, at Te Awahou. Pascoe Collection EPS personnel practice first-aid. Maori section of the Women's National Service Corps on parade. Women's National Service Corps digging trenches. War History Collection Home Guardsmen. Evening Post Collection Men of the Elmwood Home Guard prepared for work on defences, December 1941. War History Collection Crib (snack) time in a wet mine, Stockton, 1944. War History Collection Denniston, 1945. Pascoe Collection United States troops at Paekakariki, 1942. War History Collection United States marines lined up with their mess gear, Paekakariki, 1943. War History Collection Polish refugees, 1945. Pascoe Collection Free apples for school children. War History Collection Frontispiece Volume II National Savings poster. facing p. 866 Waste metal collection. War History Collection Glass and paper conservation. War History Collection A winchdriver unloading war material, 1943. Pascoe Collection Soldiers building a haystack, Hamilton, 1944. War History Collection Ration books being issued by the Post and Telegraph Department at Auckland, April 1942. War History Collection A ration book page The Coast Watching Station at Oteranga Bay, only accessible by horse, 1943. Pascoe Collection Patriotic poster designed by the Governor-General, Lord Galway. Evening Post Collection Mrs Eleanor Roosevelt talking to Mrs Janet Fraser at Auckland Airport, 1943. Pascoe Collection Mrs Eleanor Roosevelt and J. T. Paul, Director of Publicity, at Government House, 1943. Pascoe Collection Girl Guides in Auckland making camouflage nets. War History Collection Aircraft construction at the de Havilland plant in Wellington, 1943. War History Collection Red Cross supplies being loaded at Wellington Wharf. War History Collection Gift food being loaded for despatch to Britain, January 1948. War History Collection A munitions factory, 1943. Pascoe Collection Manufacture of helmets. Gordon Burt Collection facing p. 1090 A member of the Women's Land Service holding a lamb for tailing at Porangahau. War History Collection Battledress being manufactured at Cathie & Sons Ltd. War History Collection Aircraft being constructed. War History Collection Grenade making at Christchurch. War History Collection Cabbages grown by the Department of Agriculture for use by United States forces, Levin, 1943. War History Collection A Levin vegetable farm, producing vegetables for reciprocal lend lease. Pascoe Collection Cabinetmakers at work at the Disabled Servicemen's Centre, Christchurch. War History Collection Motor tow-boats built in Auckland for the United States armed forces being launched in 1943. War History Collection Loading rounds into ammunition clips at the Colonial Ammunition Company's factory, Hamilton, 1944. War History Collection Woman tram conductor, Wellington, 1943. War History Collection A stack of stripped flax fibre ready for the manufacturing process with a flax bush in the foreground, Foxton, 1945. War History Collection New housing estate, Naenae, 1944. Evening Post Collection Celebrating VE Day, Lambton Quay, Wellington, 8 May 1945. War History Collection Canadian sailors in Wellington on VJ Day, 15 August 1945. War History Collection The return of the 28th (Maori) Battalion, Wellington, 1947. Two kuias express grief for the relatives of soldiers who died overseas. War History Collection Soldiers' cemetery, Karori, Wellington, 1944. War History Collection

DOCUMENTS page Permit for Railway Journey 318 Red Cross leaflet 485 Evacuation card 539 Approval notice for application for pair of gumboots 774

CARTOONS (all by Minhinnick, New Zealand Herald) ‘Westfield Aftermath’ 384 ‘To be, or not to be’ 411 ‘Moon-struck’ 412 ‘Here————There’ 414 ‘Shrunk in the Wash’ 480 ‘The Ins and Outs’ 492 ‘Reply Paid’ 610 ‘They say she knows where there's some wool!’ 763 ‘“Come and get it!”’ 782 ‘Austerity Christmas’ 794 ‘Buttercuts and Dazes’ 819 ‘We Have no Pyjamas To-day’ 844 ‘Simple Blackout Hints, No. 163’ 910 ‘Prisoner of War?’ 943 ‘Education under Difficulties’ 1136

Abbreviations

A to J Appendices to the Journals of the House of Representatives ad advertisement admin administration Admlty Admiralty aet aged AEWS Army Education and Welfare Service Aff Affairs AIF Australian Imperial Force ANZUS Australia–New Zealand–United States App Appendix Assn, Assoc Association, Associated ARP Air Raid Precautions ASRS Amalgamated Society of Railway Servants Asst Assistant ATC Air Training Corps ATL Alexander Turnbull Library AUC Auckland University College (now University of Auckland) Auck Auckland Aust Australia b born BBC British Broadcasting Corporation b'casting broadcasting Bd Board BEF British Expeditionary Force BEM British Empire Medal BHS Boys High School BMA British Medical Association br Branch C & P Censorship & Publicity Cab Cabinet Canty Canterbury CAS Chief of the Air Staff CB Companion of the Most Honourable Order of the Bath CBE Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire CBS Columbia Broadcasting System CIGS Chief of the Imperial General Staff CGS Chief of the General Staff CH Companion of Honour Chanc Exch Chancellor of the Exchequer Chap Chaplain Chch Christchurch chmn chairman C-in-C Commander-in-Chief cmdr commanding officer CMG Companion of the Order of St Michael and St George Cmssn Commission Cmssnr Commissioner cmte committee Cncl Council CNS Chief of Naval Staff Co Company Col Colonel, colonial Conf Conference Co-op Co-operative Corp Corporation CORSO Council of Organisations for Relief Service Overseas COS Chiefs of Staff CPS Christian Pacifist Society CSI Companion of the Order of the Star of India CStJ Companion of the Order of St John of Jerusalem CUC Canterbury University College (now University of Canterbury) C'wealth Commonwealth d died DCM Distinguished Conduct Medal DBE Dame of the British Empire Def Defence Dep Deputy Dept Department DFC Distinguished Flying Cross DHS District High School Dir Director Div Division Dom Dominion DSIR Department of Scientific and Industrial Research DSM Distinguished Service Medal DSO Distinguished Service Order Dun Dunedin Ed Editor ED Efficiency Decoration Educ Education, educated EFS Emergency Fire Service EPS Emergency Precautions Scheme Exec Executive Ext Aff External Affairs FCIS Fellow of Chartered Institute of Secretaries fdtn foundation Fedn Federation FNZIE Fellow of New Zealand Institute of Engineers FoL Federation of Labour FRAM Fellow of the Royal Academy of Music FRCS Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons FRS Fellow of the Royal Society GBE Knight Grand Cross of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire GCB Knight Grand Cross of the Most Honourable Order of the Bath GCIE Knight Grand Commander of the Indian Empire GCMG Knight Grand Cross of the Order of St Michael and St George GCSI Knight Grand Commander of the Star of India GCVO Knight or Dame Grand Cross of Royal Victorian Order Gen General GGNZ Governor-General of New Zealand GMT Greenwich Mean Time GOC General Officer Commanding Gov Gen Governor General Govt Government HC High Commissioner HoC House of Commons HoL House of Lords Hon Honourable, Honorary HoR House of Representatives HQ Headquarters IA Internal Affairs i/c in charge of IGS Imperial General Staff ILO International General Staff Imp Imperial IMTFE International Military Tribunal for the Far East Indep Independent Inf Bde Infantry Brigade Inst Institute Int Aff Internal Affairs ISO Imperial Service Order ISS International Student Service JP Justice of the Peace KBE Knight Commander of the British Empire KC King's Counsel KCB Knight Commander of the Bath KCMG Knight Commander of the Order of St Michael and St George KG Knight of the Order of the Garter KStJ Knight of the Order of St John of Jerusalem Kt Knight Bachelor Lab Labour Lib Liberal LIB Bachelor of Laws LM Legion of Merit LoN League of Nations LRC Labour Representation Committee Lt Lieutenant MA Maori Affairs MBE Member of the Order of the British Empire MC Military Cross memb member Meth Methodist mngr manager MHR Member of the House of Representatives MICE Member of the Institute of Civil Engineers mid Mentioned in Despatches Min Minister Miny Ministry MLA Member of the Legislative Assembly MLC Member of the Legislative Council MM Military Medal MP Member of Parliament MS Manuscript Nat National NBS National Broadcasting Service NCO non-commissioned officer NS National Service Department NZANS New Zealand Army Nursing Service NZBC New Zealand Broadcasting Corporation NZBS New Zealand Broadcasting Service NZCPS New Zealand Christian Pacifist Society NZEF New Zealand Expeditionary Force NZEI New Zealand Educational Institute NZFU New Zealand Farmers' Union NZLA New Zealand Library Association NZLS New Zealand Library Service NZMC New Zealand Medical Corps NZPA New Zealand Press Association NZPD New Zealand Parliamentary Debates NZRB New Zealand Rifle Brigade NZRSA New Zealand Returned Services Association NZU University of New Zealand NZWWU New Zealand Waterside Workers Union OBE Officer of the Order of the British Empire OC Officer Commanding Off Officer OM Order of Merit ONS Organisation for National Security Oppos Opposition Orch Orchestra OU Otago University (now University of Otago) Oxon Oxford University P & T Post and Telegraph Pac Pacific Parly Parliamentary PC Privy Councillor PEN Poets, Playwrights, Essayists, Editors and Novelists PM Prime Minister, Prime Minister's Department PMG Postmaster-General POW prisoner-of-war PPU Peace Pledge Union Pres President Presby Presbyterian PRO Public Relations Officer Prof Professor PSA Public Service Association pt part PWD Public Works Department QC Queen's Counsel QM Quartermaster QMG Quartermaster-General RAF Royal Air Force Rehab Rehabilitation rep representative Rev Reverend RFC Royal Flying Corps RNAS Royal Naval Air Service RNR Royal Naval Reserve RNVR Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve RNZAF Royal New Zealand Air Force RSA Returned Services Association Rt Right RTA Railway Trades Association Sec Secretary SM Stipendiary Magistrate S Mil Cmd Southern Military Command Soc Society SSDA Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs Superint Superintendent Ty Treasury TEAL Trans-Empire Air Line TV Television UKHC United Kingdom High Commissioner UN United Nations UNESCO United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation USA United States of America USSR Union of Soviet Socialist Republics UNRRA United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration VAD Voluntary Aid Detachment VC Victoria Cross VD Volunteer Decoration, venereal disease Ven Venerable vol volume VUC Victoria University College (now Victoria University of Wellington) WAAC Women's Auxiliary Army Corps WAAF Women's Auxiliary Air Force WCC Waterfront Control Commission WDFU Women's Division of the Farmer's Union WEA Workers' Education Association Wgtn Wellington WHF War History File WHN War History Narrative WRNZNS Women's Royal New Zealand Naval Service WVS Women's Voluntary Services WW World War WWSA Women's War Service Auxiliary Yearbook New Zealand Official Year-book YMCA Young Men's Christian Association YWCA Young Women's Christian Association

Note regarding newspaper material cited in footnotes: where no pagination is given the citation is from the editorial.

Metric Conversion

Since 1960, most countries in the world, including New Zealand, have converted from varying methods of measurement to the Système International d'Unités (SI). The traditional English system for money and measurement denominations has been retained in this book, in keeping with the sources used and with the other volumes of the Official History of New Zealand in the Second World War series.

The following information is supplied for conversion purposes:

Money

One pound (£1) (20 shillings) = 2 dollars ($2)

One shilling (12 pence) = 10 cents

One guinea (21 shillings) = $2.10

Linear

One mile (1760 yards) = 1.609 kilometres

One yard (3 feet) = 0.914 metres

One foot (12 inches) = 30.48 centimetres

One inch = 2.54 centimetres

Square measure

One square mile (640 acres) = 2.589 square kilometres

One acre (4840 square yards) = 0.404 hectares

One square yard = 0.836 square metres

One square foot = 929 square centimetres

Cubic (liquid) measure

One gallon (4 quarts) = 4.546 litres

One quart (2 pints) = 1.136 litres

One pint = 0.568 litres

Cubic (material) measure

One cubic yard = 0.764 cubic metres

One cubic foot = 0.0283 cubic metres

One cubic inch = 16.397 cubic centimetres

Weight

One ton (2240 pounds) = 1016 kilogrammes

One hundredweight (112 pounds) = 50.802 kilogrammes

One pound (16 ounces) = 453 grammes

One ounce = 28.35 grammes

Horsepower

One horsepower = 0.746 kilowatts

Temperature

32° Fahrenheit = 0° Celsius (freezing point)

212° Fahrenheit = 100° Celsius

CHAPTER 1 The End of Waiting

3 September 1939

THE years of waiting were over, the years of uneasiness, when newspapers had reported crisis after crisis till readers were numbed by the repetition of violence, confused by the welter of assertions, negotiations, shifts of policy. From the complicated and faulty weaving of the dictators and diplomats had emerged a gloomy pattern— the aggressors seemed always to get what they wanted, pushing back the so-called victors of the Great War and gaining at every move in strength of purpose, actual power and barefaced lack of scruple. Now New Zealand was at war because of German demands for Polish territory, and it did not seem fantastic. Almost it seemed inevitable. Shocked dismay was mingled with relief that the restless, anxious peace was ended, and the terrible excitement of war was at hand.

How much New Zealanders felt or failed to feel about the war-presaging events of the Thirties was largely determined by their sense of being remote in the world and small in the British Commonwealth, but also and very strongly by what was happening at home. The effect of the Depression of 1930–5 was wide, deep and cauterising. At its worst, in October 1933, there were 79 587 men registered as unemployed,

New Zealand Official Year-book (hereinafter Yearbook) 1938, p. 802

while it is calculated that more than 100 000 could have been so classified,

Sutch, W. B., Poverty and Progress in New Zealand, p. 134

to say nothing of women, in a total population of 1 539 500.

Yearbook1938, p. 58

The Depression story has been told so often, sometimes poignantly, sometimes with weary repetition, but familiarity should not dull awareness of it when the war that followed is considered. For many New Zealanders the Depression was a worse time than the war. They found the limitations of the creed that if a man works hard he can always get along, but belief in the creed was still strong enough to cause deep shame and bewilderment. So many people knew the humiliation of farm or business failing, of being rejected by employers, of seeing their families in want; so many others lived in fear of these things. So many knew the uselessness of relief work, the cold and mud of labour camps, the tyranny of bosses conscious of labour queues, the tragedy of a lost shilling. So many women would never forget the dreariness of worn-out clothes, of meals monotonous and poor, of crowded living in dingy rooms. So many had feared to help their neighbours' want lest they need every penny themselves, yet been ashamed of their caution. Behind the smashed windows of Queen Street lay a deal of ignoble suffering.

The Depression deepened very steeply the division between classes, and was to make many workers suspicious lest the bosses should steal a march against them under cover of the war. Meanwhile, in the Thirties, it blunted concern for more remote troubles. By 1936 prices were improving and the Labour government accelerated recovery with State spending and organisation. People were absorbed in housing and pension schemes, in working hours, wages, the cost of living, farming prices; they were catching up on the bad years, improving their homes and furniture, buying blankets and china and clothes and radios and cars, bent on climbing out of a local hell into a local heaven. There were others, appalled at finding the country in the hands of a rash, experimental government, who foresaw local disaster, a chaos of socialisation and financial ruin; the enemy at home absorbed their anxious fears, their political activity. Both sorts read of invasion and political violence in China, Abyssinia, Spain, as they might have read a serial, though no serial would be so disjointed or contradictory. Few read anything except the daily papers, and the opinions they derived therefrom were coloured by a variety of existing attitudes—their attachment to Britain, their sense of colonialism or of independence, faith in the League of Nations, fear of Communism, fear of Fascism. Generally, however, New Zealanders shared one attitude, and shared it with a good many other countries—they wanted peace, and they did not want to pay for it with money or with men.

It is a truism now that the seeds of the new conflict were sown in the treaties of 1919 and began to germinate in October 1931. Then, Japan having invaded Manchuria, the member states of the League, each preoccupied with its own economic problems and not guessing how Japanese aggression would grow on success, considered its own chances of advantage and collectively they did nothing. It was the beginning, the sketching in of the pattern that was repeated implacably, with details different and freshly distressing, during the next eight years, each precedent building up in individual minds a sense of bewildered, helpless connivance—‘It's wrong, but what can we do?’

When Hitler

Hitler, Adolf (1889–1945): German Fascist dictator; Chancellor German Reich 1933; Head German State 1934–45

came to power in 1933, attacked trade unions and Jews and began to build up armaments and national spirit, the sense of war in the world grew stronger for New Zealanders. Japan was remembered as an ally; Germany was a familiar foe. Thereafter many, as they read the newspapers, felt that they would some day have to finish the fight begun 20 years before; in the small boys' battles the enemy were always Germans.

But it was Mussolini's

Mussolini, Benito (1883–1945): Italian Fascist dictator from 1922

Italy, hungry for empire, that next thickened the war clouds, for Italy, despite the threat of sanctions by the League, attacked Abyssinia in October 1935. Laval's

Laval, Pierre (1883–1945): French PM 1931–2, 1934–6, 1942–4; executed 1945

France, unwilling to risk a fight or a rapprochement of Italy and Germany, connived, though not openly or enough to satisfy Italy. The British government, though talking bravely of standing by the Covenant, was unprepared for war and determined to avoid it. It feared to drive Italy towards Germany; feared lest sanctions prove ineffective, which would make Britain the object of Italy's hostility and contempt; feared lest they prove effective, when a desperate Italy might attack in the Mediterranean and France might forsake her ally. From present knowledge of the ineffectiveness of Italy's armed forces, even years later, it seems astonishing that Britain, despite the lowered state of her forces in 1935, should so seriously have feared a fight with Mussolini; it seems probable that she also feared Mussolini's fall and the chance of another communist state. Thus, palsied with considerations, Britain and France fumbled over the most important sanction—oil—and instead Hoare

Hoare, Rt Hon Samuel John Gurney, 1st Viscount Templewood of Chelsea, PC, GCSI (1880–1959): Sec State Air 1922–4, India 1931–5, Foreign Aff 1935; 1st Lord Admlty 1936–7; Sec State Home Aff 1937–9, Air 1940; UK Ambassador Spain on special mission 1940–4

and Laval in December proposed a settlement so generous to Italy that it was indignantly repudiated by both public and Parliament in Britain.

Laval, Premier of France, and Hoare, the British Foreign Secretary, secretly agreed that their governments would use their influence to induce Abyssinia and the League of Nations to accept that a large part of Abyssinia should be assigned to Italy for economic expansion and settlement. This was a sudden change from Hoare's speech in September in support of collective security against aggression. When the proposals became known in December 1935 they were rejected by both the Commons and the Chamber of Deputies, amid uproar which caused Hoare to resign.

There was more delay over the oil sanctions, while Italy pushed on with the war, occupying Addis Ababa in May 1936; and the world—with New Zealand modestly dissenting—accepted the fait accompli.

New Zealand did not officially recognise the conquest, and when in May 1941 Ethiopians, with the aid of British troops, drove the Italians from Addis Ababa, it had no diplomatic adjustments to make.

In New Zealand, newspapers gave the dispute a leading place, starting several months before the actual fighting. There was a sincere attempt to settle a dispute with the League's machinery, New Zealand was represented at the League, and the long preliminaries gave time for attention to focus. All these were reasons why Abyssinia bulked much larger in New Zealand thinking than did later and more clearly ominous affairs with which it had no direct connection, which had lost the edge of novelty and happened far more swiftly. Generally reports were either colourless or sympathetic towards the Ethiopians, a few cartoons by Low

Low, Sir David, Kt('62) (1891–1963): b Dunedin; cartoonist Spectator Chch 1902, Buletin Sydney 1911, Star London 1919, Evenig Standard London 1927, Daily Mail London 1950, Manchester Guardian from 1953

and Minhinnick

Minhinnick, Sir Gordon, KBE('76) (1902–): b UK, to NZ 1921; cartoonist NZ Free Lance 1926, thence Chch Sun, Auckland Sun to NZ Herald 1930

attacked Mussolini, and from time to time editorials advised that New Zealand must stand by her obligations to the League, even to armed force. There was talk of being involved in war, which led to realisation that New Zealand's armed forces were very small, its air power little more than Abyssinia's. There was wide disapproval of aggression, of gas and bombs dropped on defenceless people, disapproval tempered with some reluctant recognition of Italy's economic plight, plus a rather thankful sense of remoteness caused by the obscurity of international manoeuvring.

A few leftists bleakly saw the League's collective security and preservation of peace as preservation of the status quo by the nations already supplied with colonial markets and raw materials—‘the only fight against war is the fight against capitalism’.

W. N. Pharazyn in Tomorrow, 18 Sep 35, p. 6; D. G. McMillan in Otago Daily Times, 20 Sep 35, p. 9

A few unions, while censuring Italy, firmly declared against being drawn into an imperialist war.

Federated Seamans Union, Dominion, 5 Oct 35, p. 4; Tomorrow, 9 Oct 35, p. 10; Auckland Carpenters and Joiners, Auckland Star, 11 Oct 35, p. 8

The Communist party at first declared that sanctions were the attempt of one set of exploiting powers to prevail over the other, and that Britain herself had designs on Abyssinia that might lead to general war;

Workers' Weekly, 31 Aug, 21 Sep 35, pp. 3, 1

but after Russia declared for collective security it found it ‘necessary for all those who stand for peace to support the Soviet Union in the demand that sanctions be enforced’, the Soviet being the only power consistently and wholly on the side of peace, whereas a war led by Britain would be imperialistic.

Ibid., 28 Sep, 12, 19 Oct 35, pp. 3, 1 & 2, 2

In several centres—Wellington, Napier, Palmerston North, Christchurch, Dunedin—street demonstrations and meetings were held by the Communist party or the Movement against War and Fascism, or Hands off Abyssinia committees, and at the Italian consulates in Auckland and Wellington leaflets demanding that the war should stop were distributed.

Ibid., 19, 26 Oct 35, pp. 1, 1; NapierDaily Telegraph, 1, 11 Oct 35, pp. 6, 4; Press, 30 Sep 35, p. 5

The Labour Party, still in opposition, had now replaced its hostility to war with belief in the League and collective security; Walter Nash,

Nash, Rt Hon Sir Walter, GCMG('65), CH('59), PC (1882–1968): b UK, to NZ 1909; MP (Lab) Hutt from 1929; Sec Lab party 1922–32; Min Finance 1935–49, Marketing 1936–41, Social Security 1938; Dep PM 1940–9; War Cab 1939–45; NZ Min USA & member Pac War Council 1942–4; PM, Min External Aff 1957–60; Leader Oppos 1950–7, 1960–3

for instance, said ‘those nations that carry out their undertakings can be completely effective without firing a shot’, but that if the British Empire were drawn into war New Zealanders should fight in sorrow for the good of the future.

NZ Worker, 25 Sep 35, p. 1; see also Standard, 16 Oct 35, p. 8

The conservative government, made doubly chary by responsibility, instructed its League representative to collaborate very closely with Great Britain on sanctions, but stressed confidentially that public opinion in New Zealand would not endorse any measure that might call for the application of force.

Forbes to Parr, 2 Sep 35, PM 260/4/2, pt 1, in War History Narrative, ‘Pre-war Foreign Policy’ (hereinafter WHN, ‘Foreign Policy’), Abyssinia, p. 19

In October, Parliament unanimously passed a bill that imposed economic sanctions and made it clear that any military sanctions would need further parliamentary action. The campaign that elected Labour to 53 seats out of 80 in November 1935 gave little space either to the war in Abyssinia or to general problems of defence and foreign policy. Neither party mentioned Abyssinia in its election manifesto—Labour stressed its support for the League and promised a foreign policy to promote international economic co-operation, disarmament and world peace, with open diplomacy and discussion and negotiation in Commonwealth relations;

NZ Worker, 8 May 35, p. 6; Standard, 13 Nov 35, p. 1

the National party supported the League and stressed co-operation with the United Kingdom.

Dominion, 29 Oct 35, p. 12

In December, the new Labour government cabled that it was ‘quite unable to associate’ itself with the Hoare–Laval arrangements but tactfully agreed to keep silent about its views.

GGNZ to SSDA, 13, 15 Dec 35, PM 260/4/2, pt 4, in WHN, ‘Foreign Policy’, Abyssinia, p. 58

The press was divided, the Otago Daily Times of 20 December saying that these arrangements had met the merited condemnation of the world, while other dailies voiced ‘realist’ opinions that sanctions were impractical, an experiment; that collective security was based more on despair than on reason; that Hoare was right in fact though wrong in method, and that the fiasco resulted not from his weakness but from the gap between popular aspirations and political reality.

Press, 20 Dec 35; Evening Past, 20 Dec 35; NZ Herald, 21 Dec 35

This last view was echoed in the House on 15 May 1936 in a debate on foreign affairs

New Zealand Parliamentary Debates (hereinafter NZPD), vol 245, pp. 149–84

by the youthful Keith Holyoake,

Holyoake, Rt Hon Sir Keith, GCMG('70), CH('63), PC (1904–): MP (Nat) Pahiatua from 1932; Dep Leader Oppos 1947; Dep PM & Min Agriculture, Marketing, Scientific Research 1949–57; Leader Oppos 1957–60; PM & Min Foreign Affairs 1960–72; Min State 1975–7; Gov Gen NZ 1977–80

who saw in the rejection of the plan ‘evidence of the fact that public opinion does not keep pace with world events’;

NZPD, vol 245, p. 164

Forbes

Forbes, Rt Hon George William (1869–1947): MP (Lib) Hurunui 1908–43; Min Lands, Agriculture, Deputy PM 1928–30; PM 1930–5, in Coalition govt 1931–5

and others of his party declared that the League had been tried as a preserver of the peace and found wanting; Labour members replied, dutifully but without much inspiration, that the League should still be supported.

‘Sanctions failed’ was inevitably the verdict in most minds. Stubborn idealists like Savage

Savage, Rt Hon Michael Joseph (1872–1940): b Aust, to NZ 1907; MP (Lab) Auck West from 1919; Leader Labour party from 1933; PM from 1935

might urge maintaining them

Savage to Parr, 15 Jun 36, PM 260/4/2, pt 7, in WHN, ‘Foreign Policy’, Abyssinia, p. 62; Parr, Otago Daily Times, 4 Jul 36, p. 13

after Italy's victory, but even Savage knew that New Zealand's remoteness and its small trade with Italy made its objection pedantic, and he acquiesced in their general removal in July 1936.

In March 1936 while bombs were still falling on Abyssinia Hitler, seeing the League's feebleness, the coolness between France and Britain and Italy's estrangement from both, swiftly moved troops into the demilitarised Rhineland, in defiance both of Versailles and of the Locarno Pact of 1925, which last Germany had signed as a willing equal but which Hitler claimed was already violated by the Franco–Soviet treaty then being signed. With a gun in one hand and fresh guarantees of peace in the other he confounded his opponents, who had either to take him at his word or be prepared to fight—the routine that was to be repeated several times in the next three years. France and Britain spoke with separate voices. There were proposals and counter-proposals that changed nothing, and after the first headlines it became an affair of the diplomats.

The New Zealand government followed Britain closely—on 16 March they wrote that they ‘entirely concur in the attitude of restraint’ of the United Kingdom and while ‘entirely appreciating the necessity of ending the progressive deterioration in the value of international engagements’, urged consideration of every possible means to avoid plunging the world into chaos.

GGNZ to SSDA, 16 Mar 36, PM 6/7/3, pt 3, in WHN, ‘Foreign Policy’, NZ– Germany to Oct 38, p. 17

Again on 6 April, after German counter-proposals that were unacceptable to France, they urged continued negotiations for the possible improvement of European relations, and without necessarily agreeing with the proposals advanced by Germany held that ‘these must be considered seriously with a view to an ultimate Conference intended to establish procedure for the avoidance of conflict’.

GGNZ to SSDA, 6 Apr 36, in ibid., p. 19

The theme of hope in conferences that were never to be held was to be voiced again and again by the New Zealand government during the late Thirties; meanwhile they endorsed the restraint that seriously lessened French faith in Britain as an ally.

Newspapers disapproved the treaty-breaking, commended British calm, shook a reproving finger at France and generally gave Hitler the benefit of the doubt. The Press on 10 and 11 March noted the calm reception and held that the only way to prove Hitler's sincerity was to take him at his word; the Otago Daily Times spoke likewise. The Dominion on 9 March thought that what Hitler offered now, ‘despite the breach of a bit more of the Treaty that bound Germany, is too valuable to be spurned,’ and on 12 March said that all the world knew that but for earlier French intransigence, Germany might still be in the League, might still be a democratic state. The New Zealand Herald on 11 March was outraged at Germany's suggestion that it might now re-enter the League of Nations—‘Could anything be more absurd, or more offensively presumptuous?’—but by 19 March was pointing out that a cynic could heave bricks at all the powers for their recent diplomatic pasts; even Britain, over Abyssinia, ‘bore herself none too well’. There was also the comfortable possibility that the Rhineland march was Hitler's ruse to divert Germany's attention from her internal problems of food shortages and unemployment.

Standard, 11 Mar 36, p. 6

Since the League had failed to impose the crucial oil embargo on Italy it was manifestly unlikely to impose sanctions on Germany.

Hard thereafter came the civil war in Spain, beginning in July 1936 as an army revolt. In February a liberal government had been elected (with a majority of seats though not of votes), but its reforms were resisted by the land-owning classes, to which the police and the army adhered. Strikes, disorder, and reprisal killings followed, and General Franco

Franco Bahamonde, Generalissimo Francisco (1892–1975): Generalissimo Spanish National Armies 1936–9; Head State from 1939

claimed to be upholding order and religion against anarchy. He also claimed to be leading a nationalist movement to save Spain from Russia which was organising and supporting the government—an exaggerated charge. Predictably, the most active groups on both sides were those with the most extreme political views, and it soon became a fight between Communism and Fascism. Italy and Germany, for future influence and to train and test their troops, equipment and aircraft, helped Franco from the beginning with arms, aircraft, soldiers and technicians, and in November 1936 recognised their protégé as the government of Spain. Russia, from mid-October 1936, sent arms and aircraft, and thousands of Communists and others from all over Europe went to fight in the communist-run International Brigade.

Spain, more than Manchuria, more than Abyssinia, disturbed the conscience of the world. In Britain Chamberlain,

Chamberlain, Rt Hon Arthur Neville, PC (1869–1940): MP from 1918; PMG 1923; Min Health 1923, 1924–9, 1931; Chancellor Exchequer 1923–4, 1931–7; PM & 1st Lord Treasury 1937–40

determined not to be involved, anxious to placate Italy, and of course deeply opposed to Communism, was widely charged, even by some of his own party, with favouring Franco. New Zealand's Labour government joined in this criticism, urging adherence to League principles with persistence that must have seemed both priggish and impractical to the British government. On the League Council, Jordan

Jordan, Rt Hon Sir William, PC, KCMG('52) (1879–1959): b UK, to NZ 1904; 1st Hon Sec NZ Lab party 1897; MP (Lab) Manukau 1923–35; NZHC London 1936–51; Pres Council LoN 1938; chmn Imp Economic Conference 1937–8

repeatedly urged that Franco should state his charges before the League, and doubted whether non-intervention did anything but handicap the Loyalists and strengthen the aggressors. Twice, in March and again in September 1937, New Zealand refused to be associated with shipping proposals which would have come near to granting belligerent rights to the rebels; and it did not officially recognise Franco's final victory in March 1939.

But if the New Zealand government's attitude abroad was definite, though limited, New Zealand people generally were confused. Only the leftists and Catholics were blessed with clear minds about Spain—for Communists the Loyalists were clothed in righteousness, the reactionary Fascist villains must be fought and defeated. They repeatedly urged joint action with the Labour party, which firmly declined it.

Workers' Weekly, 15 Aug 36, p. 2, 9 Apr 37, p. 2; Standard, 9 Apr 37, p. 7

The Workers' Weekly flamed abour the Nazi menace, its child victims, and British wickedness. A few women knitted for the defenders of Madrid—they were flagging by March 1937—and a few hundred pounds slowly trickled in to the ‘Spanish Aid Fund’, forwarded through the Communist party in England.

Workers' Weekly shows a total of £336 by 17 Dec 39

On the other hand the Catholic Church in Spain backed Franco, and in New Zealand followed suit, with Zealandia and the New Zealand Tablet steadily denouncing the Communists. Many others, especially people of property or tradition, felt (like Churchill

Churchill, Rt Hon Sir Winston, KG('53), PC, OM, FRS (1874–1965): British Army 1895–1916, serving India, Khartoum, South Africa etc; war correspondent South Africa 1899–1900; MP (Cons, Lib) 1900–22, 1924–64, Sec State Colonies 1906–8, Home Sec 1910–11, 1st Lord Admlty 1911–15, 1939–40, Min Munitions 1917, Sec State War & Air 1919–21, etc; PM & 1st Lord Treasury, Min Defence 1940–45; Ldr Oppos 1945–51; PM & 1st Lord Treasury 1951–5, Min Defence 1951–2

) that their own class and values were assailed by the Spanish government; the term ‘Communist’ drew forth an almost natural hostility. Some did not feel secure enough in their jobs to risk even talking about Communism in an issue clouded and far away. It was very easy to remain ignorant.

Within the Labour party there were a good many cross-currents. British Labour, as the war went on, grew more and more hostile to Franco, his supporters and the Chamberlain connivance. ‘The left became war-minded: the Spanish civil war mobilised the non-trade-union sections of the Labour movement as Hitler's brutalities had already begun to mobilise the trade unions…. Non-intervention and pacifism crossed over from the opposition to the government: “no-war” became the slogan, not of the left but of the right.’

Mowat, C. L., Britain Between the Wars. pp. 577–8

In New Zealand, Labour was the government. Was it distance, the responsibility of office, or the Catholic vote, that made New Zealand's Labour movement cooler than Britain's? Perhaps members of Parliament thought it was a matter for Cabinet, but very few gave any lead to Spanish support in their constituencies. The Spanish Loyalists had obvious claims on Labour principles and sympathies, but they were soon identified with Communism which many Labour people fervently distrusted as the rival that, claiming kinship, would creep into the Labour organisation and send it scattering in dissension. Nor did Labour prudence wish to alienate the sizeable Catholic vote—which was not a factor in British politics. Still, many trade unions and a few party branches passed resolutions of sympathy (and took up collections

The Waterside Workers Federation gave £300. Standard, 23 Sep 36, p. 7

) for the Loyalists in their fight for democracy and freedom, and urged the New Zealand government to press for the removal of the arms embargo. Some of these resolutions were no doubt contrived by local Communists, but they must have been supported by some ordinary members. The Labour Party Conference of 1937 deplored foreign intervention and urged New Zealand to press for withdrawal of foreign troops.

Workers' Weekly, 9 Apr 37, p. 1

The Standard, Labour's official paper, though it had few editorials on Spain, printed a good many pro-Loyalist photographs, and its column on international affairs from September 1936 until March 1938 (when its space was swamped by the pre-election campaign) had many sharp, far-seeing articles on Spanish issues and the diplomatic moves. It advertised a collection for relief of distress in Spain which opened on 3 December 1936 and totalled £951 on 11 May 1939, mostly from trade unions and party branches. Some of Labour's difficulties were perhaps indicated by the letter printed on 7 October 1936, attacking the unions for backing a ‘horde comparable with the supporters of Barbarossa’ and threatening the loss of Catholic votes; this brought forth other letters mainly opposed to it, with a statement from the Standard that the New Zealand Labour party had expressed no opinion on affairs in Spain and was not committed by resolutions of individual unions.

Standard, 21 Oct 36, p. 15

Although the government in 1938 gave £2,000 to an international fund for the relief of Spanish refugee children of both sides,

Ibid., 14 Apr 38, p. 1; NZPD, vol 252, p. 584

only one or two members of Parliament joined in the few public protests against particular bombing outrages, and only a few were associated with the Spanish Medical Aid Committee. This body, which was soon labelled ‘communist-front’, started in Dunedin at the beginning of 1937. It raised, mainly through public lectures and showings of the film ‘Defence of Madrid’, about £4,000 which sent three nurses, an ambulance and a laundry truck to Spain between May 1937 and January 1939.

Standard, 13 Jan 38, p. 7, 9 Feb 39, p. 2

Only about a dozen New Zealanders actually took up rifles in Spain. A few others wielded ardent pens, mainly in the pages of the left wing journal Tomorrow, while the Methodist Times on 25 February 1939 said firmly that its sympathies throughout were with the lawfully constituted government standing, with all its faults, for the more liberal and democratic elements in Spain. The general public in its daily newspapers had copious and often confusing news, through cables, photographs and editorials. Evidence that Italy and Germany were taking part was balanced by the predominance given to Russian designs, and held in poise by the inertia of the British government. The total effect was probably to accustom New Zealanders to the idea of war in the world, a faraway war, between two sets of objectionable people.

The same issues, more or less, were served up again in mid-1937 when Japan renewed her attack on China, where Chiang Kai-shek's

Chiang Kai-shek, Generalissimo (1887–1975): Director Kuomintang Party, Republican China 1938; chmn Supreme National Defence Council 1939–47; Pres Republic China 1948–9, from 1950 (in Taiwan)

nationalist forces were then co-operating with Chinese communists in a programme of moderate reform and anti-Nipponism. China, a League member, went through the routine of appealing to the Covenant, but no basis for collective action could be found, though as usual Jordan spoke out in Geneva for principles and the lost cause. There was world-wide sympathy for China, many trade unions and other organisations advocating a boycott of Japanese goods. In New Zealand there was a curious conflict. The Watersiders Union and the Federation of Labour objected to loading scrap-iron and other material for war purposes on Japanese ships, in which protest they were joined by at least one Farmers' Union branch.

At Hororata, see Press, 9 Oct 37, quoted by Tomorrow, 13 Oct 37, vol III, p. 771

Importers, Chambers of Commerce and wool interests complained about one section of the community imperilling a valuable trade, and the Prime Minister declared that only the government had authority to decide where New Zealand would trade

Evening Post, 1 Oct 37, p. 13

but prohibited all scrap iron exports ‘to protect New Zealand's steel industry’.

Standard, 4 Nov 37, p. 1. Export, without the consent of the Minister of Customs, of all cast scrap iron had been prohibited since 10 June 1937 by statutory regulation 183/1937. On 5 October another regulation (243/1937) extended this prohibition to all scrap metal.

The Federation of Labour, anxious not to embarrass a Labour government, contented itself with this, with watching international trade union action, and with urging a personal boycott.

Ibid., 28 Oct 37, p. 1, 3 Mar, 21 Apr 38, pp. 11, 5

The Standard on 7 October explained that a New Zealand boycott, pitiably inefficient in itself, would involve the British Commonwealth, of which New Zealand was the least important unit, in international politics. Members of the Commonwealth who were helpless should leave the initiative to those who would bear the result of action. ‘To pass resolutions is one thing: to take sporadic, unorganised, unauthorised action is another.’

Ibid., 7 Oct 37, p. 1

On 4 November an editorial said that any widescale boycott ‘may possibly result in our own pocket being hurt with a consequent injury to the pockets of our own workers. Japan, it is well to remember, buys a considerable quantity of our wool and… last year helped to raise prices to our benefit. Any boycott, effective or ineffective, will not improve our commercial or diplomatic relations with Japan, and though this may appear to be a materialistic viewpoint, it should be remembered that we live under a capitalistic system in a generally capitalistic world.’

The boycott was also frowned upon by a few intellectuals and pacifists who urged that it would act indiscriminately against all Japanese and, by proving foreign hostility and encirclement, strengthen the military party; also, Britain should first set her own house in order by sharing the empire acquired by earlier actions similar to those of Japan.

Tomorrow, 30 Mar, 13 Apr 38, vol IV, pp. 351, 383

In Europe, early in 1938, Hitler had declared that the German Reich reached out beyond its frontiers to ten million Germans in Austria and Czechoslovakia. His rapid seizure of Austria in March 1938 was swallowed with only a slight ripple of the world's gullet. It was a swift decisive move, offering no scope for argument, and those concerned were ‘all Germans anyway’. Also, to some with knowledge of post-1919 Europe, in Austria both nationalism and economics made union with Germany inevitable. As early as 1934 an article in Tomorrow prophesied that in the long run ‘the Anschluss must come’.

Ibid., vol I, 19 Sep 34, pp. 4–5, by J. C. Beaglehole, referring to John Wheeler-Bennett's Wreck of Reparations. Again, in Salient, the student paper of Victoria University College, Wellington, an editorial on 8 January 1938 suggested that though the democracies were ‘aghast at Germany's so-called “grab”’, many Austrians might find it economically helpful.

Chamberlain's government, by 1938, had quite turned from collective security to hope that a satisfied Germany would mean peace, until peace itself could be buttressed by British rearmament. It speedily recognised the take-over. New Zealand was not consulted about the recognition, and did not protest. The Standard, in one of its last articles on international affairs before immersing itself in local matters for the November election, wrote of the event itself and its reception.

“No Danger of War” the posters said on Monday night. It had not seriously been suggested, however cleverly the news had been displayed to give an effect of it, that war was imminent. Hitler had marched his troops into Austria, just as before he marched them into the Rhineland…. Germany acted this time when France was without a government, M. Chautemps

Chautemps, Camille, GCVO (1885–1963): French politician; Min State 1936–7, 1939–40; PM 1937–8; in Daladier Cabinet 1938–9

having resigned a day or two before and M. Blum

Blum, Leon (1872–1950): French politician; PM 1936–7, 1938; PM & Foreign Min Provisional Govt 1946–7; Pres Socialist party France

still being in the process of forming his new Cabinet. Saturday, as it invariably is, was the chosen day to cross the Austrian frontier. The stage management was incomparably fine, for during the week-end, when the time came to assess the repercussions, foreign feeling would have recovered its outraged balance. A decade ago it would have been hard to imagine such an occurrence not being the word for war. But a decade ago Britain was still chivalrous in the self-saving cause of “balance of power.” Today it is almost ridiculous even to contemplate Britain's lifting a finger to redress the wrongs of a small country. Even the sight of Germany gathering strength at a furious rate is no pretext for action but only for added rearmament against the day when Fascist might is face to face with Britain. So that to mention war this week was simply an anachronism.

Standard, 17 Mar 38, p. 8

Newspapers had headlines about ruthless Nazis, Jewish purges and the frantic efforts of Jews and liberals to leave Austria; editorials spoke of the lengthening Nazi shadow and the blatant hypocrisy of Hitler. But Count von Luckner,

Luckner, Count Felix von (1881–1966): good-will missioner and sailor, to Australia 1895–1900; German Imp Navy, in Battle of Jutland, then commander raider Seeadler, world tour in Sea Devil 1937ff; in Germany, not a Nazi, 1939–45; lecture tour to further understanding between people 1949–50

on a round of public meetings at this very time, had in general a cordial reception, except from the Federation of Labour. He was well known for his exploits in 1917, when having got through the British blockade in a 2000-ton sailing ship disguised as a trader, he sank thirteen Allied cargo ships in the Atlantic and Pacific, the crews being all saved and sent ashore. He was wrecked in the Fiji group, captured and interned at Motuihi, Auckland; escaped, seized the scow Moa and made for the Kermadec Islands, where he was recaptured. Newspapers announced on 20 April 1937 that he was making a world tour in his new motor yacht Sea Devil, would visit Australia and New Zealand, and would ‘engage in propaganda for German ideals’.

Dominion, 20, 22 Apr 37, pp. 9, 12

This provoked hostility from the Communists who from a German paper quoted von Luckner as saying, ‘I am going as Hitler's emissary to the youth of the world to win them for a better understanding of our new Germany. I will tell them of my private exploits during the war and the salvation of the Fatherland….None but criminals have been deprived of their liberty in Germany in order that decent Germans may live.’

Workers' Weekly, 9 Jul, 30 Apr, 7 May 37, pp. 1, 2, 1

A few trade unions

Ibid., 9 Jul 37, p. 3; Tomorrow, 21 Jul 37, vol III, p. 580

joined in urging that he be refused admission. Some private persons also objected, while others defended a very gallant gentleman;

Dominion, 22, 28 Apr, 1, 6, 7 May 37, all p. 13

the Acting Prime Minister, Fraser,

Fraser, Rt Hon Peter, PC, CH('45) (1884–1950): b Scotland, to NZ 1910; MP (Lab) Brooklyn 1918–50; Min Education, Health, Marine 1935–50; Acting PM, 1937–40; PM, Min External Affairs, Police 1940–9, Island Territories 1943–9, Maori Affairs 1946–9; Head War Cab & War Council; UN offices 1945–8

had no comment to make;

Dominion, 28 Apr 37, p. 13

a respected trades union secretary advised reading Areopagitica and opposed exclusion on the grounds of freedom of speech,

Workers' Weekly, 6 Aug 37, p. 1

a view shared by the Federated Seamen's Union

Standard, 15 Jul 37, p. 9

and by Tomorrow.

Tomorrow, 21 Jul 37, vol III, p. 580

A rising civil servant, Dr R. A. Lochore,

Lochore, Dr Reuel Anson (1903–): civil servant, diplomat; PM Dept, Dept Internal Affairs with several years post-WWH as Naturalisation Officer, Dept External Affairs 1957; NZ Min India 1962, Indonesia 1964, 1st NZ Ambassador West Germany 1966

declared that he himself was one who had privately sought to persuade the Count to visit New Zealand, that the Count's main object was to cement friendship between Germany and the Anglo-Saxon peoples. He would explain away the latter's mercenary and selfish appearance on the one hand, and on the other show that Germans ‘are not the barbarians and sadists that fanatical war propaganda and its aftermath have so luridly depicted’. The press, Lochore said, constantly put the worst possible construction on news from Germany, while never before had Germans shown such cordial goodwill—‘I have repeatedly heard lectures on British ideals in Germany; I have delivered some on New Zealand ideals myself. For a week, in a camp of storm troopers we put in our mornings trying to analyse and understand the mentality of French and British.’

Dominion, 26 Apr, 4 May 37, pp. 3, 11

Von Luckner's lectures, which contained no propaganda, were very popular, especially in Wellington where he received a tremendous ovation and his talk was punctuated with clapping—this but a week after Germany had taken over Austria. The Federation of Labour, however, said that in Germany he had promised to preach the virtues of Hitlerism, sneered at his goodwill mission, and challenged him to public debate on Nazi ideology. This the Count declined, denying all political interest, but explaining that the labouring people were the great power behind Hitler, and that no other country had such wonderful labour organisations as Germany.

Ibid., 19 Mar 38, p. 12

There were a few more newspaper letters,

Evening Post, 21 Mar 38, p. 8; Press, 22, 23, 26 Mar 38, pp. 8, 8, 22

mostly deploring the Federation's bad manners; the Royal Port Nicholson Yacht Club on 24 March honoured him with its burgee;

Dominion, 25 Mar 38, p. 5

Salient, Wellington's university student paper, on 30 March printed a scathing interview. To sum up, it was mainly the Communists and the Federation of Labour who objected to his presence as a representative of a detestable regime; democratic feeling opposed exclusion, and many were ready to take the bluff sailor at face value—it was comfortable to think that there were decent Germans; most people did not concern themselves at all.

A few months earlier the area of commerce had shown similar unconcern. Late in 1937 trade and payments agreements were made with Germany rearranging the basis for existing trade, so that goods were directly exchanged for goods, not for credits. This caused New Zealand to take more German manufactures than before and send to Germany considerable quantities of butter and apples that otherwise would not have gone there.

Comptroller of Customs to Min Customs, 29 Aug 39, in WHN, ‘Foreign Policy’, NZ– Germany to Oct 38, p. 11; Evening Post, 6 Oct 37, p. 6

In general the arrangements debated in the House on 6 October 1937 were received by the press with mild favour—enthusiasm was hardly to be expected for any Labour action. In Parliament there was some government expression of the view that Germans were good people themselves and that more direct trade might promote more friendly relations. The Opposition's criticisms were that the agreement was of little practical value to New Zealand, and might disturb the harmony of trade with Britain; only one member was opposed to trade with a Fascist country as such.

NZPD, vol 248, p. 628; whole debate pp. 594–639

Though in March 1938 Germany had expressly denied having any designs on Czechoslovakia, the last democracy in central Europe, by August the three million Sudeten Germans were the occasion for Reich demands which the Czech government, relying on joint treaties with France and Russia, refused. Chamberlain had admitted in March that if war broke out over Czechoslovakia it would not be limited to those with obligations—Britain would be involved. Out of the mists of diplomacy, war suddenly loomed frighteningly close, and Britain felt frighteningly unready for it. Chamberlain made his dramatic flights to Germany which culminated at Munich on 29 September and induced a not unwilling France to join in persuading the Czechs to accept partition, induced Hitler to accept their sacrifice, and so clawed off the thundering shore. September 1938 was a month of world crisis, of frantic, confused preparation, of stunned waiting. New Zealand was largely anaesthetised, gripped by a hard-fought election in which foreign policy and defence had very little part. It was obvious that in the nearness of danger the Labour government, remote and small, would not re-utter the well-worn pleas for collective security; it merely thanked the British government for copious official information and earnestly hoped that Chamberlain's efforts would succeed.

GGNZ to SSDA, 29 Sep 38, PM6/7/3, pt 4, in WHN, ‘Foreign Policy’, NZ-Germany to Oct 38, p. 21

Newspapers nevertheless gave much space to the crisis, and for the first time BBC bulletins from Daventry were re-broadcast over the national network. People listened and talked, following the zigzag of successive ultimatums, negotiations and concessions, the details largely meaningless, from which two things at least seemed clear— Hitler was spoiling for a fight and Chamberlain was doing everything to dodge it. They realised that war threatened Britain, that they would follow Britain into it, and it was all too late and too far away to argue or protest.

Round Table, Oct 38, pp. 53–7; Wood, F. L. W., New Zealand in Crisis, May 1938– August 1939, pp. 1–9

Thankfulness for peace was expressed in the first days of October by newspapers, and by public meetings in a few towns. At Auckland, led by R. Armstrong,

Armstrong, Richard (d 1959 aet 60): with RFC WWI, to NZ 1922; exec member Labour Representation Cmte, Auck Trades Council; former City Councillor and past member Auck Transport, Drainage Boards

a city councillor, and at Hamilton, led by F. A. de la Mare,

de la Mare, Frederick Archibald (1877–1962): Hamilton High School Board Governors, 1st chmn CORSO cmte, borough councillor; NZU Senate 1919–47

there were also small public dissensions, tempering relief with disapproval of the methods used to obtain it.

Evening Post, 3 Oct 38, p. 10; Workers' Weekly, 7, 12 Oct 38, pp. 1, 2

It was not then fully apparent how dearly Czechoslovakia had paid for peace and the details of the Munich concession were understood by very few. Hitler's success could not, however, be mistaken and Peter Fraser, who had no wish to cloud his electioneering with foreign affairs, probably summed up widespread feeling by saying on 2 October, ‘In certain aspects the dictators of the world largely had their way, but the calamity which threatened was terrible…. Everyone felt that a load had been lifted from the mind and heart, and all were thankful to Mr Chamberlain for saving the world from worldwide bloodshed.’

Evening Post, 3 Oct 38, p. 10

It was not hard to be thankful for even a reprieve from war; but a few trade unions vigorously criticised appeasement,

Workers' Weekly, 23 Sep–7 Oct 38; Evening Post, 29 Sep 38, p. 10

while the government somewhat guardedly linked its official thankfulness with hopes that settlement would prove a lasting safeguard of world peace founded on justice and order;

Evening Post, 30 Sep 38, p. 10

it did not think it necessary to comply with a British suggestion that Commonwealth prime ministers should congratulate Chamberlain himself.

Jordan to PM Dept, 3 Oct 38, PM 6/6/6, pt 1, in WHN, ‘Foreign Policy’, NZ– Germany to Oct 38, p. 22

The National party leader, Adam Hamilton,

Hamilton, Hon Adam (1880–1952): MP (Nat) Wallace 1919–22, 1925–46; Min Labour, PMG 1931–5; Leader Oppos 1935–40; War Cab 1940

congratulating the ‘saviour of peace’, hoped that his four-power agreement would forerun a more general peace-ensuring settlement,

Evening Post, 1 Oct 38, p. 10

while some other National members chided Labour for its dissident unions and its rather limp support of Chamberlain.

NZ Herald, 10 Oct 38, p. 13

Both parties and the press—with a few bleak comments from Tomorrow—turned back to the November elections with renewed zeal.

Munich was accepted far more quietly by New Zealand's Labour government, that for years had advocated collective security, than by Britain's Labour and a section of her Conservatives. But British Labour was not in office, facing an election, nor preoccupied with installing Social Security and fighting the British Medical Association. The Standard's main utterance was a reprint of an article from the Glasgow Forward of 24 September headed ‘Chamberlain: Hero or Traitor? Who dares to judge?’, asking what war would achieve and listing its horrors, including the seeds of another war. ‘Would Hitler doing the goose-step in London, and Mussolini astride the lions in Trafalgar Square be any worse than that?’ And it declared there must now follow a bold and genuine peace conference to solve the problems of nationalities, raw materials and food, even at the expense of British imperialism.

Standard, 27 Oct 38, p. 17

No such arrangement was attempted. In mid-March 1939 Germany took over the remainder of Czechoslovakia and imposed a trade agreement on Romania; Lithuania under pressure ceded Memeland; Italy in the general rush grabbed Albania. The German sights shifted to Danzig and the Polish corridor and the Nazi machine pressed hard against Poland. Chamberlain, now fully aware that Hitler could not be trusted or appeased, fearing that a sudden coup might within days neutralise Poland, fearing also that Hitler might strike west before moving further east and pushed both by the warlike section of his party and by public indignation, made an astonishing about-turn; on 31 March Britain, with France, guaranteed Poland against aggression.

The New Zealand government, on 21 March, had reminded the British government of its desire for an international conference ‘in the widest possible sphere’ or at least ‘for a conference of those nations which are opposed to aggression and which are now seeing the danger to themselves more clearly than ever before’; it pledged that New Zealand would play its full part ‘should the occasion unhappily arise’ in defence of the right against the brutalities and the naked power politics of aggressor states.

GGNZ to SSDA, 21 Mar 39, PM 6/6/3, pt 4, in WHN, ‘Foreign Policy’, NZ-UK from Munich to war, pp. 3–4

The British government appreciated these assurances but felt there was ‘real difficulty’ in arranging any form of general conference, pointing out that some states were determined on neutrality and those nearest Germany, from fear of immediate retaliation, wanted no part in discussions about checking aggression.

SSDA to GGNZ, 31 Mar 39, PM 6/6/3, pt 16, in ibid., p. 4

The public of course did not know of this exchange. On 22 March Savage declared that his government had been informed ‘all along the line’ of international movements; that local critics, 12 000 miles from events, could well trust people on the spot, and that ‘when Britain is in trouble we are in trouble’. He also advocated that Britain should call a world conference to discuss economic problems leading to war.

NZ Herald, 23 Mar 39, p. 12

The Herald, for once, found that the Prime Minister expressed ‘the heart, mind and will of all in this country’ while Adam Hamilton declared that in supporting Britain the government had the whole-hearted support of the National party. The attitudes of the coming September were rehearsed.

In the British guarantee of Poland there was at last the firmness, the open statement of policy, for which Labour had pleaded earlier. Yet to fight for Poland, on the far side of Europe, with its illiberal landlord rulers, its depressed minorities, its short-sighted foreign policy, was a curious cause. There had been no time for consultation—it was accepted without comment by the government which had just avowed its loyalty. A few newspapers

eg, Press, 22 Mar 39, Auckland Star, 21, 23 Mar 39

held that Britain should keep out of east Europe and unsuitable alliances with Poland, Russia or the Balkans, all disreputable opportunist dictatorships. But Chamberlain had stressed that the guarantee was to cover only an interim period, while Britain was negotiating with the Soviet Union and other states. There was no widespread realisation that the decisive step had been taken which in just five months would lead to war. Other apparent undertakings had dissolved in the hands of the diplomats, leaving plain men dismayed or puzzled or relieved. By now there was no sense that Hitler had some excuse, that he could hardly be blamed for retrieving his own—he had already amply redeemed Germany's losses at Versailles, and could make no racial claims to Bohemia and Moravia. It was plainly more than time to stop him and if Poland were to be his next grab, Poland was the place for a showdown. There was still feeling that a firm ‘Thou shalt not’ in advance would be sufficient without actual fighting—the Christchurch Press of 3 April found ‘some reason to suppose that the announcement of the guarantee has relaxed rather than intensified the tension in Europe.’

Likewise Auckland Star, 1, 3 Apr 39, Otago Daily Times, 3 Apr 39

The intricacies of political pressures and of Chamberlain's own mind in making the decision were not clear in New Zealand, but Chamberlain was known as a man who clung to peace with more desperation than dignity, and if he now felt that firmness was necessary then anyone could be convinced. Further, it was a relief to see the British Prime Minister cast aside his placatory role and speak sharply.

Evening Post, 1 Apr 39

In Britain the Labour party joined in the surge of applause and not since the war, wrote the New Statesman and Nation of 8 April, had a premier received such general support as that accorded to Chamberlain when he gave his unexpected pledge to Poland. This enthusiasm was echoed in New Zealand. In Britain and still less in New Zealand the difficulties of enlarging the Polish guarantee into a compelling ‘Stop Hitler’ bloc were not widely understood.

If the well informed in Britain still covertly hoped that the fight might be between Germany and Russia, it was a hope vaguely but warmly held by many a man in the street both in Britain and New Zealand—let the two bad boys have the fighting to themselves. Anglo–Russian peace-bloc talks, begun in April, went on slowly for several months, while leftists fumed that Chamberlain was losing the last real chance of preventing war. But Chamberlain profoundly distrusted both Russia's honesty of purpose and its competence as a military ally;

Feling, K., The Life of Neville Chamberlain, p. 403; McLeod, R., and D. Kelly (eds), The Ironside Diaries, p. 78

Poland, Romania and the Baltic states were all wary of receiving Russian guarantees lest these either provoke immediate German attack or lead to Russian intrusion to forestall indirect aggression; Russia, dubious lest Britain and France might withdraw at the last leaving it to face Hitler alone, declared its unwillingness to pull other peoples' chestnuts out of the fire and balanced its halting movements towards a Western alliance with cautious steps towards Germany. On 12 May, the New Zealand government, acknowledging that the United Kingdom was much closer to the problem and its possible results, urged that it would be deplorable if Russian assistance in preventing aggression were not secured, and that no reasonable opportunity of gaining it should be lost.

GGNZ to SSDA, 12 May 1939, PM 201/4/2, pt 7, in WHN, ‘Foreign Policy’, NZ– UK from Munich to war, p. 11

The British government politely replied that these considerations were constantly in its mind.

SSDA to GGNZ, 17 May 39, PM 6/6/3, pt 17, in ibid., p. 12

This exchange did not of course reach the public amongst whom, leftists apart (in the pages of Tomorrow and to a much lesser degree in the Standard), there was little advocacy for alliance with Russia or impatience with the inconclusive moves. The public could not but perceive that peace-bloc manoeuvres were small and cautious, compared with the drive of German aggressiveness, but to balance and comfort there was a slight swelling on the theme that had been sounded for years by journalists and financial experts and refugee ministers—that Nazi Germany was war-weary already, its workers exhausted, its economic system strained, that it lacked adequate resources of raw materials, of oil and gold reserves, and could not fight a long war.

Meanwhile July saw the last act of appeasement, this time in the Far East: the Tokyo Agreement,

See Wood, F. L. W., Political and External Affairs (hereinafter Wood), p. 65

whereby Britain, recognising ‘the actual situation’ in China, advised British subjects there to keep clear of anything that might assist the Chinese and bring on themselves the justified wrath of Japan. New Zealand's government had been informed but not consulted. Several Labour back-benchers spoke out strongly about this ‘Eastern Munich’ and Chamberlain's European policies, saying that he was dominated by international finance and war profiteers, while New Zealand dragged silently at his heels— probably the strongest criticism of British foreign policy made by Labour speakers while Labour was in office.

Standard, 3 Aug 39, p. 10; NZPD, vol 254, p. 699 (R. McKeen), p. 738 (A. H. Nordmeyer), p. 787 (W. T. Anderton), vol 255, p. 13 (R. M. MacFarlane), pp. 108–9 (C. M. Williams)

But this minor Eastern discord was lost among the quickening threats of Germany. By 1 June the Standard was remarking that people no longer asked if war were coming that year, but where it was likeliest to start, and on 6 July reported that the newsmen of Washington placed the betting 5 to 4 on the chance of war before 15 September. According to Tomorrow one of the most popular pastimes of August was guessing the answers to such questions as, ‘Will there be war?’ ‘When will it start?’ ‘Will we be in it?’; and an opinion commonly expressed was, ‘Oh, there won't be any war, this crisis will pass like the last.’

Tomorrow, 16, 30 Aug 39, vol V, pp. 649, 677

But August's crisis did not pass, and when on the 22nd Russia and Germany announced their non-aggression pact there was no longer room for doubt or hope. The cable pages overflowed with inch-high black headlines; anger against Hitler was matched with shocked rage at Russia and statements that treachery might have been expected from that conscienceless nation. There was no feeling that anything could be done now to avert war, no doubt that New Zealand stood with Britain. Administratively the government was ready. The Organisation for National Security (ONS), modelled on the British Committee of Imperial Defence, having struggled through a starveling infancy, had come to modest growth since Munich, and now had its prescribed departmental procedures, its ‘War Book’ prepared. A state of emergency was proclaimed on Friday, 1 September, the necessary legal preliminary to bring into force the Public Safety Conservation Act of 1932, under which emergency regulations were issued as Orders-in-Council, dealing with mobilisation of the armed forces, stabilising prices and setting up censorship controls. With these weekend preparations tidily made, New Zealand waited for Sunday.

CHAPTER 2 Impact of War

FACING war, the Labour party was in a very difficult position. Traditionally, Labour was anti-conscription and anti-militarist, viewing war as part of the imperialist struggle for markets, a force that cut clean across its aim of improving workers' conditions and standards of living. Apart from the obvious suffering and sorrow, war meant loss of civil liberties and working harder for less, while destroying fellow-workers likewise driven to arms by the forces of capital. Labour leaders had been in prison for refusing to support the 1914–18 war. Only a few, however, were absolute pacifists— rather they had opposed that particular war and its abuses, such as conscription coupled with uncontrolled prices. During the 1920s Labour had opposed the League of Nations, viewing it as a victors' club and saying that the world needed instead a league of peoples. This attitude changed gradually as the League's useful technical work emerged, and when Germany joined in 1926 and Russia in 1934 it could no longer be considered a victors' club. New Zealand Labour followed the British movement in its hopes of world disarmament by agreement, and in 1930 it supported the Forbes government in suspending compulsory military training, a measure prompted both by economy and sentiment—the will to peace being strengthened by the obvious folly of spending money on armaments when the immediate enemies were unemployment and poverty. By 1931–2 New Zealand's armed forces were small indeed: there were only two cruisers and while Britain spent £1 8s 5d a head on land and air defence, and Australia 5s 6d, New Zealand spent only 2s 10d on all these services, its air force being almost non-existent.

Round Table, vol 25, p. 214

World public distaste for war preparations was at its height in 1933–4, but already British defence authorities, with eyes on Germany and Japan, were moving slowly into rearmament. Ripples of this reached New Zealand, and in 1934 the defence vote was almost furtively increased, Labour opposing it with the more urgent need to fight poverty. But Labour, growing towards the responsibilities of office, increasingly stressed collective security as the effective means of defending democracy and peace—H. E. Holland

Holland, Henry Edmund (1868–1933): b Australia, to NZ 1912; MP (Lab) Grey 1918–33; Leader Labour party from 1919

asked Forbes (who declined) to urge League action over Manchuria in 1931.

NZPD, vol 235, p. 770

Labour in office strongly upheld sanctions against Italy and was critical of concessions to Spanish rebels. In 1936 it carried forward the programme of increasing armaments, and took to the League proposals that went far beyond British ideas for making enforcement of the Covenant automatic and powerful, while enlarging and deepening support by consulting the peoples of the world through plebiscites and broadcasts of League proceedings. It also proposed surveys of economic problems as a preliminary to rectifying international grievances. Against the charge of inconsistency in showing no will to abolish armed forces, Labour declared that it had never held that a nation should not be ready to defend itself, but that economic aggression was precedent to and the main cause of military aggression, and could be removed by economic adjustments.

Standard, 11 Nov 37, p. 6

At the Commonwealth Conference in 1937 Savage spoke out his faith, saying that some grievous mistakes had been made, to which New Zealand had sometimes but not always consented, urging that peace could best be preserved not by secret diplomacy but by the Commonwealth laying down the lines that it would pursue in future; that as disputes between nations had always an economic basis, a concerted international effort was needed to remove these economic injustices, and that meanwhile the Covenant should be made real— there would be no final end to the miseries of war until those nations that loved peace made it abundantly clear that they were determined to maintain it, if necessary by force.

Ibid., 5 Aug 37, p. 2; Wood, p. 49

The Labour party, then, even in such idealists as Savage and Jordan, had come increasingly to the idea of force as necessary to restrain evil. More robustly, Peter Fraser could say to the Labour Conference in 1937, ‘If we truly desire to see Labour Democracy continue in our country we ought to be ready to defend it, even die for it. Do you think we would get any mercy from Mussolini or Hitler?’

Standard, 8 Apr 37, p. 2

In September 1937 the budget, totalling nearly £34½ million, allowed £15,000 to the League, and £1,600,000 to defence

NZPD, vol 248, pp. 432–3

—an increase of £585,000 on the previous year. Nash remarked that these items were inextricably linked: effective application of the League's principles alone could bring permanent peace, but until then defence was necessary. The military and naval services were being modestly increased and re-organised and an air force begun, but with no idea of facing a major invasion. Commonwealth defence experts thought that the most likely attack would be from a raiding ship with aircraft and able to land about 200 men on a hit-and-run mission. Gradually emphasis was shifting from reliance on internationalism to territorial defence measures, though the economic foundations of peace and the value of education and propaganda were still pillars of Labour faith.

The Standard, during 1936–8, had many solid, hard-thinking editorials giving the background of treaties and national movements since 1919, stressing that armament makers throve on fear; that economic grievances, the basic cause of war, could be worked out at a world economic conference; that the League should be made a reality with force behind it. It was not actually said that New Zealanders should be in this League force; it was always implicit that before fairness-plus-firmness even dictators would be reasonable.

In April 1937 trade unions and district Trades and Labour councils combined to form the Federation of Labour, replacing the Alliance of Labour. The industrial section of the Labour movement now had a more vigorous and coherent central organisation which in foreign affairs was more leftist than was the rest of the movement. At its first annual conference, in April 1938, the Federation passed this general resolution on foreign policy:

This Conference… directs the attention of the whole Labour Movement to the terrible threat to world peace by Hitler, Mussolini and Japanese Military-Fascism. The danger behoves the working-class to more firmly unite its ranks, strengthen its organizations, sharpen its vigilance and generate greater activity in the struggle against Fascism and war.

We consider that the policy of the Chamberlain Government in retreating before the Fascist black-mailers, instead of averting the drive to war, helps to promote aggression and is leading the British Empire into war.

The cause of world peace today depends upon the checking of Fascist aggression in Central Europe, Spain and China. Therefore we urge the Labour Government to insist that the British Empire will (a) support France and the Soviet Union in guaranteeing the independence and security of Czechoslovakia, (b) lift the embargo on arms to the Spanish Government and insist on the immediate withdrawal of the Fascist interventionists' forces in Spain, (c) organize collective action to bring to an end Japanese aggression in China.

Also we call on the trade union movement to improve in every way its support for the Spanish Government and to strengthen the boycott of Japanese goods.

Further, this conference denounces the suggestion in certain quarters for the reintroduction of compulsory military training, which is but the prelude to a demand for conscription for overseas services in the event of an imperialist war. Having in mind the experiences of the war of 1914–18, when the people of New Zealand were subjected to what was virtually a military dictatorship, we urge the Labour Government to take steps to repeal all legislation which provides for conscription for overseas service for imperialist purposes.

Finally, we direct the National Council of the Federation to give greater attention to the danger to world peace, to the issuance of propaganda against war and Fascism and the developing of opposition to war in the working class movement.

Workers' Weekly, 22 Apr 38, p. 1

It was a large, impossible order, a putting-together, without compromise, of irreconcilable policies—insistence that the growing danger to peace and the working class be curbed, without any modification of the traditional stand against conscription and ‘imperialist’ war. The government was to insist that aggression be checked, but not by New Zealand workers—for plainly at the time the number likely to volunteer would not have caused a dictator to bat an eyelid. It was an unhappy conflict, one which was shared by the Labour movement in Britain, and which was to remain with them well into the war. It is not insignificant that this resolution was moved by a Communist and published in full by the Workers' Weekly (22 April 1938) but not in the Standard. A Standard article, after remarking that in Europe the dictators were now more firmly in the saddle than ever and probably other countries besides Austria would soon be under Fascist domination, neatly turned the point homeward: ‘It is not enough to talk of democracy or to be anxious of its fate in Europe, we must be careful to preserve Government by the people and for the people here in New Zealand.’

Standard, 21 Apr 38, p. 2

In Germany a strong working-class movement had been overcome by Fascism; New Zealand workers must take care Fascism did not gain ground here. The election was only seven months away.

The National party, with its sense of close adherence to Britain, had felt the impropriety of New Zealand's occasional divergences from Britain at the League of Nations. Its members, with more experience of office, were more accustomed to the idea of the inevitability of war and not at all committed to any theory of nonparticipation. Some were not afraid to say, even in 1936, that if New Zealand subscribed to collective security it should give support not only with words but with a complete expeditionary force.

NZPD, vol 246, pp. 311–12

They expected quite early that the League of Nations would fail and they wanted more defence. They were reluctant to see Labour spend on public works and social services money which could be used for that purpose.

The New Zealand Returned Soldiers' Association was specially concerned with defence and felt that its members' knowledge of the last war, their sufferings and their dead companions entitled them to respectful hearing. Obviously they were not pacifists, and they could reasonably ask other men to face what they had faced 25 years before. Though a non-political body, their views on defence coincided with those of the National party: they felt that New Zealand was not ready to do her fair share in Commonwealth defence, and that compulsory training in the Territorials was a first essential.

Late in 1936 the sense of inadequate defence led some people with strong RSA and Territorial interests or belonging to such organisations as the Navy League (all of whom the Labour party speedily identified with the Nationalists) to form the Defence League,

Evening Post, 15 Oct 36, p. 10, 25 Mar 38, p. 7

aiming to educate public opinion towards increased defence measures and to encourage young men into military, naval, and air force training. It also wanted the government to organise services, such as hospitals, transport and food supplies, to meet a possible national emergency. The League claimed that its intention was to assist not hinder the government, and that it was a non-party organisation, on a democratic and national basis. On 15 October 1936 a deputation visited the Defence Minister who politely welcomed its assurances of co-operation, reminded it that the government was responsible for defence and was working ‘quietly but thoroughly’, and did not think there was any need for scares.

Ibid., 16 Oct 36, p. 11

Labour rank and file was much more sensitive. ‘More than ever eternal vigilance is the price of popular government and liberty’, wrote a correspondent in the Standard of 9 September 1936, alarmed at the proposed formation by business and professional men of a military propagandist league; it would be nothing new for such a league to turn into a defence force, complete with shirts and salutes. The workers must scrutinise closely the aims, objects, personnel and sponsors of proposed leagues. ‘Europe today proves that patriotism is the refuge for greater scoundrels and the cloak for more bestial brutality than ever before.’

Though the Standard continued its warning against the Defence League as the possible germ of a fascist force, the League was favoured by the press in general, which was consistently critical of the government and friendly to its opponents. Another sign of Labour distrust was a remit from the Easter conference of 1937 which, though not naming the League, clearly referred to it: ‘That the Government be urged to disband and prevent the formation of armed forces not directly under the control of the Government, to prevent the wearing of party uniforms, and to legislate to ensure that the manufacture of arms and and munitions is under Government control.’

Cyclostyled paper, ‘New Zealand Labour Party, 1937 Annual Conference. Recommendations to the Government’, p. 1

During 1938, with concern for defence becoming more general, the League's activity increased. At Wellington on 24 March a meeting of about 800 urged that besides increased Army strength all resources should be organised for defence. Suggested measures included a militia force of middle-aged citizens, organisations of civilians so that in a national crisis there would be as little confusion as possible, and instruction about gas decontamination and gas masks. The principal speaker, Hon W. Perry MLC,

Perry, Hon Sir William, Kt('46) (1885–1968); barrister and solicitor Wgtn; 1NZEF; Dom Pres RSA 1935–43; MLC 1934–50; member War Cab 1943–5, Min Armed Forces and War Co-ordination

spoke of current negotiations in Britain to relax conditions of labour so that more work could be put into armaments; it was no argument to lessen the Labour movement's distrust.

Dominion, 25 Mar 38, p. 12

Progress in New Zealand's rearmament was described by Jones,

Jones, Hon Frederick (1885–1966): MP (Lab) Dun Sth 1931–46, St Kilda 1949–51; Min Defence, PMG 1935–40, Min Defence 1940–9; NZHC Aust 1958–61

the Defence Minister, on 18 May 1938 at Dargaville in a speech widely published in the press and as a pamphlet. He spoke of reorganising and increasing the naval division, creating an air force and making improvements in the Territorial forces which aimed to train leaders ready for a sudden expansion if needed. A peacetime strength of 9000 was thought sufficient, and Jones admitted that there were then but 7400, of whom only 41 per cent had attended camp that year. He appealed to fit, alert young men to sacrifice some of their leisure, and to employers to give leave for service. The Defence League approved; but the next day Auckland papers published a manifesto signed by four Territorial colonels who broke soldierly silence in a sharp criticism of the Territorial position, declaring the present numbers, organisation and training quite inadequate, due to lack of support from successive governments and from the public.

These statements brought defence into prominence for some weeks, and bodies such as a Farmers' Union Conference urged a more vigorous defence policy with universal military training.

Evening Post, 25 May 38, p. 12

The Defence League offered to bring in the 1600 needed Territorials and proposed a citizens' militia of men over Territorial age. To all this the government replied that it was doing a great deal more than the Nationalists had done in the early 1930s, that its measures were adequate for any attacks anticipated by Imperial experts, that it was spending money and getting good value for it; that many of these criticisms were political, a stick with which to hammer the government. But on 2 June 1938 the Prime Minister, remarking that ‘No one can say what is going to happen when the nation has its back to the wall, but, whatever is necessary, when it comes to compulsion, we will not begin with human flesh and blood’,

Dominion, 3 Jun 38, p. 12

obliquely made the first suggestion that a Labour government might find conscription necessary, a suggestion that he and others were to repeat with increasing significance. Delicately Savage began to accustom himself and his party to an inevitable change that went clean against Labour principles and tradition. Meanwhile, in July, as a practical encouragement to service, Territorial pay was raised by 3s a day, plus camp allowances of 5s a day—the first rise since 1911.

Early in its election campaign for November 1938, while still acknowledging the ideal of the League of Nations, the National party urged that a strongly defended British Empire was the greatest factor in world peace, that in foreign policy New Zealand must stand wholeheartedly with Britain—Jordan's assertions of difference were deplored

‘[Mr Chamberlain's] policy is to avert war, and we should assist him by every means in our power, instead of making his job more difficult.’ Adam Hamilton, Dominion, 7 Jun 38, p. 8; NZPD, vol 251, p. 129, vol 252, pp. 442–5

—while land, sea and air forces should be expanded rapidly to contribute fairly to Empire defence and world peace. The armed force would be voluntary, but in war the resources of the country, both men and women, would be mobilised; no one would be allowed to exploit his fellow citizens.

Evening Post, 20 Sep 38, p. 6

Countering this, Labour's manifesto on 24 September had explained that it was increasing defence expenditure—£600,000 in 1932, £1 million in 1935, more than £3 million in 1938–9.

These figures differ from those printed in the budgets which give £1,014,370 actually expended during 1935–6, in a total of £25,890,567; £2,099,289 for 1938–9, out of £35,772,678.

It was improving and co-ordinating the three Services. In foreign policy it claimed belief in collective security through the League, Commonwealth co-operation and more defence. Neither party wished to risk popularity by stressing war and defence; it was politically wise to keep to familiar, blunted phrases.

During 1939 as threats multiplied, feeling again grew that not enough men were enlisting in the Territorials, especially the more mature who might supply leadership. The government uneasily juggled with its distaste for militarism, with defence needs, and with rebuttal of political opponents. The Defence League, since November 1938, had urged three months' compulsory military training for 18-year-olds, followed by four years in the Territorials. The Chamber of Commerce considered this view in May

Commerce Journal (Auckland), 25 May 39, pp. 1, 15

and, together with manufacturers and employers, pressed it (plus universal emergency service) upon the government late in August.

Evening Post, 21 Jun, 29, 31 Aug 39, pp. 12, 17, 10

Even a few Labour members with military backgrounds, notably J. A. Lee,

Lee, John Alexander, DCM (1891–1982): MP (Lab) Auck East 1922–8, Grey Lynn 1931–43; Parly Under-Sec Min Finance 1936–9; 1st Controller State Housing Dept; expelled Lab Party 1940

W. J. Lyon

Lyon, William John (1897–1941): MP (Lab) Waitemata from 1935

and W. E. Barnard,

Barnard, Hon William Edward (1886–1958): MP (Lab) Napier 1928–43, Speaker HoR 1936–43; resigned Labour party 1940

advocated increased recruiting. Labour's Easter Conference both re-affirmed its opposition to conscription and turned down a motion to suppress the Defence League—the Defence Minister saying that the League merely represented Labour's political opponents, defeated last year, and it was better to have them working openly than underground. Lee asked, ‘Are we to say there is to be no free speech for these retired and liverish colonels who want to see everyone doing the goose-step when there is no war?’

Standard, 20 Apr 39, p. 2

The Prime Minister repeated that no one could tell what a nation would do when backed to the wall, but conscription would not begin with flesh and blood.

In the second half of April 1939 a Pacific Defence Conference was held in Wellington. It had its origins in repeated requests by New Zealand for discussions between Britain, Australia and New Zealand on the strategic importance of the Pacific should trouble there coincide with a European war.

Wood, pp. 72–82; McGibbon, I. C., Blue-Water Rationale, pp. 257, 316ff

It was made clear that help from overseas, even of equipment, could not be quickly obtained, and New Zealand's defences must be sharply increased. Savage was finally convinced that immediate strengthening of land forces was needed. This he proclaimed on 22 May, having in the preceding weeks fumbled reluctantly towards it. In April he still wanted an international conference, hated the idea of conscription, and was sure that every man would be ready to serve in an emergency;

Evening Post, 18 Apr 39, p. 12

on 25 April he suddenly spoke of a home defence force of 50 000 men of up to 50 years old, independent of overseas sources for arms. This was closely involved with his belief in New Zealanders' eagerness to defend their Labour-governed country, but it gave rise to a report that the government was ordering 60 000 uniforms and should have done so earlier when it would have improved the wool sales.

Otago Daily Times, 4 May 39, p. 12

This Savage called an attempt to discredit the government both with the wool growers and the anti-militarists; he was thinking of a citizen army in plain clothes, ‘not goose-stepping… in uniform and spending hundreds of thousands a year.’

Dominion, 4 May 39, p. 10

The goose-stepping reference offended the Territorials, reported the Dominion of 6 May; poor Savage complained that everything was being turned to party propaganda.

Ibid., 6, 8 May 39, pp. 10, 10

Political absurdities attended New Zealand's approach to war.

Besides the Defence League there were in May 1939 a few extra-governmental movements to augment the home forces. An RSA National Guard was proposed at New Plymouth

Ibid., 3 May 39

and a Veterans' Brigade at Auckland.

Truth, 10 May 39, p. 8

Some trade unionists made their own suggestions. The Easter Labour Party Conference had asked the government to co-operate ‘with the Industrial Labour Movement in building up a Democratic Defence Force.’

Minutes of Labour Party Easter Conference, 1939, p. 23

The Auckland Trades Council in May proposed a company of 200 trade unionists officered by men with whom they normally worked, which would, said their adviser W. J. Lyon, assist co-ordination and ésprit de corps.

Workers' Weekly, 5 May 39; Standard, 4 May 39, p. 10

The leftist Carpenters Union paper The Borer in May urged the recruiting of trade unionists prepared to defend both their country and their progressive institutions, to fight enemies at home and abroad.

The Standard of 11 May strongly deprecated attempts ‘by a section of the Press and certain organisations to create a feeling of panic’ about defence, and Savage declared that private armies were not wanted, that the bogey of invasion had been turned into a political weapon against the government. The Defence Minister politely vetoed all separate organisations, saying that their spirit was appreciated, but defence must be under government control and those prepared to join such organisations would readily enlist in the Territorial forces.

Standard, 1 Jun 39, p. 9

In May a recruiting drive began; on the 22nd Savage, in a special broadcast, said that while he did not believe general war to be inevitable and had no secret information of a crisis, the international situation was bad and all, however reluctantly, must face reality. Strength and vigilance were the conditions of survival. If war came to Britain it came to New Zealand. He asked for volunteers, first to the regular Army, then for 6000 more Territorials to make them up to 16 000; for 280 to the specially trained coast defences, and finally for all able-bodied men of 20–55 years to register in a National Military Reserve, from which 5000 experienced men would be selected as Territorial reserves.

Evening Post, 23 May 39, p. 16

To avoid confusion he asked the Defence League to withdraw its enrolment cards. He stressed that training was for home defence, defence of living standards and social security; explained how the Air Force in particular had improved in Labour's time, and still declared that international discussions would be of more use before a new war than after it. The Defence League welcomed the speech, and withdrew its cards. The Opposition expressed relief and qualified approval, still preferring universal training to volunteers.

Ibid., 24 May 39, p. 12

So did the press in general. The Dominion on 27 May gave the views of 17 assorted people on the defence proposals, several suggesting that conscription would be necessary.

Territorial enlistment was brisk and the 16 000 were secured early in August,

Ibid., 8 Aug 39, p. 10

but for the Military Reserve it went much more slowly. The anxieties of the Opposition and the RSA were renewed, the latter's annual conference in June urging ‘compulsory universal national service’.

Ibid., 23 Jun 39, p. 10

After Parliament opened in June the Opposition vigorously criticised defence inadequacy and wanted universal military training for home service, while some members introduced what was to be one of the repeated themes in the next few years: that money should be diverted from public works and social services to defence—national security before social security.

NZPD, vol 255, pp. 504–5

The Farmers' Union, a body usually closely associated with the National party, in July approved the government's defence efforts, deprecated criticising it for inadequate preparations, saying that the people themselves were to blame, and strongly urged compulsory military training.

Evening Post, 12 Jul 39, p. 7

In its qualified approval, the Farmers' Union at this stage was close to the Defence League, acknowledging advances but demanding more.

The National party, then, in the three years before the war urged increased defence as a need transcending politics, but urged it in the terms of party warfare. The RSA and the Defence League, in advocating compulsory military training, stood with the National party. Labour was sensitive and resentful about these attacks, and suspicious of their motive. Party politics dogged and clogged every defence move.

Immediately war was declared towards midnight on Sunday 3 September 1939

See Wood, pp. 7–10

all major sections of the community voiced support of the government to help Britain and fight the Nazis. Many different streams of feeling and tradition could unite in this. For instance, a Labour party caucus replying to British Labour greetings predicted the inevitable ‘triumph of justice, democracy and socialism’;

Standard, 14 Sep 39, p. 5

the National caucus resolved ‘This is the hour to remember the slogan which fired the patriotism of the men and women of this country twenty-five years ago—“To the last man and the last shilling”’;

Dominion, 7 Sep 39, p. 11

Adam Hamilton declared ‘Party politics must be laid aside so that our people may be united in their determination and effort to live up to the high traditions established in the past.’

Evening Post, 4 Sep 39, p. 8

The Federation of Labour promised to keep production as high as possible, stressed that Nazis were the enemies of trade unionism and of the best sections of the German people and called all workers, including those of Germany, to make common cause in the fight for human justice, liberty and international brotherhood.

Press, 8 Sep 39, p. 10

The churches sonorously proclaimed loyalty to the Throne, co-operation with the State, and the brotherhood of man.

A great many local bodies, trade associations, sports and other groups passed resolutions and wrote to the government of their unswerving loyalty to the Crown, and keen desire to co-operate fully with the government in defence of the Commonwealth. Such declarations came, for instance, from the NZRSA,

Evening Post, 5 Sep 39, p. 5

the Associated Chambers of Commerce, which most pressingly offered to assist in framing regulations affecting commerce and industry,

Ibid., 7 Sep 39, p. 13

the Wellington branch of the National Council of Women,

Ibid., p. 16

the New Zealand Federation of Young Farmers' Clubs,

Ibid., 8 Sep 39, p. 13

the New Zealand Motor Trade Federation,

Ibid., 9 Sep 39, p. 6

the Wellington Manufacturers Association,

Ibid., 4 Sep 39, p. 11

the Municipal Association of New Zealand,

Ibid., 12 Sep 39, p. 8

the Canterbury Progress League,

Press, 7 Sep 39, p. 10

the Christchurch City Council,

Ibid., 12 Sep 39, p. 10

the New Zealand Bowling Association

Evening Post, 25 Sep 39, p. 4

and the New Zealand Amateur Swimming Association.

Otago Daily Times, 4 Oct 39, p. 6

Fortunately for the government officers concerned, many local sports bodies did not express their loyalty individually but asked their New Zealand associations to frame suitable resolutions: thus the rugby players of Otago, hotly followed by those of Canterbury, on 4 September telegraphed to their New Zealand Union proposing a united resolution.

Evening Post, 5 Sep 39, p. 5; Press, 6 Sep 39, p. 16

Some took the situation very seriously: the cricketers of Wellington and Otago delayed planning their season as their young men might be defending the country instead of playing cricket,

Evening Post, 5, 7 Sep 39, pp. 5, 7

while the New Zealand Baseball Council declared that though competitions would be carried on where possible, players of military age should offer their services in this dark hour.

Ibid., 7 Sep 39, p. 7

In a few aspects, war actually began. Recruiting for the National Military Reserve, begun in May for service in New Zealand, increased rapidly, with nearly 7000 offering in the first four days, making a total of 25 444 by 6 September, some of whom were soon called for guarding vital points, coast-watching and fortress duty.

Press, 7 Sep 39, p. 14; Evening Post, 1 Dec 39, p. 6

Enlistment for the overseas force opened on 12 September to an equally enthusiastic response. Public Works carpenters and private contractors swung into action, building camps at Trentham, Burnham and Ngaruawahia. Some eager people who, remembering 1914–18, at once began to raise patriotic funds, were checked and chilled by the government which promised instead a comprehensive organisation for money-gathering. Petrol was rationed for a few weeks; prices were frozen; day-to-day life changed not at all. For most people there was nothing immediate to do.

With some people, self interest balanced fervour and they began at once to hoard food. Anticipating shortages arising from import restrictions plus war conditions, they bought tea, sugar and flour in panic quantities. The grocers, unable by regulation to exceed their normal wholesale supplies, were obliged to ration their customers. Four pounds of sugar per person per time was fairly general and in Wellington, for instance, tea was limited to one pound and flour to seven pounds.

Evening Post, 7 Sep 39, p. 14

This embarrassed grocers, for obviously it was the more worthwhile customers who could afford such outlay, nor did it avoid multiple buying by the determined ones; country people, used to 56lb bags of sugar, were bewildered when offered 4lb a week. The flour rush lasted only a few days. The quantities of tea and sugar entering New Zealand were not diminished, rather increased, and by mid-November the panic had subsided. Tinned fruit and fish were also bought up by those who could afford them, while in drapers' shops the belief that reels of cotton would be scarce made the demand so strong that they were scarce indeed.

Dominion, 15 Jun 40, p. 9

It was all small scale, but the private and petty greed contrasted with public professions of loyalty and co-operation.

After the first moments of acceptance when all parties stood bareheaded before the great issue, the war seemed far away and local differences re-assumed their sharp outlines. On 12–13 September the Emergency Regulations Bill which gave the government very wide powers to legislate by orders-in-council, was passed without opposition, J. G. Coates

Coates, Rt Hon Joseph Gordon, PC, MC & Bar (1878–1943): MP (Nat) Kaipara 1911–43; Min Public Works 1920–6, Justice 1919–20, PM 1925–8; Min Railways 1923–8, Native Affairs 1921–8, Public Works, Transport, Unemployment 1931–3, Finance, Customs, Transport 1933–5; Member War Cab 1940–3

saying ‘All of us dread the idea of a Government taking omnibus powers to do exactly what it likes, but the people of this country must realise that their very existence may depend on the unification of effort.’

Standard, 21 Sep 39, p. 8

Fraser soon warned that the government would advance some finance measures on which he would not expect the Opposition to stifle its criticism: ‘Nobody should be expected to sink his conscientious opinions even at a time like this.’

NZPD, vol 256, p. 46; Evening Post, 13 Sep 39, p. 5

Hamilton, as he himself later explained, had privately besought Fraser to avoid contentious legislation; this he held would not seriously embarrass the government and would be a very real contribution towards public and sectional unity.

Evening Post, 23 Nov 39, p. 10

Here it is necessary to remember the background. The National party was alarmed by what the government had already done and feared more for the future. Labour, coming to power in 1935 pledged to relieve unemployment, had done so largely by putting thousands of men on public works—hydro-electricity, irrigation, and, conspicuously, road-making. It was not pick-and-shovel relief but fully-paid work, often from large camps which included family housing, and using a great deal of heavy equipment imported directly by the government. This, plus increased imports resulting from increased spending power, bit so deeply into New Zealand's balance of trade funds in London that the government was obliged to restrict imports at the end of 1938. Nash went to England to renew accumulated loans totalling more than £17 million due for repayment in 1940. He found the financial authorities so hostile to his government's ‘unsound’ experimental policies that they at first refused to convert the loan (which would have bankrupted the New Zealand government), then consented to do so on very hard terms. In July 1939 the loan was raised: more than £1 million was to be repaid on 1 January 1940, and the remaining £16 million carried on at 3½ per cent, with £2 million to be repaid in 1940–1 and £3½ million in each of the four following years.

NZ Herald, 8 Jul 40, p. 6

Restrictions checking the import of British goods were frowned on, and the New Zealand government should not promote industries in conflict with British interests.

Information from Dr W. B. Sutch, Jan 66; cf. Olssen, Erik, John A. Lee, p. 142

Nash learned a lesson he never forgot: ever after he watched over New Zealand's sterling balance with a protective care which caused him to restrain early wartime impulses to give produce and money to Britain.

Meanwhile it was necessary to keep imports down, and as local industry could not rapidly be built up without importing equipment, shortages were inevitable. These were soon to be swallowed up in the larger shortages of the war, but during the first year the complaint was often made that, but for pre-war import restrictions imposed by a spendthrift government, various goods would still have been plentiful. While the restrictions favoured manufacturers, they curbed and threatened many importers and traders, and encroached on an area hitherto free from State intrusion; they were viewed with resentment and alarm as a long step towards socialism. Such controls, administered by civil servants necessarily new to the business field, inevitably occasioned misunderstanding, rudeness, muddle and delay, which brought resentment against regimentation to a very high pitch well before war started. However, when war made controls inevitable not only were people pre-conditioned to accept them, but the organisation already existed and had got through some of its teething troubles.

War further sharpened the Nationalists' wish to have men of sound ideas and business ability at the helm. Many were convinced that the country would be ruined, its war effort enfeebled and democracy overthrown by experimenting socialists, and many saw totalitarianism looming at home: ‘if democracy is worth fighting for abroad, it is worth defending politically in this country’.

Adam Hamilton, Evening Post, 1 Nov 39, p. 12

Firmly exiled from office by the 1938 election, the National party hoped that the new need for unity would at least curb Labour's socialistic progress, and shrewd minds knew that wars often bring in coalition governments. As the Standard jeered on 12 October: ‘they thought that the sweet fruits of office, even though they had to share them with the Labour party, were almost within their grasp.’

For the Labour party, avoidance of measures that would displease the Opposition was a very high price to pay for co-operation. What was the point of being the government if they were to govern according to the wishes of the Opposition? From top to bottom Labour was exasperated at being interrupted by war when it had lately achieved triumphant re-election and was ready to press on with social and financial reforms. To rein in, or to accept coalition, was to abandon the position for which it had battled so long, and workers could argue that abandonment would be giving in at home to the enemy they were fighting abroad.

The political truce was broken early in October over the Marketing Amendment Act, which enabled the government to buy and re-sell any produce at prices fixed by the State, and over the Reserve Bank Amendment Act which enlarged the Bank's powers and made final the government's control of it. There was a storm of protest, directed particularly against Nash, in Parliament, in the press and at meetings of farmers and businessmen. The national emergency was being exploited to promote the factional end of complete socialisation.

On 5 October the Speaker ruled out as tedious repetition argument about Socialism and the Marketing Amendment Act. NZPD, vol 256, p. 713

Nash stated that the Bank bill was an ordinary measure which would probably have been introduced had there been no war, but war made it still more necessary that currency and credit should be controlled by the government. Hamilton replied that New Zealanders would never submit to autocratic dictatorship of the State, the very thing Britain was fighting; Sidney Holland

Holland, Rt Hon Sir Sidney, PC, GCB('57), CH('51) (1893–1961): MP (Nat) Chch Nth, Fendalton 1940–57; Leader Nat party 1940–9; member War Admin 1942; PM 1949–57; Min Finance 1949–54

said New Zealand had thrown her financial captain overboard and faced a stormy voyage with a crew of political adventurers rocking the boat; Coates wanted to know the difference between National Socialism under Hitler and National Socialism under Nash.

Otago Daily Times, 7 Oct 39, p. 9; actually Holland spoke about a ‘reckless crew of political “experimenters”’, with ‘a militant section of that crew’ rocking the boat. NZPD, vol 256, p. 772

The session closed on 7 October 1939, with Fraser remarking that such heat was quite in order; the government did not expect sinking of principle or curtailment of expression of opinion.

NZPD, vol 256, p. 840

The Standard, however, wrote about obstruction of war measures.

Standard, 12 Oct 39, p. 1

During the next two or three months widespread and widely reported meetings of farmers and businessmen complained of these new encroachments of socialisation, plus the longer-standing grievances of import restrictions and no increase in dairy prices for 1939–40. Such war regulations as price and transport control were seen as clumsy government intrusion into affairs run much better by private enterprise. A few extremists even advocated direct action such as closing all farms for a fortnight, or tipping milk down the drains.

Otago Daily Times, 27 Oct 39, p. 8, reporting a Rotorua meeting; Standard, 11 Jan 40, pp. 8, 11, reporting a meeting at Coroglen ‘a month ago’.

A Dunedin newspaper correspondent wrote: ‘We are at war and it is no disloyalty to organise and put into practice a general strike to make this country quietly more efficient, prosperous and free.’

Otago Daily Times, 25 Oct 39, p. 3

Such wrangling could perhaps be expected, paradoxical as it may now seem to have been. Troubled peace had been replaced by ‘phoney war’. After all the forebodings, bombs were not raining on cities; almost stationary armies faced each other in fortifications. For New Zealand, waiting went on. Normal living, it was felt, should be suspended, but there was nothing to replace it. Unable to get at the enemy without, National party people turned their frustration and adrenalin against the enemy at hand; Labour replied in kind, and each accused the other of using the war to grind political axes.

The need for increased production confirmed the position of farmers. Traditionally they were the backbone of the country, the vital basis of the New Zealand economy—in fact, were the economy— and they knew it. It was only sense, therefore, that their interests should rank first with any government, and especially in war time. They believed deeply that what was good for farmers must be good for New Zealand. They had little use for secondary industries, which the Labour government, hoping to lessen dependence on overseas prices for farm produce, was trying to foster behind tariffs and import controls. They had still less time for unproductive public works, some virtually relief projects, on which the government was spending freely and which, by offering better pay and conditions than farmers could afford, drew workers away from farms. Traditionally suspect were freezing workers and wharfies, always loafing behind their regulations and awards, always trying to clip a bit more than their labour's worth from the farmer's returns, and cossetted now by a Labour government. For two years or so before the war farmers had adjusted to rising costs by trimming expenses, especially of labour, cutting down dairy herds and increasing sheep numbers, thus maintaining net income even though production was lessened.

Dairy cows in milk—1937: 1 805 405; 1938: 1 763 775; 1939: 1 744 478; 1940: 1 739 874; 1941: 1 779 603. Yearbook 1942, p. 346. Total butterfat production fell from 442.4 million pounds weight in 1936–7 to 419.9 in 1937–8 and 376.7 in 1938–9; despite the grumbles about incentive it rose again to 415 million pounds in 1939–40 and 448.8 million pounds in 1940–1. Ibid., p. 355

Now farmers were asked to produce more, while army enlistments and a rise in public works pay made their labour shortage worse, and the government took no large steps to help them. Let the government close public works, they urged, then farmers would have an adequate supply of men to choose from, money would be saved for war expenses, and even the guaranteed prices might be improved enough to make increased effort worthwhile. They resented being asked to work harder for no more money while the rest of the community took the war easily.

In particular, farmers were disturbed because there was no time limit to the commandeer of produce under the Marketing Amendment Act and, when questioned, Nash would say only that the matter would be brought before Parliament when the war ended.

Point Blank, 15 Nov 39, p. 15

It was strongly felt that the government intended to use the war as a stalking-horse to get control of the main economic structure, and this cut very deeply at farmers' independence: ‘… the farmer will not do what he is told according to the dictates of an employer. He is the master of his farm and its production depends on his ability and organisation. If he is given the correct incentive he will do his job but without it he won't. If they interfere with the individual enterprise of the farmer they can never replace it with any other organisation and get the same production’,

Ibid., p. 47

wrote an indignant man from Hawke's Bay, and similar views were widely uttered.

Labour's guaranteed prices for dairy produce, starting in the 1936–7 season, had at first won farming approval. In that year a loss of £272,482 was borne by the government. The 1937–8 season saw a modest rise in prices paid to farmers and a £576,724 surplus in the dairy account; but in 1938–9, when prices again rose slightly, the deficit was £2,514,889.

Yearbook1941, p. 357

An advisory committee recommended a further price rise for 1939–40 but Nash, questioning the basis of its calculations, decreed that there would be no increase,

Evening Post, 1 Dec 39, p. 4

and in fact butterfat prices were to continue unchanged from 1938–9 until 1 April 1943.

Yearbook1940, pp. 414–15, 1947–49, pp. 880, 890

The halt in 1939–40 caused keen dissatisfaction: farmers were being asked to produce more with no compensation against rising costs: it followed that the prices were a bar to increased production, and loyalty to the Empire required their improvement.

An allied complaint was the shortage of experienced farm labour. This was not just a wartime problem; it had succeeded the Depression problem of not being able to pay even for an experienced man when he stood at the door asking for work. But it was accentuated by rural labour enlisting, and a further acute annoyance was the public works pay increase from 1 October of 5s a week (plus an extra 5s camp allowance for married men in single quarters), giving a minimum wage of £4 5s a 40-hour week. This brought public works pay in line with that fixed for other industries by the Arbitration Court, but the award wage on a mixed farm was £2 5s a week, plus board and lodging reckoned at £1 a week, and on a dairy farm £2 12s 6d, with no 40-hour limit.

Farm wages, except those for a few groups such as shearers and harvesters, had never been fixed by collective agreements or Arbitration Court awards. Farm workers were too scattered for organisation, farmers strongly disliked regimentation, board and lodging were normally part of the deal, hours and conditions varied, and pay likewise. However, following the guaranteed price scheme which was intended to assure the competent dairy farmer a decent standard of living, the Agricultural Workers Act 1936 passed on the benefit to his employees. It decreed a certain number of paid holidays and a scale of minimum wages ranging from 17s 6d a week for those of less than 17 years to £2 2s 6d for those of 21 or more, which rose by 1939 to range from £1 to £2 12s 6d.

Riches, E. J., ‘Agricultural planning and farm wages in New Zealand’, International Labour Review, vol 35, no 3, Mar 37, pp. 5, 8, 21–3; Yearbook 1940, p. 832

Meanwhile, by various Orders-in-Council, the Act was extended to other farm workers, establishing holidays and rates of pay. From 1 May 1937, on farms producing wool, meat and grain, the rates ranged from 17s 6d to £2 2s 6d.

Regulation 154/1937; Standard, 6 May 37, p. 7

These rates rose with those for dairy farms, except that for men of 21 years and more pay should not exceed £2 5s a week.

Yearbook1939, p. 723, 1940, p. 815

Farmers widely allowed that good men would be fools to stick to farms, and were certain that they could not compete with such pay; according to newspaper reports, very few spoke like the Waimate farmer who said that somehow farm wages must be raised: ‘Do not think for a moment you are going to smash all other classes of the community down to the level of the teamster who gets £2.5.0 a week’.

Press, 6 Nov 39, p. 10

Few mentioned poor farm housing as a cause of the labour shortage. Basically, many farmers expected a supply of capable single men, content to live in more or less primitive bachelor conditions. They were sure that they could not afford family housing for employees, forgetting that the resultant absence of children from rural districts perpetuated the shortage and that it was the Public Works Department's provision of housing, as well as better pay, which enticed labour away from the land. Of course some farmers provided good houses for married men, but often even large farms had only one or two small family houses apart from single quarters. Naturally farm housing had been at a standstill during the Depression, and during the few intervening years of comparative prosperity it seemed a less urgent need than the fencing, top-dressing and long-delayed repairs or improvements that soaked up the better prices.

Ibid., 2 Nov 39, p. 4

It was frequently urged that unproductive public works where men were ‘unemployed in the sense that we understand the term’ should cease, and it was even suggested that farmers should be able to claim particular men from public works—the obvious difficulties ‘probably could be solved if the Government faced the position resolutely’.

Ibid.

Some thought that farm workers should not be accepted by the Army, others that it was useless to hold a man who wanted to enlist: ‘he would only grumble on the job’.

Otago Daily Times, 6 Nov 39, p. 4

Subsidised farm labour was proposed at a number of meetings—one at Lawrence, for instance, approved a detailed plan advanced by the president of the Otago Farmers' Union, transferring men from subsidised local body (Scheme 13) and public works to such jobs as scrub cutting, weed clearing, hedge cutting, ditching, draining and fencing, not more than £1 a week of wages coming from the farmer, the rest from government funds. Camps on wheels for easy moving could be established where required in country districts, and the men distributed to adjoining farms to work in gangs under efficient supervision.

Ibid., 11 Nov 39, p. 5; Point Blank, 15 Dec 39, p. 13

A good many farmers would have endorsed the Canterbury Progress League's suggestions for suspension of the 40-hour week, registration of manpower, national service for both war and production and the transfer of men from public works back to farms.

Press, 16 Nov 39, p. 8

After a month's tour of the North Island, Hamilton's summing-up of the farmers' attitude modified somewhat the devoted support for Britain expressed earlier: support in the form of farm produce should fetch a decent price. He had found everywhere ‘intense dissatisfaction of the militant type’ arising from the inadequate price of butterfat, the permanence of the commandeer of produce, the shortage of suitable labour and the insufficient measures to check rising costs. Though farmers were willing to make sacrifices, he said, if they retained ownership of their produce and could sell it for sterling, ‘thus getting possession of British money’, they would get substantially more than at present, and ‘regain a large portion of that economic justice that is not only their right but also the country's vital need’.

Otago Daily Times, 8 Nov 39, p. 6

An editorial in Point Blank, the Farmers' Union paper, of 15 December gathered together the farmers' grievances as many saw them:

While the farmer is asked to work fifty or sixty hours on seven days a week, in all weathers, and for an inadequate return, the produce from his farm is commandeered and controlled by well-paid officials who are given the benefit of the forty hour week. It is handled on the wharves and in the freezing works by spoon-fed trades unionists, many of whom are concerned with doing as little as possible for as much as possible…. The farmer is willing to do his duty, but he cannot do it unless he gets a good deal fairer treatment than he is getting now. In the first place, adequate labour must be provided…. There is plenty of labour available for Public Works, on which the wages have recently been increased …. Let Mr Webb

Webb, Hon Patrick Charles (1884–1950): b Aust, to NZ 1906; 1st Pres NZ FoL; MP (Lab) Grey 1913–14, Buller from 1933; Min Mines, Labour, Immigration, PMG 1935–46

use his influence with Mr Nash to obtain prices, for their commandeered produce, that will enable them to pay farm workers a wage that will attract men from Public Works and also permit them to give their workers a forty hour week. Why should the farmer himself not have a forty hour week if it comes to the point, and be recompensed for the higher skill and ability he possesses. His returns to-day are less than those of a carpenter. When the Government is willing to look at matters squarely and put first things first, then, and then only will increased production be assured.

Another, more appealing, statement of attitude by the man on the land appeared in the advertising columns of several newspapers:

I, THE UNDERSIGNED, and all those associated with me, engaged in a 60- to 80-hour week producing Wool, Mutton and Lamb in order that New Zealand will keep its promise to the British Government as part of its war effort, and being quite content to set aside all pecuniary reward for the duration, give notice that on conclusion of peace, WE WILL ASSUME COMPLETE CONTROL OF THE SALE AND DISPOSAL OF OUR WOOL, MUTTON AND LAMB, and will use every Constitutional and Legal measure TO PREVENT THE NATIONALISATION AND SOCIALISATION OF OUR PROPERTIES. T. D. Burnett,

Press, 14 Nov 39, p. 1; Dominion, 15 Nov 39, p. 3. Burnett, Thomas David (1877–1941): MP (Nat) Temuka from 1919

Mount Cook Station, South Canterbury November 11, 1939.

This was reprinted in the New Zealand Transport Worker, the watersiders' paper, of 15 December with the comment: ‘[if this gentleman] had to sell his wool in the market this year without nationalisation, as he calls it, how would he get on? And who the devil wants his Mount Cook station anyhow?’ The same paper, remarking on talk of a farmers' revolt, wrote that under a Nationalist government a Labourite who talked sedition during a major war would be summarily dealt with, and perhaps even a Labour government could be too tolerant with agitators. ‘The sooner these people are made to realise that they are now the “agitators” and the “spreaders of strife”, and that the Labour government is the rightful and constitutional guardian of this country, the better.’ It remembered the baton-carrying farmers who helped to break the 1913 strike.

NZ Transport Worker, 15 Dec 39, p. 26

A few letters appeared in newspapers saying that the Farmers' Union did not speak for all farmers, and that its president and Hamilton should urge increased production instead of ‘continually grousing and attacking the Government’.

Press, 24, 25 Nov 39, pp. 13, 15; NZ Herald, 9 Jan 40, p. 10

A resolute note of self-help sounded from some districts where, though young men were scarce and wives were helping with milking, farmers claimed they would get over this difficulty just as they had in the past;

Otago Daily Times, 19 Oct 39, p. 8, report from Taranaki

some local committees proposed to advise and assist on properties owned or affected by those enlisting.

Ibid., 20 Oct 39, p. 10, report from Feilding

Government spokesmen tried to placate. They saw the difficultties—including that of getting experienced labour under 21 years of age. They explained that farm workers were on public works only if no farm work were available (which did not, of course, account for men who deliberately got themselves sacked from farms);

Ibid., 27 Oct 39, p. 4

that public works men could readily have leave for seasonal farm work; that more than 3500 men were already transferred from Scheme 13 and public works to farm work, breaking in new land or reclaiming farms that had gone back, with the government paying 75 per cent, and it was hoped to transfer thousands more to such work.

Evening Post, 20 Oct, 3 Nov 39, pp. 9, 9; Press, 23, 27 Nov 39, pp. 10, 12

Farmers were offered a subsidy of £1 a week for six months to take on an inexperienced man,

Evening Post, 17 Nov 39, p. 6

and were assured that arrangements were being made to check on enlistments, men in occupations classified as essential being refused; of those already enlisted several hundred would be returned to their normal jobs.

Otago Daily Times, 17 Nov 39, p. 6

In the community of trade, background discontent against Labour's regimentation of business, in wages, hours, working conditions and import restrictions, was increased again by price stabilisation.

See Baker, J. V. T., War Economy (hereinafter Baker), chaps 11–12

An early request by Auckland's Chamber of Commerce to start selling at replacement costs was refused.

Otago Daily Times, 27 Oct 39, p. 6

Prices could be raised after 1 September 1939 only by the actual increase of costs, applied for and approved in each case by the Price Tribunal. Increases such as extra imported costs of goods, freight, insurance, interest on extra capital needed to meet increased import prices, all set forth on special application forms, could be passed on, but traders feared that there would be rising costs everywhere—such as for stationery—with which the forms would not cope. They did not seek extra profits, they claimed, only the right to pass costs on, making a reasonable margin of profit; they added that they would not get what they did not fight for.

Evening Post, 17, 18 Oct 39, pp. 10, 15

The Christchurch Chamber of Commerce and the Canterbury University College Economics Department, in two bulletins published in November, protested that to submit a claim for every price increase would be intolerably cumbersome and slow in the quick moving world of business. There were as yet very few shortages and adjustment of supply and demand would be better achieved if prices were allowed to run free.

Press, 27 Nov 39, p. 9

In the first months of the war import restrictions remained the chief complaint of the business world. This was linked to war purposes by the idea that to pay as you go required business as usual; hence the government should strongly assist farmers to increase production and sterling funds and allow traders to secure stocks, in order to supply revenue and maintain employment. Also, a few shop assistants' unions feared that business retrenchment would lead to unemployment ‘after Christmas’.

NZ Importers Federation, in Evening Post, 22 Nov 39, p. 10; Press, 21, 22 Nov 39, pp. 10, 8, reporting meetings at Hamilton and Invercargill; a report in ibid., 30 Nov 39, p. 5, suggested that these were the only such meetings so far

A large meeting at Hamilton on 4 December, combining the usually conflicting voices of farmers, the businessmen and shop assistants (‘an unholy alliance’, said Savage),

Ibid., 4 Dec 39, p. 6

pressed for the relaxing of import restrictions, and reducing farm costs and labour problems.

Ibid., 5 Dec 39, p. 8

Some sections of the trading interest, however, had no sympathy with the Farmers' Union claim that unless their conditions were improved primary production could not be increased. This production determined how much imports might buy, and a trade journal harangued farmers in terms reminiscent of the extreme Left:

There can be no more haggling now over prices, and anyone (no matter what his standing) who attempts to put any brake on production for either personal gain or political motives deserves nothing short of a prompt trial and speedy punishment on conviction. The rest of the Empire is rallying to the tocsin and every New Zealander worth his salt will pull his full weight, without stopping to argue what it is worth to him.

NZ National Review (incorporating NZ Manufacturer), Nov 39, quoted in Press, 28 Nov 39, p. 10

From the Associated Chambers of Commerce, a body traditionally critical of government interference in business and trade, came a remarkably fair, non-sectional statement by the retiring president, M. S. Myers, who said that had there been no war he would have protested about regulations intruding on trade. But war inevitably meant assumption by the State of functions neither necessary nor desirable in peace. The government had to govern, to decide what the country would do in all the war's aspects. Fighting men were only a part of defence; food-growing, factories, and financial sacrifice were also important factors. More co-operation was needed between all sections. Discussion and constructive criticism should not be stifled—‘it is only mean, contemptible, negative or destructive criticism that is to be condemned’. As the State's intervention might be more easily borne but for lack of business knowledge in its officers, the remedy surely was close consultation between the public authorities and trained private interests. On the ‘sound business’ handling of shortages he remarked that sharply rising prices simply meant that the poor paid by going short or doing without, while the rich paid in money. He did not believe that special profits out of war conditions were necessary for the maximum output of New Zealanders: rather that large returns easily made, in business or in wages, induced slackening of effort.

Otago Daily Times, 16 Nov 39, p. 5

Such far sight was exceptional. For the most part public utterances in these first few months showed no foreboding of how long or deep the war might be. The war was as yet only an argument to be used by various sections of the community in support of attitudes already held: the traders were still chafing against import restrictions, the farmers' complaints were really another phase of the conflict between town and country, a conflict very strongly rooted in New Zealand. The government felt it neither necessary nor wise to stifle—or even to censor out of the newspapers—sectional hostility and criticisms of itself that only a few months later would seem dangerously subversive.

War sharpened the government's inner trouble, the threat of schism which could have made necessary either coalition or else an election charged with war hysteria. It grew from the past. The distress of the Depression had swept Labour into power after 20 years of striving growth, in which members' differences mattered less than their effectiveness. They were men of high purpose, fervent to bring economic justice and prosperity to the people of New Zealand, and at first they were so busy relieving the Depression that they scarcely noticed a latent division in their ranks. The majority was headed by Savage, who inspired a quite extraordinary faith and following in the electorate, if to a lesser degree among his colleagues; under him a shrewd, competent, hard-working pair, Fraser and Nash, gradually came to dominance. This majority aimed to direct the economy through existing channels, while others wanted government to take control of it more boldly.

The cracks were held together by the pressure of the 1938 election, but afterwards there emerged a group of left-wingers. In this group were Lee, McMillan,

McMillan, Hon Dr David Gervan (1904–51): MP (Lab) Dun West 1935–43; Vice-Pres Labour party; Min Marine, Prisons, DSIR 1940–1

Nordmeyer,

Nordmeyer, Hon Sir Arnold Henry, KCMG('75) (1901–): Presby minister 1925–35; MP (Lab) Oamaru 1935–49, 1951–69; Vice-Pres Labour party 1940–50, Pres 1950–5; Leader Labour party (Parly) 1963–5; Min Health 1941–7, Industries & Commerce 1947–9, Finance 1957–60

Clyde Carr,

Carr, Rev Clyde Leonard (d 1962 aet 76): MP (Lab) Timaru 1928–62; Deputy Speaker HoR 1946–50, education cmtes 1929–30, 1935–49

Lyon, Richards,

Richards, Arthur Shapton (1877–1947): b UK, to NZ 1894; MP (Lab) Roskill/Mt Albert from 1931

Barnard and Langstone,

Langstone, Hon Frank (d 1969 aet 88): MP (Lab) Waimarino 1922–5, Roskill 1928–49; Min Lands, State Forests 1935–40, Lands, External Affairs, Cook Islands 1940–2; NZHC Canada 1942

with some other waverers on the edge. They felt that Labour's government was making no advance towards socialism, which they regarded as its original and proper goal. Instead, the relief measures and the 40–hour week giving employment and overtime pay, by increasing spending power had promoted inflation and the crisis of 1938, which had compelled import restrictions and a British loan on hard terms. Hardening of Labour's hierarchy discipline made these back-benchers powerless; they felt that democracy was dying in the Labour party, with leaders becoming less brotherly as years in office multiplied, and many voters shared their disillusion. At Labour grass-roots in the branches there was a broad swell of discontent, growing from lack of socialism and from awareness that the comradely atmosphere of the branches, in which Labour had largely grown to strength, was becoming unimportant beside the growing influence of trade union leaders, powermen elevated by compulsory but inert unionism. That mounting Nationalist pressure for conscription of men was not being confronted by vigorous measures to conscript money augmented the sense of Labour's betrayal.

In this dissatisfaction John A. Lee had a forward part, advancing a financial policy much akin to the Douglas Credit-type ideas prominent in the mid-Thirties: that the State, instead of borrowing for development, should create a socialist bank and issue credit based on capacity to produce, with more stress on secondary industries than on the roads and hydro-electric schemes of Labour's public works, thereby checking the inflation caused by spending power not balanced by production of consumer goods.

After the 1938 election, wherein Lee's Socialism in New Zealand was much pointed to, and Nationalists hinted alarmingly that he was likely to succeed the milder Savage, Lee pressed for the appointment of Cabinet by caucus. This had been Labour's original intention, but in the enthusiasm of 1935 Savage had been given a free hand. He expected it again in 1938, and after initial defeat by caucus he got his way as a personal matter. Lee, able, forceful, and his party's most skilful propagandist, expected Cabinet rank, and many expected it for him, but after four years he had no portfolio, no real power, though he was active on the Defence Council. In defence Lee diverged from New Zealand's traditional policy of sending expeditionary forces to seek the foe overseas. He believed in isolation and in New Zealand being defended by air and by a small but efficient military force. His defence thinking was not adopted but the Air Force was substantially increased between 1937 and 1939.

Olssen, pp. 88–9

In mid-1936 Lee became Director of Housing with wide powers and cheap finance and with Nash, his Minister, pre-occupied with other matters. It was estimated that New Zealand needed 20 000 new houses, while 27 000 should be demolished and 55 000 repaired. Lee organised with energy and skill, making good use of such resources as his shrewd and able permanent Under-Secretary, Arthur Tyndall,

Tyndall, Sir Arthur, Kt('55), CMG('39), MICE, FNZIE (1891–1979): Under-Sec Mines 1934, Dir Housing Construction 1936; Judge, Arbitration Court 1940–65; ILO commissions 1950, 1952–3, 1957, 1964–5

and the facilities of the powerful Fletcher Construction Company, which included joinery factories.

Olssen, pp. 93–4, 96, 104

Building trade unions, which sought to establish socialistic principles and worker control in State house construction, were advised by Lee to form cooperative companies and to compete with tenders. Companies were formed in Wellington, Hamilton and Dunedin, but proved successful only in Dunedin.

Ibid., pp. 103–5

Land was purchased and prepared in many towns, architects devised standardised but not uniform houses, and, despite rising costs and shortages of both workmen and materials, contractors put up houses at an increasing pace. By July 1938 it became clear that the Housing Department had outrun the capacity of the building industry,

Ibid., p. 107

but by March 1939 some 3445 houses had been completed.

Ibid., pp. 92–108; cf. p. 797ff

After the 1938 election, Armstrong

Armstrong, Hon Hubert Thomas (1875–1942) MP (Lab) Chch East from 1922; Min Labour, Immigration 1935–8, Health, Housing from 1938

became Minister of Housing and Lee's responsibility lessened.

Lee, restive, criticised Nash's policies—‘shilly-shallying and drift’, attempting ‘a Labour spending policy with a capitalist financial machine’—in a letter which leaked out early in 1939 and was widely circulated.

Olssen, pp. 135–7

Labour's Easter Conference of 1939 very heartily voted confidence in Nash, and more narrowly (285 votes to 207) censured Lee's disloyalty and indiscipline. With the war Lee's impatience grew. Five Cabinet ministers, including Fraser, had been gaoled in the 1914–18 war, while Lee, with all the appeal of a demagogue heightened by a DCM and an empty sleeve, was seemingly qualified for wartime leadership. This did not endear him to the Fraser–Nash group, and his financial proposals increased their irritation. He declared that orthodox financing of the war would ruin New Zealand, he spoke of debt repudiation, he renewed pressure against bankers, recalling that bankers had subsidised Hitler; these ideas were attractive to many who had felt the weight of ‘the Bank’ in the bad years. He was ready to press on towards socialism, despite the war and the risk of financial panic. Against the charge of disloyalty, Lee and his friends claimed that they were holding to Labour's pristine policy, which others were forsaking. He stood for democracy in caucus, and he was critical of New Zealand being hitched to Chamberlain's chariot without visible safeguards.

Savage, the beloved figurehead, was ill with cancer, though this was carefully concealed to avoid unrest.

As late as 7 Mar 40 the Standard laughed at rumours of the Prime Minister being seriously ill, and mentioned a chill; he was looking very fit and was in daily consultation with his ministers. He died on 27 March.

Lee, knowing that he was sick but not how near he was to death, wrote ‘Psychopathology in Politics’

Tomorrow, 6 Dec 39, pp. 75–7

explaining that a leader physically and mentally sick was fatal to his party. It was poor taste and poor timing, and Lee was at once relieved of his post as parliamentary under-secretary to Nash. On 11 January 1940 at Auckland's Labour Representation Committee a motion of severest censure against him was defeated 109:85 and replaced by one expressing confidence in both Lee and Savage. But before Labour's National Executive two days later almost the same censure motion was carried 15:3.

Brown, Bruce, The Rise of New Zealand Labour, pp. 205–6

On 25 March at the Easter Conference Lee was expelled from the Labour party. With Savage dying, it was vital to the central group underwriting the smooth succession of Fraser that Lee be got rid of quickly. The expulsion was well organised. ‘Big Jim’ Roberts,

Roberts, Hon James (1881–1967): b Ireland, to NZ 1901; Sec Waterside Workers Fed (later Union) 1915–41, NZ Alliance Lab 1920–36; rep NZ ILO Conf 1930, dep member Governing Body 1930–8; Pres NZ Lab party 1937–50; Waterfront Control Cmssnr 1940–6; MLC 1947–50

king of the waterfront unions and president of the Labour party, made little pretence of impartiality. Savage's death was expected hourly and it was claimed that Lee's attacks had killed him. Branches unaware of the issue beforehand had not instructed their delegates, and power was concentrated in a few hands by a voting system established that very day whereby union delegates exercised votes in proportion to the size of the unions, now swollen with compulsory but often passive members. The expulsion vote however, 546:344, showed that Lee's challenge was far from slight, while the election of D. G. McMillan, also prominent in the left wing, as vice-president of the party showed that this group was not rejected.

There is little doubt that the offending article was the pretext, not the cause, of Lee's expulsion, little doubt that he was condemned in an hysterical atmosphere to which Fraser contributed.

Lee also contributed. His final appeal was maladroit as he himself seemed to recognise 23 years later in his Simple on a Soap-box, p. 194. His wife came to stand beside him as he spoke from the floor, and he embraced and kissed her, with words that had far more emotion than relevance. The Labour Conference in 1940 was not susceptible to matinée finales that might have been successful in an American campaign of recent decades. It seemed contrived, a ‘jack-up’, and cost Lee votes.

But political comradeship of 20 years mattered nothing beside the welfare of Labour, which Fraser firmly identified with his own comprehensive leadership. Lee's expulsion was more than the removal of an unruly member, it was a formative piece of discipline. He was exiled to the political wilderness, a salutary example, and with him went W. E. Barnard, the Speaker, who resigned from Labour in principled protest. The sacrifice of Barnard's promising career (he had been in Parliament 12 years and was widely respected) marked as with a gravestone the point where the rest of the leftists headed back into the main stream. It was the task of McMillan, runner-up to Fraser in caucus voting for Prime Minister,

The voting was published: Fraser 33, McMillan 12, Clyde Carr 3, which leaves four votes unaccounted for. Brown, p. 209, has remarked that it could have been no comfort to Fraser that his succession was opposed by nearly a third of those voting. McMillan was reported in the Auckland Star, 8 Apr 40, p. 9, as saying that the voting figures published were not correct.

to close the rift. He firmly expressed loyalty and received Cabinet rank but resigned at the end of the year for health reasons. Langstone, already in Cabinet, supported Lee silently and later retired to a diplomatic post. Lyon went into the Army and was killed.

Lee set up his Democratic Labour party, with branches all over the country, but there was no large breakaway. The election due in 1941 was postponed for two years because of the war. In the 1943 election almost all of Lee's 51 candidates lost their deposits, though they polled four per cent of the total votes; Labour, though losing five seats, still had a comfortable majority.

Louise Overacker,‘The New Zealand Labour Party’, The American Political Science Review, vol XLIX, no 3, Sep 55, p. 722

Many of Lee's followers would not split Labour; all their political experience held them from this, especially with the Nationalists pressing for wartime coalition. However much Lee had contributed to his own downfall, something died in the heart of Labour when he was cast out. Authoritarianism was strengthened; criticism of the leaders would not do. This change, this narrowing, would probably have occurred without the war, but at all levels the war was an extra reason for suppressing strife within the government's party.

Lee's head on a spike was both a warning against divergence within Labour and a show of force to those outside. It revealed, said the New Zealand Herald of 27 March, a system as totalitarian as Fascism, Nazism or Communism, which should be noted by people fighting for freedom. A writer to another Nationalist paper wondered how opponents of the government could hope for tolerant consideration when men who had served Labour faithfully for years were discarded for divergence on the means to achieve Labour's ends.

Point Blank, 13 May 40, p. 41

But most conservatives were thankful that Labour had shed its dangerous member. ‘The “Thunder on the Left” seems destined to pass away harmlessly for lack of a storm centre’, predicted the New Zealand Herald on 27 March.

It was often remarked after the first few weeks that it was a funny war. Poland was knocked out with numbing swiftness in three weeks, but thereafter the expected war did not happen. The cable war news, despite bigger headlines, seemed in its day-to-day effect much the same as people had been reading for years. In Britain air-raid precautions were switched on, children were evacuated from cities, and everyone waited with their gasmasks, but the bombers did not come. British ships blockaded, while British aircraft attacked a few naval bases and dropped propaganda leaflets over Germany explaining to Germans that the Nazis were their real foes. The French advanced a few miles into the Saar, stopping short of the Siegfried Line; by mid-October they were joined by some 160 000 of the British Expeditionary Force, and the western front settled down quietly for the winter, while German propagandists assured French troops that Britain would fight to the last Frenchman.

During those first months, but for Russia New Zealand's newspapers would have been hard up for excitement and for wrath. Russia was rated the direct and immediate cause of the outbreak of war, for without the treacherous Russo–German pact would Hitler have attacked Poland? This fury of words and feeling could not, of course, reach Russia, but part of it could be turned against New Zealand's own Communist party, a small, highly derivative group, zealous in trade union activity and fringed with intellectuals,

Scott, S. W., Rebel in a Wrong Cause, p. 88

which stuck faithfully to its duty of supporting Russia's foreign policy through all its changes.

After 1928 it had been the declared policy of the Comintern, to which the New Zealand party was then affiliated, to ward off attacks on the USSR and promote world revolution. The local party gathered strength during the Depression, when authorities viewed it as a sinister influence among the workless, and its leaders were repeatedly arrested on charges of fomenting unrest and strikes, and of distributing seditious literature. A closely allied body, professedly nonpolitical and cultural, the New Zealand branch of Friends of the Soviet Union, was formed in 1932 and had 1000 members by the following year,

Soviet News, Jun 33

its aims being closer political, economic and cultural relations between the workers of the USSR and other countries, defence of the former against imperialist intervention and making known the truth about Russia's development.

Ibid., 1 Aug 32

In 1935, following the rise of Hitler, declared foe of Bolshevism, world revolution receded in the Comintern's policy, while support of Russia became paramount. Reformist governments which, by offering the workers a slice of bread and inducing them not to seize the loaf, were no longer the enemy. Communist parties the world over were urged to unite with socialist and labour forces in the struggle against war and Fascism, and to defend the USSR. In New Zealand this directed Communists toward anti-war efforts, such as ‘hands off Abyssinia’ processions, but local leadership continued opposition to Labour till after the 1935 election, when it was decided to give the new government unconditional support against the forces of reaction. The offer was not welcomed. Pointing to the communist role as disrupters of working class solidarity in Germany, Spain, France and Australia, unions and the Labour party firmly rejected united front proposals.

Standard, 19 Feb, 8 Jul, 4, 26 Nov 36, pp. 1, 7, 3, 6

The Communists continued to seek affiliation regularly, undaunted by vigorous rejection—as in 1937 when the Labour Conference declared against admitting Communists or Friends of the Soviet Union to membership of the Labour party.

Ibid., 8 Apr 37, p. 7, 20 Apr 39, p. 10

Communists were active in trade unions, where they rallied all those anxious for rapid internal social progress and for opposition to war and Fascism abroad. They denounced appeasement very strongly throughout the Spanish war and the Czech crises, and urged the formation of a peace-bloc, including the USSR. The Polish guarantee they greeted with scepticism, unable to credit Chamberlain with a genuine change of policy. In the chequered Anglo–Russian talks they saw, rightly, evidence of Chamberlain's inability to stomach an alliance with Russia; they took no notice of rumoured German–Russian negotiations except to deny them.

Workers' Weekly, 16 Jun 39, p. 2

On 25 August, in a widely distributed Manifesto, the National Executive declared staunchly: the Soviet Union is right. The Pact signed on 23 August was in the interests of socialism and the world Labour movement. The USSR had double-crossed no one, remaining faithful to its policy of having peaceful and friendly relations with all countries willing to do the same. Hitler, realising that the Soviet Union, with its people morally and politically united under socialism, was too powerful to attack, had double-crossed his backers, the financial gangsters in London, the real criminals, who had hoped to direct him against the Soviet Union. By signing the Pact, the Soviet Union had disrupted imperialism's cynical plans to involve it in a war which, whatever its initial stages, would develop into a united front of the Munich powers against the land of socialism; it had safeguarded the citadel of socialism, and it had driven a wedge between Germany and Japan, thereby greatly assisting the Chinese people. If war came, it would be the responsibility of the pro-Fascist leaders of Britain and France, the top-hatted gangsters who had helped Fascism to unleash the war.

But, continued the statement, while the Pact was necessary in the interests of socialism, Hitler's Fascism remained the deadly enemy of the working classes. Fascism could not be defeated by Britain under its present leadership but only if this were replaced by a real people's government and a democratic defence force. In New Zealand Peter Fraser was fraternising with Adam Hamilton, preparing to abandon the positions of the working class for those of the reactionary imperialists who intended, under cover of the war crisis, to attack democratic rights and living standards. If Fascism were to be defeated, democracy must be extended and living standards maintained, for only a free people with something to defend could defeat Fascism. An emergency conference of the Labour party, the Federation of Labour and the Communist party must meet at once, the government must state its support of the Soviet Union and oppose the reactionary British imperialists. All trade union standards, all social services and all democratic rights must be maintained, defence measures must be on a democratic basis and conscription of wealth must begin.

This may be taken as a sample of current communist thinking, pruned of much rhetoric. It was printed in the People's Voice of 1 September 1939 and, as a leaflet, 40 000 copies were thrust under doors, into letter boxes and cream cans, into factories and workshops. It was infuriating to many citizens in that September, when the mood of loyalty was high. Sections of the community with little in common could at least join in berating the Communists, as could those frustrated by having no direct means of getting on with the war. In Parliament, protests came from both sides: Doidge

Doidge, Hon Sir Frederick, KCMG('53) (1884–1954): b Aust, to NZ 1935; 1st Pres NZ Journalists Association; MP (Nat) Tauranga 1938–51; NZHC London 1951–4

and Polson

Polson, Hon Sir William, KCMG('51) (1875–1960): MP (Indep Nat) Stratford 1928–46; War Admin 1942; Leader Legislative Council 1950

on 12 and 13 September thought that Communist subversive activities should be suppressed in war time, while Labour's Schramm

Schramm, Hon Frederick William (1886–1962): MP (Lab) Auck East 1931–46; Speaker HoR 1944–6

wanted the country to be protected from ‘unfair, subversive, untrue, malicious and disloyal Communist propaganda’. Fraser soothed, explaining the folly of giving nation-wide publicity to statements beneath contempt. The government, he said, would take action if necessary

NZPD, vol 256, pp. 47, 87, 96

and this remained the administration's policy until January 1940.

Most newspapers warned against communist subversion but the Standard, headlining ‘Nonsense from the Mental Slaves of Moscow’ on 7 September, launched a campaign that surpassed anything from the conservative press:

The New Zealand dupes of Comrade Stalin

Stalin, Generalissimo Joseph Vissarionovic (1879–1953): Gen Sec Central Cmte of Communist party from 1922, effective ruler of USSR from 1924; Commissar for Defence of the USSR 1941–6; Pres Council Mins from 1946

are now bellowing out that a war between democratic Britain and Fascist Germany is an imperialist war…. The Communist decoy ducks now say that Stalin has betrayed the European Socialists so that he may preserve intact the so-called Socialism operating in Russia. Exactly the same argument is used by a scab in an industrial fight… so that his wages will keep his home comforts intact.

Stalin's course was in harmony with the treachery of local Communists everywhere who deliberately weakened Labour movements with internal strife, and whenever this happened Fascism triumphed. ‘Only a person with the logic of a lunatic and the mentality of an industrial and political traitor would try to explain the relations of Germany and Russia away as the Communists… are attempting.’ While democracy was making a life and death bid for law in world affairs, the Communists were making a typically twisting attempt to cloud the issue by criticism of the Chamberlain government.

The Labour hierarchy, zealous to extinguish in its rank-and-file the deep-seated though not uncritical regard many had for Russia as the exponent of Socialism, attacked this lingering loyalty in other major Standard articles. On 21 September one, ‘The Hitler–Stalin Axis; brief history and explanation of communist policy’, told how Russian Communism had departed from its beginnings, and how local Communist parties, under Kremlin direction, shattered Labour movements, while in Russia itself Stalin's purges made Hitler's insignificant, and the last ten years showed that Hitlerism and Stalinism were not opposites but twins. All Communists were now revealed as Nazis in disguise and all the ‘confusionism’ of the New Zealand Communist party could not hide their openly established front with Stalin and Hitler. ‘Some are fanatical hopeless worshippers of Stalin, as doped as are the Hitler youth of today. Some are merely mistaken. It is to be hoped that the latter will now open their eyes and admit the existence of facts no longer disputable’.

Standard, 21 Sep 39, p. 11

A fortnight later another long article explained, allegedly from American sources, that Russian shipments daily left Leningrad without which Germany would be starved into revolt within a year; also, that on 9 April 1935 Germany and Russia signed a pact for a 200 million Reichmarks credit during the next five years, which had enabled Hitler to absorb Austria, smash the Spanish Republic, and seize Czechoslovakia; the August 1939 pact enabled him to invade Poland and defy the democracies.

Ibid., 5 Oct 39, p. 1

A long editorial on Stalin's iniquity and the disruptive folly of local Communists concluded: ‘By the time this appears in print, it seems almost certain that Russia will be in full military alliance with Germany and at war with Britain. Should Russian submarines appear off our coast and sink our ships will the People's Voice justify that as being in the cause of peace and democracy?’

Ibid., p. 3

Some Labour people found these attacks excessive.

Ibid., pp. 6–7, 12 Oct 39, p. 13

Early in November, J. A. Collins, a trade union secretary, wrote that the reported drop in the Standard's circulation was mainly due to political and trade union leaders in Wellington who had forced the Standard into foolish diatribes against Russia, ill-founded and insulting to the intelligence of the average New Zealander.

Ibid., 8 Nov 39, p. 14

He added that certain trade union secretaries with a pathological hatred of Communism kept their power by gangster methods, packing unions and meetings with supporters, or organising rival candidates against those who opposed their policies.

The national executive of the Labour party followed up the Standard's pressure with the so-called ‘black circular’, an authoritarian instruction which narrowed channels for criticism within the party, forbade the publication of any resolution or information contrary to government policy, and also forbade Labour party members to give any support or information to the Communist party.

Press, 20 Oct 39, p. 8

Some trade unions passed resolutions on the Standard's lines, for example that of the Federated Seamen at a Wellington meeting chaired by F. P. Walsh

Walsh, Fintan Patrick (1896–1963): Pres Seamens Union from 1927, Wgtn Trades Council from 1937; Vice-Pres FOL from 1948; member Industrial Emergency Council during WWII, Economic Stabilisation Commission throughout its existence

which said, ‘To us the crimes of Stalin's dictatorship are even more repugnant than those of his comrade and fellow-worker— Hitler….’

Auckland Star, 9 Dec 39, p. 17

Several Ministers lent their weight: Semple

Semple, Hon Robert (1873–1955): b Aust, to NZ 1903; formed 1st Miners Union Runanga, helped form 1st Miners Federation 1908 to become Federation of Labour 1909; MP (Lab) Wgtn East 1918–19, 1928–54; Min Public Works, Transport, Marine, National Service, Railways 1935–49, War Admin 1942

‘belted the ears off’ communist supporters,

Evening Post, 13 Nov 39, p. 9

Webb said that there was no room in this country for a party which hailed Stalin or Lenin;

Ibid., 19 Dec 39, p. 8

on 18 January 1940, under Standard headlines, ‘Moscow Minikins March to Order Goose-stepping with Hitler’, Fraser himself described, with long quotations, how British Communists had ‘turned’ on orders from the Kremlin. At the outset of the war British Communists had behaved ‘like ordinary, normal decent citizens anywhere’. Their manifesto in the Daily Worker of 2 September supported the war, believing it to be just: the present rulers of Britain and France could never do anything except for their own imperialist interests, but whatever their motives, the action now taken by them, under pressure from their own people, ‘is actually for the first time challenging the Nazi aggressor’, and should be supported by the whole working class. Ten days later, continued Fraser, the emissary from Moscow, Georgi Dimitroff,

Dimitroff, Georgi Mihailov (1882–1949): Bulgarian politician; became Russian citizen 1933; Executive Sec Comintern 1934–43; Premier Bulgaria 1946

secretary to the Communist International, came to Britain, threatening H. Pollitt,

Pollitt, Harry (1890–1960): Chmn UK Communist party from 1956; Sec ‘Hands off Russia’ Movement 1919, National Minority Movement 1924–9, Communist party 1929–56

Secretary of the British Communist party, and J. R. Campbell

Campbell, John Ross, MM (1894–1969): member Executive Cmte Communist party 1923–64, of executive cmte Communist International 1925–35; Editor Daily Worker 1949–59

of the Daily Worker with political liquidation, and himself gave orders to oppose and hinder the war. ‘In the whole history of politics there has never been such a shameful abdication of principle, such a complete “sellout”, as that of the British Communist Party, indeed of the Communists everywhere including New Zealand’, who, openly and blatantly, were now supporting ruthless aggression.

Standard, 18 Jan 40, p. 4

Again, in a Trades Hall argument, Fraser vigorously declared that there was no place for Communists in the Labour movement; such ‘unity’ was spurious.

Ibid., 25 Jan 40, p. 7

Labour's rejection of Communism was not new, but it was sharply insistent now, for two main reasons, apart from genuine disgust. Compulsory unionism had made communist zeal unnecessary, indeed antipathetic, to many union leaders, while to the government, mustering support as widely as possible and making use of side issues to absorb the antagonism of powerful opponents, the Communist party was thoroughly expendable. Nationalist interests, shocked at the socialisation of such measures as the Marketing Act amendment were mollified by Labour's enmity towards Communism. Thus the editor of Point Blank on 16 October, after stating that though New Zealand was not yet at war with Russia, Russia was as great a menace as Germany, with emissaries all over the world who in New Zealand were making violent attacks on both Chamberlain and the New Zealand government and demanding to be included in a Labour conference, went on:

The Acting Prime Minister Hon. P. Fraser, who, since the outbreak of war, has displayed qualities of real statesmanship is not likely to pay the slightest attention to their “demands”. Further than that Mr Fraser is the type of gentleman who will deal very firmly with them if they become a nuisance, and probably the only reason why they are permitted to issue their printed rubbish is because at a time of Empire crisis there are very few people likely to take much notice of them. They would have been more dangerous had not Russia come out in her true colours. Nevertheless, subversive elements should be carefully watched… and the safest place for many of them would be under lock and key.

A month later the editor remarked that although Point Blank did not often agree with the Standard, he was pleased to commend the latter's utter condemnation of Communism.

Point Blank, 15 Nov 39, p. 10

Russia's actions continued to disgust New Zealand critics, while demanding much agility from the Communist party. Secret clauses in the Russo–German pact

Sontag, R. J. (ed), Nazi–Soviet Relations, 1939–41, p. 78

had allotted eastern Poland, Bessarabia and the Baltic states as Russian spheres of influence; so on 17 September 1939 as Poland crumpled, Russia, declaring that the Polish state no longer existed, reclaimed on ethnic grounds the Ukraine and White Russian territory acquired by Poland after the First World War. Two days earlier the People's Voice had rebutted speculation about Russian troop concentrations: ‘the daily press, true to its desire to organise a campaign of hate against the land of Socialism, spread all kinds of fairy tales about a secret deal between Germany and the Soviet Union for the partition of Poland—in spite of the well known declaration of Stalin that the Soviet Union did not covet a foot of anybody else's territory.’

People's Voice, 15 Sep 39

A week later the People's Voice explained that the Red Army was an army of liberation, rescuing their blood brothers both from Polish oppression and the brutal German threat.

Ibid., 22 Sep 39

On 28 September, after signing their Boundary and Friendship Treaty which openly partitioned Poland, the German and USSR governments declared that they had thereby created a sure foundation for lasting peace in east Europe; that it would be in the true interests of all peoples to end the war; that if it continued Britain and France would be responsible; that Germany and USSR would consult on necessary measures. At the same time Russia hastened to improve her Baltic frontiers: Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, by ‘pacts of mutual assistance’ (28 September to 10 October), ceded naval bases and airports to Russia.

Newspapers presented Russia's entry into Poland as a cynical violation of treaty obligations. Some, such as the Press (19 and 22 September 1939) saw evidence of detailed agreement there, but wondered if this would persist. Others, such as the New Zealand Herald, guardedly welcomed it as a check to Hitler, with hints that German and Russian interests were too divergent for their alliance to last.

NZ Herald, 20 Sep 39

Thus a Minhinnick cartoon, ‘Snatching the Swag’, showed a sly-grinning Stalin shaking hands with a doubtful Hitler, while his left hand holds a bundle labelled ‘Ukraine’.

Ibid.

Another bore the words ‘Adolf met a bear—the bear was bulgy—the bulge was Adolf’.

Ibid., 3 Oct 39

The Standard had it both ways: its foreign affairs column referred to the Kremlin's diplomatic victory over Hitler, while elsewhere it said that without the August pact Germany would not have attacked Poland, and that without Russian help there ‘Germany would be desperate and the war much nearer its end’.

Standard, 19 Oct, 2, 9 Nov 39, pp. 4, 4, 6

Russian attempts to control the Gulf of Finland and to adjust the frontier of Finland where it approached Leningrad were resisted, and war broke out at the end of November. World indignation against Russia was greatly quickened by this new instance of a smaller nation fighting against great odds. In Britain there was public readiness and official planning to send military aid to Finland, and this came not only from the Right: the British Labour movement declared profound horror and indignation against Soviet imperialism and its Nazi methods and called for all practicable aid to the Finnish nation. In New Zealand newspapers were eloquent. Thus spoke the Herald:

Decent-minded people everywhere are revolted at the grim Baltic spectacle of bear stalking beaver…. Previously it was chauvinist Czechs and pugnacious Poles that oppressed the innocent Nazis. Now the fiery Finns have turned on the benign Bolsheviks …. The technique is terribly familar and affronts commonsense.

NZ Herald, 1 Dec 39

Russia's brutal onslaught on Finland has profoundly shocked world opinion…. The Nazi offence against Poland was rank, smelling to heaven, but what shall be said of this even more cowardly aggression?

Ibid., 4 Dec 39

The Dominion saw ‘in both Nazi and Soviet methods an identical attitude…. These dictatorships are engaged upon crusades for the furtherance of their own political ideologies throughout the world’.

Dominion, 2 Dec 39

Russia's act, said the Press, was an appalling declaration of her aims and her rejection of any restraint in pursuing them.

Press, 2 Dec 39

The Otago Daily Times on 2 December spoke of Stalin using the tactics of the gangster to impose his will on a small country, and on 30 December considered him a more ruthless and cynical menace than Hitler. The latter's ‘errant genius’ had driven him to maniacal excesses but, in Stalin, dictatorship without charity or principle played the diplomatic game with laborious concentration on self-interest alone. ‘Where Hitlerism has persecuted and degraded thousands, Stalinism has “purged” and starved hundreds of thousands into submissiveness or death’.

On 14 December 1939 the League of Nations expelled Russia as an aggressor, New Zealand voting for expulsion,

PM to Jordan, 11 Dec 39, PM 344/2/1, pt 1, in War History Narrative, ‘New Zealand and the War in Europe’ (hereinafter WHN, ‘NZ and Europe’), p. 5

and asked member states to help Finland. The New Zealand government considered this for a month, then, having consulted the British government,

GGNZ to SSDA, 16 Jan 40, in ibid., p. 6

gave £5,000 to the Finnish Red Cross.

Evening Post, 17 Feb 40, p. 5

At first Russia used comparatively small forces and the Finns proved unexpectedly tough. Reports of Finnish heroism, of skilful ski-troops and success, and of Russian brutality and ineptitude filled papers starved for excitement on the western front. It was almost a surprise in March 1940 to realise that brave little Finland had surrendered to Russian armies which had lost so much prestige. ‘All the honours of the campaign go to the Finns’, said the New Zealand Herald on 14 March. ‘They have exposed the clumsiness of the Russian military machine and banished the bogey of the Red Army.’ The Press on the same day deplored ‘the fiasco of the Allied scheme to aid Finland’, and the Evening Post on 1 April held that the ‘Soviet Government in its onslaught upon the heroic Finns has exposed to the whole world the ravages which Communism makes upon the fibre of any nation which falls a victim to that deadly mental and moral disease. The exposure of the Russian army and the Russian air force has astonished the world.’

Against all this the People's Voice published Russian accounts of border incidents, ‘the brazen provocations of the Finnish militarists’ in their ‘senseless adventure’,

People's Voice, 15 Dec 39, p. 5

denied civilian bombings

Ibid., 22 Dec 39, p. 1

and, more reasonably, said that Russia wanted to safeguard its frontiers, especially near Leningrad; in 1918 the Finnish ruling class and ‘Butcher’ Mannerheim

Mannerheim, Baron Carl Gustaf Emil (1867–1951): Finnish soldier & statesman; Regent Finland 1918; planned & built Mannerheim Line against Russia & commanded army against Russia in 1939–40, 1941–4 wars

had called in German troops to suppress a workers' rebellion, killing thousands, and since then Finland had ‘been the happy hunting ground of every anti-Soviet adventure’.

People's Voice, 8, 22 Dec 39, pp. 1, 2

The Red Army had checkmated Helsinki plans for ‘incidents’ to win United States assistance,

Ibid., 19 Jan 40, p. 1

and Bernard Shaw

Shaw, George Bernard (1856–1950): Brit socialist, dramatist, novelist, critic

and Stafford Cripps

Cripps, Rt Hon Sir Stafford, PC, CH, Kt, FRS, QC, JP (1889–1952): UK politician; MP (Lab) 1931–50; Solicitor-Gen 1930–1; Ambassador Russia 1940–2; Lord Privy Seal & Leader HoC 1942; Min Aircraft Production 1947, Chancellor Exchequer 1947–50

were quoted as saying that without Western backing Finland would not have refused Russia's proposals.

People's Voice, 12 Jan 40, p. 3

These arguments were put together in a pamphlet, Finland, the Truth, by N. Gould, which, according to the People's Voice, sold nearly 15 000 copies.

Ibid., 9 Feb 40, p. 5

Finally, in March, that paper claimed: ‘Right from the start, the Voice, alone in New Zealand, has pointed out that the REAL issue was the desire of the imperialist states to make Finland a war base against the Soviet Union’.

Ibid., 21 Mar 40, p. 1

Actually this view had been advanced by the other leftist journal, Tomorrow,

Tomorrow, 6, 20 Dec 39, pp. 73, 105, 24 Jan 40, p. 191

which also, remarking that official enthusiasm to aid Finland was simply another very significant step in the lining-up of world capitalism against the one socialist power, urged that the Labour movement should make sure that New Zealand boys were not used to overthrow Socialism on the plains of the Ukraine or elsewhere.

Ibid., 21 Feb 40, pp. 230–1

During September New Zealand's Communist party supported the war on two fronts—defeat Hitler and eject Chamberlain—and the need to defeat Hitler was stressed in the People's Voice of 16 and 22 September. The ‘two fronts’ line was also taken by the British Communist party on the outbreak of war, as the People's Voice of 6 October pointed out, quoting a statement from the Daily Worker of 2 September, presumably to show that it had erred in company. On the other hand, the American Communist spokesman, Earl Browder,

Browder, Earl Russel (1891–1973): US politician; member Central Communist party US from 1921, Gen Sec 1930–44; 1st Pres Communist Political Assn 1944–5; member exec cmte Comintern 1935–44

had said on 2 September that America must not become involved in the war but must seek an opportunity to intervene decisively for peace. This too was reprinted in the People's Voice on 6 October. Russian leaders, a week earlier, had said that the war was unnecessary and should end. The Voice's editor, Gordon Watson, wrote: ‘the clear firm voice of the land of Socialism… is appealing for peace’. Faced by the might of Socialism, Hitler had surrendered more in a fortnight than the appeasers gave him in six years. Russia had snatched the Polish Ukraine and White Russia from Hitler and their landlord oppressors, saved the Baltic states from the Nazi nightmare, and was forming a peace bloc in the Balkans. Peace now would enable the peoples of the belligerent countries to get rid of those responsible for the war. New Zealand should press Britain, with the Soviet Union and the United States, to call a peace conference.

People's Voice, 6 Oct 39, p. 1

On this same day the British Communist party was likewise changing step. The Daily Worker of 6 October said, ‘This is not a war for democracy and against Fascism. This is not a war in defence of peace against aggression. The British and French ruling class are seeking to use the anti-Fascist sentiments of the people for imperialist aims…. The war is a fight of Imperalist Powers over profits, colonies and world domination. It will bring only suffering and misery to millions of working class homes.’

Russia's new friendship with Germany was signalised by several statements that drove its overseas supporters further towards an anti-war position. Thus on 10 October, Izvetsia denounced the British and French idea of war against Hitler's ideology: ‘destruction of people because somebody does not like certain views and world outlook is senseless and insane brutality’.

Ibid., 27 Oct 39, p. 1

On 2 November a speech by Molotov

Molotov, Vyacheslav Mikhailovich (1890–): Russian politician; dep chmn Council Mins USSR 1941–57; Commissar, Min Foreign Aff 1939–49; Ambassador Mongolian Rep 1957–60; Permanent Rep Internat Atomic Energy Agency 1960–1

carried the readjustment a step further: Britain and France, who lately declaimed against aggression, were now the aggressors, while Germany was striving for an early peace. Ideological war was dismissed, bracketed with the religious wars of old; fear of German claims for colonies was at the bottom of this imperialist war; German relations with Russia had radically improved.

People's Voice, 10 Nov 39, p. 1

On the anniversary of the Russian revolution the Communist Internationale issued a statement lauding Russian achievement and calling, in well worn slogans, for struggle against the imperialist war.

Ibid., 24 Nov 39, p. 2

The New Zealand party hastily accepted this doctrine and, after a national committee meeting at the beginning of December, explained that clearly this was, on both sides, an imperialist war which must be opposed by the working classes. ‘The Party should have said this decisively from the beginning. Weaknesses and mistakes in the Party's work and slogans were due to the fact that it had not grasped quickly enough the decisive changes in the world situation, brought about by British imperialism's rejection of the Peace Front with the Soviet Union, and the consequent extension of the imperialist war to involve Britain, France and Germany.’ New Zealand had come in as a satellite of Britain, her Labour leaders proclaiming the policy of collective security, which they had helped to destroy at Munich. These leaders had finally deserted the working class for the imperialist war-mongers. The Communist party could no longer seek affiliation with Labour, and called on the New Zealand working class, along with those of other fighting countries, to oppose the war.

Ibid., 8 Dec 39, p. 4

This opposition continued until June 1941, when Russia was invaded. There was at least some communist thinking in the trade union resolutions that opposed the war and conscription in the early months, and Communists were prominent in putting anti-war amendments, which were heavily defeated, before the Easter conferences of the Federation of Labour in 1940 and in 1941.

Defeated 224:26 in 1940, and 229:27 in 1941. Standard, 28 Mar 40, p. 14, 17 Apr 41, p. 3

Opposition was also expressed through the People's Voice, leaflets, and public meetings, in stereotyped and raucous phrases attacking Britain's aims and conduct of the war, the Labour government and the Army in New Zealand, the folly and dishonesty of recruiting and of conscription. Some local bodies speedily forbade their open-air meetings, and there were very few halls available to Communists. The People's Voice, which claimed circulation of 7500 on 22 September 1939 and 10 000 on 16 February 1940, was the main channel until it was suppressed three months later; but thereafter the Communists, with furtive zeal, continued their attacks in cyclostyled pamphlets, variously titled.

See chap 19, ‘Censorship’

This was in the future. During the early months of the war, the Communist party was not stifled and its activities were limited only by its available energy. Looking back, its persistence in seeing righteousness rather than expediency in every Russian move may combine comedy with pathos. At the time, for many people such disloyalty was outrageous, though its very blatancy lessened its appeal and its danger.

During the mid-1930s the reformed churches in New Zealand, as in Britain, voiced in varying degrees the current distaste for war and war preparations. Many felt that if the churches could speak on this with a unified voice the government would listen more attentively, but church union was a large, difficult and distant matter wherein New Zealand was unlikely to step ahead of Britain; nor were there any attempts at a direct Christian crusade against war preparations. As events moved towards war the churches, with minor reservations and some small differences in alacrity, accepted it, and at the outbreak urged the members to respond helpfully to State demands. But in each church, again in varying degrees, a rift developed between a minority who believed that even in war time Christians should bear witness to the wrongness of war, and the majority who felt that it was too late for protest, that human nature cannot be changed, and that this particular war justified, even demanded, participation in it.

The Methodist Church went further than the others in its rejection, following its counterpart in England which had declared against war in 1933. Pacifist feeling was liveliest among young people, but it was by no means limited to them, nor to any protesting fringe; it was espoused by active, ardent men in the heart of the Church, men such as Percy Paris,

Paris, Rev Percy Reginald (1883–1942): Methodist minister from 1906; Superint Wgtn central circuit 1935, Pres 1938; Ed Methodist Times 1924–34; founder League of Young Methodists 1920

president of the New Zealand Conference, its governing body, in 1938. In March 1935 the Conference declared war to be contrary to Christ's purpose and a crime against humanity. It must be repudiated utterly and the Church would support every means towards peaceful settlements, reduction of armaments and removal of economic inequalities. Recognising that if war came some would refuse to bear arms while others would fight for national and international commitments, the Conference upheld individual liberty of conscience in all directions. In schools citizenship training should replace military cadet courses, but Methodist chaplains would not be withdrawn from the armed forces.

NZ Methodist Times, 30 Mar 35, pp. 7, 11, 13

By 1937 the Conference, while still declaring war to be abhorrent, upheld the use of force to preserve law and order under the League of Nations, and called for a world conference on economic grievances and for repeal of the compulsory clauses of the Defence Act (which had not been enforced since 1930).

Ibid., 13 Mar 37, p. 374; Evening Post, 25 Feb 37, p. 14; Yearbook1938, p. 208

Early in 1939 it reaffirmed these resolutions. After 3 September some official Methodist voices, while repeating that war was contrary to Christ, praised the labours of British leaders for peace and reminded that the Church taught the duty of Christians to serve their country, and give obedient, loyal support to constitutional authority. Inner conviction, which drove some to arms, some to refuse arms, should be honoured and for the latter the State was asked to provide alternative service compatible with conscience.

NZ Methodist Times, 7 Oct 39, p. 185; Otago Daily Times, 3 Oct 39, p. 3

Other speakers urged the need to respect conscience, to secure the Church against schism and its pulpits against being used for either recruiting or pacifist propaganda.

NZ Herald, 15 Nov 39, p. 11; Press, 16 Nov 39, p. 2; Evening Post, 22 Nov 39, p. 17

At New Year the Methodist Young Men's Bible Class passed a startling resolution: war was contrary to Christ and they should unswervingly follow the Cross, refusing all war service; they urged the government to stand firm against conscription.

Evening Post, 4 Jan 40, p. 8

It was rapidly established that this was not the general or official Methodist position.

Ibid.

The Conference, meeting in February 1940 amid recruiting and pacifist activity, did not wish to be identified with its pacifist element, notably with the Rev O. E. Burton,

Burton, Rev Ormond Edward, MM, Medaille d'Honneur (1893–1974): served 1NZEF; Methodist minister 1935–42, 1955–; chmn NZCPS 1937–45

already in prison. It no longer repudiated war, declared loyalty to the Throne and held that New Zealand was at war because there was no honourable alternative. Conscientious objections should be respected but all objectors should render alternative service. It accepted the State's ban on subversive utterances and opposed recruiting or pacifism from pulpits.

Otago Daily Times, 28 Feb 40, p. 4

The Methodist Times of 10 February firmly rebuked the Church's active pacifists.

Reprinted in Auckland Star, 12 Feb 40, p. 9

The official church, while steadfastly claiming freedom for the individual conscience, accepted the war and turned to the ensuing moral problems of wet canteens and raffles for patriotic purposes.

The Church of England's Lambeth Conference of 1930 had declared that war where one's own country did not attempt arbitration should be rejected. The concept of collective security under the League of Nations was accepted in the mid-1930s by both English and New Zealand leaders, and in 1936 the Archbishop of Canterbury

Lang, Most Rev & Rt Hon Cosmo Gordon, 1st Baron Lambeth ('42), PC, GCVO (1864–1945): Archbishop Canterbury 1928–42

declared that it was not un-Christian to fight in just wars.

Evening Post, 14 Oct 36, p. 11; Year Book of the Diocese of Auckland… 1935, p. 21

In succeeding years Averill,

Averill, Most Rev Alfred Walter (1865–1951): b UK, to NZ 1894; Bishop Waiapu 1910–13, Auck 1913–40; Primate NZ 1925–40

Archbishop of New Zealand, and other prominent churchmen, while condemning war and criticising the settlement of 1919, saw lessening hope in the League of Nations and, though reluctantly, more need of British rearmament. They urged strengthening the Church through increased spirituality and claimed for all who came to conscientious and not merely convenient decisions on military service the respect of fellow Christians.

Year Book of the Diocese of Auckland… 1936, p. 27; Church News (Christchurch), Sep, Nov 37, pp. 21, 10; Dominion, 16 Apr 37, p. 12

The General Synod of February 1940 held that the war was the lesser of two evils, it was to save civilisation, prevent self-intoxicated men from forcing inhuman ideals on the world.

Press, 17 Feb 40, p. 9

Meanwhile it was the duty of the Church to strengthen its hold with normal ministration, to sow and work for the future.

Church Chronicle, 1 Feb, 1 Apr 40, pp. 3, 35

Though the word ‘crusade’ was skirted warily, the Allies were fighting for the freedom to be Christians.

Press, 23 Apr, 15 Oct 40, pp. 3, 4; NZ Herald, 21 Aug 40, p. 6

From this position it was not difficult, on formal occasions and with leaders of other churches, to step on to the recruiting platform.

Press, 5 Jun 40, p. 8

In the Presbyterian Church of the mid-1930s official policy was to support the League of Nations.

Evening Post, 14 Nov 35, p. 11

Each Christian must determine whether or not to refuse war service and the Church would minister all members wherever inner conviction led them.

Outlook, 11 Nov 35, p. 22

More than other church papers, the official Presbyterian Outlook in 1938–9 had articles on world affairs, on religious persecution in Germany and the threat of war, generally concluding that the key to peace was in Christianity.

Ibid., 2 Mar, 1 Jun, 7 Sep 38, pp. 21, 2, 3, 22 Mar, 10 May, 28 Jun, 30 Aug, 6 Sep 39, all p. 3

After 3 September the Outlook held that Britain had made every effort for peace; it was a just and necessary war.

Ibid., 13 Sep, 4 Oct 39, pp. 3, 3

A pronouncement prepared by a central committee on international relations spoke of a just cause and urged civic responsibility in service required by the authorities, restraint in judging the foe, and pressing on with the usual work. It was passed by the Dunedin Presbytery, with a plea for kindness to refugees, by Auckland and Christchurch.

Otago Daily Times, 6 Sep 39, p. 5; NZ Herald, 13 Sep 39, p. 13; Press, 14 Sep 39, p. 4

Wellington's Presbytery made a separate statement, ashamed that Christian witness had not prevented war but recognising that New Zealand could only range itself with Britain. Members should give national service as conscience, enlightened by the Holy Spirit, would commend; some would bear arms, some refuse, either course could express true loyalty to the will of God.

Evening Post, 16 Oct 39, p. 5

In November the General Assembly, endorsing the pronouncement, advocated service with due regard for the rights of conscience.

Press, 16, 21 Nov 39, pp. 2, 10; Outlook, 20 Sep 39, p. 11

On 27 September in the Outlook a correspondent (Alun Richards

Richards, Rev Alun Morgan: b Wales 1907, educ NZ; freelance journalist Europe, Far East; Presby minister; WEA tutor-organiser Wgtn 1939–41; with Govt Publicity (Economic Information Service), NZ organiser CORSO 1947; Ed Outlook 1948–56; Min Wgtn 1957–65; Ed NZ Methodist 1966–8

) asked about the Church's attitude to censorship: would the editors censor their paper to hold it in line with government censorship regulations or maintain freedom to prophesy? An editorial answered crisply that ‘we shall, of course, submit to the law of the land’; there was no reason to expect that the government would interfere with any fundamental doctrines and certain restrictions had to be accepted.

Outlook, 4 Oct 39, p. 3; Star-Sun, 4 Oct 39, p. 6

However, by June 1940 Presbyterian zeal for taking thought, for not yielding up judgment, reasserted itself in an editorial claiming that freedom to criticise should be prized and protected, that to ban it as subversive would be great error; wise leaders could learn from informed criticism while bearing the ill-informed with equanimity.

Outlook, 5 Jun 40, p. 4; Press, 6 Jun 40, p. 6

The Roman Catholic Church, with no school of absolute pacifism, opposed armament-making, supported the League and hoped that education would improve economic understanding and lessen nationalism. Traditionally it held that a state attacked might rightly engage in war when it was the only means left to repel violation of territory, integrity or just treaties, or to resist the fomenting of revolution.

NZ Tablet, 27 Mar, 5 Jun, 18 Sep 35, pp. 3, 33, 1–2, 29 Apr, 6 May 36, pp. 21, 7, 22 Sep 37, p. 26, 2 Feb 38, p. 27

Mussolini's attack on Abyssinia by these definitions was unjust and the Church in New Zealand, through its periodicals, stoutly condemned him, while criticising other nations, notably Britain, which had earlier acquired empires by war and would not share them.

Ibid., 28 Aug. 4, 11 Sep, 13 Nov 35, pp. 3, 20–1, 6, 9 & 29, 26 Feb, 4 Mar 36, pp. 23, 4

There was special difficulty as the Pope, encircled by Fascism, had spoken, albeit vaguely, of the war as justified by the defensive and material needs of Italy.

Ibid., 30 Oct 35, p. 1

New Zealand apologists, seeing Mussolini as the arbiter of power in Europe, who could be driven by opposition into the arms of Germany, stressed the need for revision of colonial mandates.

Ibid.

Fortunately the Abyssinian affair ended quickly and about Spain there was no doubt. Franco's nationalists were fighting for religion and order against red revolution and anti-Christ, as the Tablet and Zealandia proclaimed almost weekly; they also mentioned that Spain proved war to be sometimes just and necessary.

Ibid., 22 Sep 37, p. 26, 2 Feb 38, p. 27

Many New Zealand Catholics came from Ireland, did not trust British politicians and disapproved of the Treaty of Versailles. But Catholics were persecuted in Germany, Poland was a Catholic country, and the German pact with atheist Communist Russia threatened the reign of anti-Christ. ‘This is why we fight not a war but a crusade.’

Ibid., 27 Sep 39, p. 7

A Zealandia article remarked on the general decline of pacifism as an unconscious tribute to the traditional Catholic attitude: ‘as long as man is man… human beings will believe certain things to be so evil that they will feel obliged to stick at nothing, short of greater evil, in order to prevent or even to protest against them’.

Zealandia, 7 Sep 39, p. 10

CHAPTER 3 The First Moves

ON 8 September 1939 it was announced that there would be a special force of volunteers to serve in and beyond New Zealand, the immediate target being 6600 men aged 21–35 years for the First Echelon (about one-third of the proposed expeditionary force). The three long-established military districts, northern, central and southern, sub-divided into sixteen areas, were each to supply according to its population a certain number of volunteers. Enlistments began on 12 September: by 9 pm that night they totalled 6655

NZ Herald, 13 Sep 39

and within a week reached almost 12 000.

Wood, p. 98

Thereafter as the first mood of acceptance and excitement waned, recruiting became slower and slower, and by December it plainly needed gingering up to complete the Second Echelon. For instance the Otago area yielded 567 volunteers in the week ending 16 September, but only 7 in the week ending 11 November, while in the Canterbury area the scores were respectively 1130 and 21.

Otago Daily Times, 16 Nov 39, p. 10

For this sudden surge and the sharp decline there were many reasons, some practical, some emotional. A large number of men were ready to enlist at the first call, their motives various and often mixed. Some were moved by plain old-fashioned patriotism, or were adventurous, restless, bored; some wanted to see the world or get away from jobs or families that depressed them. Some, though hating war, felt soberly that Nazism was so bad, so contrary to their own values, that it outweighed other evils and only fighting could stop it. They themselves could not remain out of the fight. Some, sure that they would have to go sooner or later, preferred not to wait or to be pushed. Some saw that, for the first wave, the chances of interesting jobs matched those of dying a little sooner. These, and no doubt hundreds of individual reasons, lay behind those first 12 000 enlistments.

Having passed the medical examination (where a good many were halted for teeth, which at this stage had to be repaired at their own expense), they could not go straight into khaki—carpenters and other tradesmen were busy extending camps at Ngaruawahia, Trentham and Burnham, clothing and equipment had to be assembled, officers and NCOs sorted out. Men were warned not to throw up their jobs until actually called. Officers and NCOs were summoned in the last days of September, and most of the rank and file of the First Echelon during the first week of October. Volunteers for the Second and Third echelons were still sought (by 2 October enlistments totalled 14 742

Ibid., 4 Oct 39, p. 3

) but they would not be called up for two or three months. These necessary delays tended to check the enlistment snowball right at the start. There was time for a wait-and-see mood to grow.

Speechmakers and newspaper editors in the next few months commented often that there was not the wave of feeling, not the flocking to the colours, not the open-handed giving of money, not the serious war-mindedness of 1914; they usually concluded that the country needed a lead. But was this inertia surprising? The war was remote, confused, and not dramatic; life was unchanged and there was no smouldering backlog of military temper ready to flame up if skilfully stoked or poked. Rather there was a deep reluctance, especially amongst men of fighting age and their families, to go through the desolate business again. Behind this feeling lay the wounds of 1914–18, when about 100 500 New Zealanders (including 550 nurses) had gone overseas. Some 58 000 casualties had included nearly 17 000 deaths, from a population little in excess of 1 100 000.

Press, 8 Mar 40, p. 8; Yearbook1940, p. 230

These wounds had been deepened by awareness that anxiety, poverty and failure had beset thousands of returned men, inadequately compensated for suffering and loss of opportunity, in a world that seemed no better for their sacrifice. Also, for three years before 1914 military training had been compulsory, producing a large body of young men already half-way into the Army, prepared to do what was expected of them and carrying others along with them; while very few guessed at the long grim stretch and the savage dirty fighting that lay ahead. In the years before 1939, by contrast, Territorial training was voluntary and not popular, nor was there complete acceptance of the soldier as a worthy figure—if many esteemed him, to others his uniform was an unwelcome symbol. The war itself was accepted without protest. Almost everyone declared loyalty but dull resentment was widespread, expressing itself almost unconsciously in forgetting the war as much as possible and, for many, in feeling that it was primarily the concern of a vague ‘they’, presumably the government; if ‘they’ wanted an army, let them conscript it, not expect a man to volunteer.

This absence of enthusiasm, mixed with foreboding and remembered pain, showed at the railway station farewells to the First Echelon contingents both when entering camp early in October and when returning from final leave just before New Year. Bands did their best, there was the usual banter, the soldiers themselves were cheery if set-faced (‘the real feelings of the Troops were for the moment hidden under a mask of cheerful indifference’

Southland Times, 29 Dec 39, p. 6

) but there were few cheers, some crowds were notably silent and women wept. At Napier and Hastings, for instance, it was the opinion of several old soldiers that the attitude of the people towards the war was reflected in the atmosphere of restraint: ‘There was no gloom, but the wild and hysterical enthusiasm witnessed during the Great War was absent.’ It seemed that no one present welcomed the war but that all were determined to see it through now that it had started.

Hawke's Bay Daily Mail, 29 Dec 39

Further, the slowness of the war in the west gave time for second thoughts. It is now known that the German command thought and hoped at first that Britain and France did not really mean to fight, that their war would be a fire of straw and a peace could be patched up for a year or two more. This was not known to the Allies, but it was clear that the peace so far from peaceful had been followed by war much less warlike than expected. The careful imprecision of the British government's stated war aims contributed to the sense of uncertainty. During November the Opposition wanted sharper definition of war aims than defence of freedom and democracy, and to some there seemed still a chance of avoiding a big fight; Fraser in London pressed on both these points.

Wood, pp. 106–9

In New Zealand it is hard to guess how many, and with what urgency, asked ‘What are we fighting for?’ Apart from pacifists and Communists, there were a good many Labour supporters who had been very uneasy about Chamberlain's pre-1939 course and who were troubled now that New Zealand's government had identified itself completely with the British government's purposes.

Discussed in ibid., pp. 111–12

Could the men in Britain and France whose judgments had been so wrong be trusted now for wisdom and integrity? Such people felt that the war was slipping into a likeness of the imperialism of 1914–18, that it might crumble into an ill-advised Chamberlain peace or somehow, especially after Russia attacked Finland, be switched against Russia. All the years of secret diplomacy and faits accomplis favoured these doubts. Some West Coast trade unions in December passed critical resolutions about this imperialist war; writers in Tomorrow, including a few members of Parliament,

F. L. Frost, J. O'Brien, W. E. Barnard

were worried about war aims, convinced that others less articulate were also worrying, and some urged that the first duties of politically conscious New Zealanders were to protect civil liberties and guard against the excesses of war-mindedness and against Fascism at home: the non-political could defeat it abroad. Tomorrow spoke for only a very thin slice of New Zealand, but such people were not alone in feeling a lack of purpose and direction—for instance Rodney Coates, farmer of Otamatea and no leftist, declared, ‘There is a spirit abroad that is anti-British. People are so ignorant of the position they are asking, “What are we fighting for?” All are asking for a lead.’

NZ Herald, 22 Jan 40, p. 9

He laid this bewilderment at the door of the government, but a larger despair was expressed by a writer to the Hawke's Bay Daily Mail who on 8 April wrote that lately a returned soldier had asked why, after he had gone through hell for years, his sons were required to go through it all again. The peoples of the Empire, the letter continued, were for the most part going into the war in a spirit of dazed fatalism. ‘Having no real understanding of the propaganda game, they are just marching out once more, thinking that since we're “in it” there is no way out but to stumble and blunder further in.’

On the other hand, in the Transport Worker, which generally backed the government and held that the prime and proper concerns of trade unions were the wages and working conditions of their members, a writer asked what would happen if Germany won. Would New Zealand be taken over? Would his own life, liberty and standard of living be preserved? He did not want to know what Chamberlain said to Hitler, or what the British did in the Boer War 40 years ago. ‘Whether the Treaty of Versailles was wrong or not is not as important to me as what occurs to my carcase just now, and the necessity of a commonsense decision of supporting the New Zealand Government in its war effort.’

NZ Transport Worker, 1 Mar 40, p. 9

These are sample views, individual perceptions of war aims or lack of them, each, it may be presumed, held by a number of people; doubtless there were many others. Of those above, the clearest reason given for fighting the war was to prevent Germany from winning. Withal, the feeling that plain men did not know the real purposes and maneouvres of governments behind their fronts of words induced caution. For instance, the Southland Times on 6 October remarked that First Echelon men were merely going into camp for three months, after which they would receive orders to hold themselves in readiness while back in civilian work, or to remain on military duty here, or to go overseas. In the camps, gossip ran that troops would not be going overseas, they would have three months' training and return to their jobs. Such talk could well deflect men from enlisting when a break in employment could check promotion or even lose a job, let alone the three months' drop in pay.

Newspapers yield a few letters from young men saying why they did not volunteer. They were bitter that war had arrived for them, who had had no part in making it. Without enthusiasm, they accepted that it was necessary to fight the Nazis. They felt that conscription would come sooner or later and they might as well wait for it. With the bleak days of the Depression only a little behind, men who had known relief camps and pannikin bosses had no zest for more mud or for Army sergeants; men who had secured good positions at £5 or £6 a week had no mind to give them up for 7s a day any sooner than they must; men still on relief had little urge to fight for the country that had given them so little. Unemployment was waning, but jobs were still eagerly sought—thus at Christchurch and Dunedin where papers at first published the names and addresses of volunteers, employers were embarrassed by applications for jobs before their present holders were even medically examined.

In one newspaper, for instance, a questioning young man wrote that a travelling companion on a train had asked him what young men today thought about the war. ‘Some, of course, don't think about it at all, but the ones who do, I am convinced, think it is a scandalous thing.’ They did not, he went on, disagree with Britain's policy, but war was so different from the ideals they had been brought up with.

Unlike Germany, the war psychosis is not an integral part of the young New Zealander's make-up…. Every year when at school, and perhaps after that, we marched with the returned soldiers to the Cenotaph to commemorate those who had laid down their lives for democracy—the war to end wars; and today with this second Great War upon us, looking back it seems all so farcical…. Despite these thoughts, since September war has been our policy, to give freedom to the oppressed people of the world, and if war it must be then every young man in this country is prepared to do his part. Most of us are marking time and waiting, waiting silently, for the time to come when we will be conscripted, and I think that that time should be now. We have known for years the way the wind was blowing in Europe, and I think that conscription or compulsory military training should have been brought in… two years ago. It is the only fair way and… the general physique would have been at a higher standard. There is no doubt that Hitler is a madman, and if we are to meet force with force every man should be asked to do his duty and should be prepared for it.

When this war starts in earnest thousands can be expected to suffer. But for what? Will the world be a better place when it is all over? We hope so and will give our lives in that cause, yet still the doubt remains.

Evening Post, 9 Dec 39, p. 12

A 23-year old, well read in the last war, said that he was holding back not from cowardice or pacifism, but because he could not see why he should be mutilated or blinded while others of his age waited for conscription; instead of leaving the decision to the individual, let the government's register and ballot decide whether one should be called up in two days or two years.

Press, 27 Dec 39, p. 7

Another thought that thousands would be willing to serve under conscription, without the moral responsibility of volunteering to kill; wanting both British victory and a clear conscience, he would destroy his fellow men if directly chosen to do so by lawful authority, with the rightness or wrongness of it resting upon the government, not on himself.

NZ Herald, 13 Mar 40, p. 15

A 33-year-old man wrote to the Press on 10 October: One realises what one is sacrificing in giving up a hard-earned situation to enlist—for what? Some of us don't forget that a few of the best years of our lives were spent in camps at 10s a week. Some of us have seen pictures of acres of white crosses in France, and in the ears of some of us still ring the echoes of the tragedies of last war. Sacrifice and die for one's country! Yes and again yes; but let it be done in a fair way, and what more fair way could there be than conscription…. I am quite content to hold my job until John Bull whistles me up through the conscription list. Then I shall fall in and march into the fog of duty… my step will be no less brisk because my life is conscript to my God and my country's need.

Another reported that when he discussed service with married men they said, ‘It's not my job, I've a wife and kids’, while single men said, ‘If they want me they can come and get me’, or ‘I've a job worth six quid a week, I would be a mug’.

Ibid., 18 Mar 40, p. 10

Yet another wrote that he was quite willing to go under conscription but not willing to give up his job to ‘some scrounger who won't volunteer’, and that he knew plenty of others who were waiting for ‘a written invitation from Mr Savage’.

Press, 23, 30 Jan 40, pp. 6, 12

A fencer was quite willing to fight for the country but was not giving up a good job at £1 a day while ‘Jack So-and-So remains in the bank and John Someone-Else in the county office’.

NZ Herald, 17 May 40, p. 11

Certainly a large part of the young men's reluctance to immolate themselves ahead of others was fear that being away at the war would cripple them economically for the rest of their lives. The recruiting air was full of promises, but they knew how promises can become vague and shrunken. Savage on 7 January pledged that they would not return to ‘an unseemly struggle for the right to live’. Again on 3 March, in his last broadcast speech, he said that this time New Zealand could and must do more than before; to reabsorb thousands back into civilian work would be a full-sized job for the government and the community; the government was taking steps and would welcome suggestions.

No government getting a war under way could reasonably be expected to have its rehabilitation cut and dried, but people, equally reasonably, were dubious of promises not backed by statutes. A first step was made on 14 October with a regulation obliging employers to reinstate employees at the end of their military service, but this was not strongly publicised till later. Many officials less responsible than Savage promised quite as much as he did on behalf of the government—for instance, the deputy-mayor of Wellington declared that returned men or the dependents of the dead would ‘have no call to make on the Government that will not be fully met’, they would lose nothing, apart from the accidents of war; he himself would undertake as far as was in his power that Wellington would do its share to make the pledge good.

Evening Post, 13 Mar 40, p. 12

Fine words uttered freely and vaguely on all sides begot more doubt than confidence. At Auckland the RSA, sharply aware of last time's meagreness, said that the government must remove some pension anomalies before it would urge young men to enlist.

NZ Herald, 2 Feb 40, p. 8; Truth, 14 Feb 40, p. 14

Newspapers carried a trickle of letters contrasting the soldiers' 7s a day plus danger and discomfort with the ‘carry on as we are’ attitude of the rest of the community. One said:

It is rather amusing to witness the attempts being made to entice men to enlist. Wash it all out and get down to facts. Let the various bodies who are doing the most shouting come out in the open and declare themselves ready to protect the vital interests of the men…. All the mortgages, monetary interests, big businesses, shares, insurances etc., won't be worth the paper they are written on if the tide goes the other way and we are beaten…. Start a crusade for the protection of the men who protect wealth and I'm sure conscription will never come.

Press, 16 Jan 40, p. 5

An example of the situation was provided at Stratford where the Mayor and the RSA called a meeting to encourage recruiting. Most of the young men were at a swimming carnival but 74 other persons, while supporting a motion for conscription, firmly defeated a proposal to first levy one per cent on all capital over £500 for a fund to rehabilitate men after the war.

Truth, 17 Jan 40, p. 9

Again, at Palmerston North, when the Junior Chamber of Commerce recommended conscription of both men and wealth, the senior Chamber urged conscription of manpower as in 1917, but opposed subsidising soldiers' pay out of taxpayers' money, suggesting instead that the government should, if necessary, increase the allowance for wives and children.

Southland Times, 4 Oct 39, p. 6; Palmerston NorthTimes, 4 Oct 39, p. 8

Some local bodies considered subsidising their employees' Service pay to civilian level but decided it was not practicable.

Another factor checking enlistment was uncertainty about ‘reserved occupations’. Farmers were assured that their highest duty was to work their land—‘Farm or fight’ was a slogan—but did this hold for their skilled labourers? Some farmers believed that they had no right to intrude on the decisions of their men; others pressed their claims on the Labour Department and Army authorities, to the chagrin of enlisting musterers or shepherds, who might be passed fit then told to go back to their jobs. Skilled technicians, too, were held at the employers' requests, for the government had no wish to disrupt industry. There were protests against the hidden contrivings of some employers and demands that reserved occupations should be publicly listed; the government, feeling its way through new problems, was anxious not to commit itself. Enough uncertainty existed for some waverers to claim that they were not allowed to enlist, and for others to distrust this claim.

Right from the beginning there were demands for a national register and for conscription. Wars are usually fought within the framework of the previous war, and in 1916 conscription had been brought in, though volunteering continued along with it till the end, resulting in nearly 92 000 volunteers and 32 000 conscripts and some feeling between the two. In the reasons now advanced, fairness stood first: why should the burden and risk be borne by the willing, while the slack and selfish stayed in safety and took the jobs? Efficiency demanded that men keenly needed for food production or for essential industry should not disrupt these things by disappearing into the Army. Conscription also saved the personal ordeal of deciding between the claims of country, family and business obligations. Many of these demands came from National party circles, from farmers' organisations, Chambers of Commerce, the newspapers and the RSA, some closely and calmly reasoned, some smacking more of political attack on the government. A steady trickle of newspaper letters spoke of fairness and efficiency, some were of the direct ‘I have two sons in the Army. Why doesn't the Government bring in conscription’ type, others more complex, discussing for instance the relationship of the State, the individual, and the good of the nation.

The government was highly sensitive on this point. Labour had decried the 1914–18 war as an imperialist struggle wherein workers were duped and exploited for privilege and money power, and five Cabinet ministers had been gaoled for opposing conscription or the war itself. This war, for the protection of workers and democracy everywhere, was, they explained, quite different, but it was no light matter to make an about-turn on conscription, and they hoped to avoid it. Surely, with their own Labour government and a high standard of living to defend, which would certainly be lost if Britain were defeated,

Savage's ‘If Britain loses, all is lost’ became a slogan.

workers would volunteer in such generous numbers that conscription would not be needed. For the first three months there was no real recruiting campaign: military plans were uncertain, and it was a task for which most Labour members felt a natural reluctance. Those in the House most for it were Nationalists, and the left-wingers Lee and Barnard for whom the government did not desire prominence. Moreover, many people thought that massed infantry had given way to aerial combat and it followed that expeditionary forces were unnecessary.

The statement by Savage in June 1938 that if conscription came it would begin not with men but with money was now established Labour doctrine, placating traditional feeling within the party and fending off conservative pressures.

See p. 28. Langstone on 20 December 1939 said that if there were not enough volunteers and strong measures had to be taken, they would be 100 per cent, with everyone on soldier's rations and pay; it would be a great step towards collective socialism, and those most opposed to it would be capitalists and Communists. Evening Post. 20 Dec 39, p. 12

Conservatives however were apt to retort that as recent legislation had already conscripted wealth, manpower should follow. For instance a letter in the Press of 21 November 1939 said that there was a catch-phrase often heard, ‘If wealth is to be conscripted, men should be conscripted as well,’ adding that only an ignorant savage or a cold and finished scoundrel could weigh a man's life against a bag of money. Another writher, not a lone voice, expressed a less emotional view: ‘It may be assumed that the majority of those called up for service would return from the war uninjured. They would merely sell their services to the State for a short period. Wealth conscripted would be seized without payment and would never be returned’; one class would not only give its men but be robbed of its property also.

NZ Herald, 31 Jan 40, p. 12

The impracticability of conscripting wealth was repeatedly explained.

Ibid., 5, 8, 9, 13 Mar, 28 May 40, pp. 10, 10, 14, 15, 13; Auckland Star, 28 May 40, p. 6

The first rush of volunteers was reassuring, and until arrangements about the use of New Zealand troops were made with Britain during Fraser's November–December visit, urgency was lacking. But with Freyberg

Freyberg, Lieutenant-General Rt Hon Sir Bernard, Baron Freyberg of Wellington and Munstead, Surrey ('51), VC, GCMG('46), KCB('42), KBE, DSO (1889–1963): b UK, to NZ 1891; GOC NZ Forces 1939–45; C-in-C Allied Forces Crete 1941; Gov Gen NZ 1946–52

appointed as General Officer Commanding and the First Echelon due to sail early in January, while not nearly enough men were available for the Second, a national recruiting campaign was launched just before Christmas 1939 for 10 000 volunteers by 12 January, for the Second Echelon and the nucleus of the Third. Higher overseas pay rates were announced, colonels rising by 17s 6d a day to 42s 6d and privates by 6d to 7s 6d; while teeth would be repaired by the Army. There were large newspaper advertisements and posters: ‘Your pal is in the First Echelon. Enlist today’, ‘The Spirit of Anzac calls you. You will be proud to be among the first Ten Thousand’. Recruiting officers were to visit remote pockets of manpower such as public works camps, sawmills and mines, with attendant doctors to give medical examinations on the spot. Local bodies, the RSA, Territorial Associations, patriotic councils, Red Cross societies and the like were asked to help.

Many of these people and groups believed in conscription, and with divided minds they pumped out their speeches. As the Press put it: ‘They co-operate; but they do not agree.’

Press, 10 Feb 40, p. 13

Probably those near the apex of affairs accepted more readily than those less elevated the need to subdue their own convictions, support government policy and work up volunteers. Thus Colonel P. H. Bell,

Bell, Brigadier Peter Harvey, CB('44), DSO (1886–1963): QMG & 3rd Military Memb NZ Army Board 1940; OC Northern Military District 1941

commanding the Southern Military District, told the RSA that despite all private opinions the idea of conscription must be abandoned and the appeal for volunteers supported;

Press, 22 Dec 39, p. 8

Adam Hamilton declared ‘The duty of the National Party is to assist the Government to the fullest extent in making the voluntary system effective. If conscription is unduly stressed it will undermine the Government's efforts and no member of the National Party wants that.’

Evening Post, 29 Feb 40, p 10

Many local leaders however were less willing to stifle their feelings. The Mayor of Ashburton, for instance, when only 100 people came to farewell the district's 34 soldiers, said that he had been asked to appeal for recruits but would prefer a ‘spot of conscription’.

Press, 22 Dec 39, p. 3

The Otago Farmers' Union, though it would ‘willingly co-operate’ in this drive for the Second and Third echelons, declared that universal military service was the only fair and democratic basis for an overseas force.

Ibid., p. 6

The Waipa County Council thought likewise, but while government policy was for volunteers it would give what support it could; one councillor asked how they could back what they knew to be wrong: ‘The Government's attitude is absurd and they are asking us to stump the country.’

NZ Herald, 24 Jan 40, p. 12

At Te Aroha a patriotic spokesman held that voluntary enlistment had failed if civilians were expected to go round telling young men they should go to war and he thought the young men wanted conscription.

Ibid., 6 Feb 40, p. 9

Some local bodies declared themselves in favour of conscription, but on 26 January Fraser said that Cabinet was taking no notice of such resolutions.

It is probable, however, that others took notice. In Dunedin, where from October to March enlisting was slow, the Mayor, entraining recruits for the First Echelon on 6 October, had hoped there would soon be conscription, while the local RSA spoke firmly for it and not until pressed by headquarters did the president appear on recruiting platforms.

Otago Daily Times, 15, 28, 29 Feb, 6 Mar 40, pp. 8, 10. 8, 8

At Christchurch, where enlistment also dragged at first, the recruiting committee was very active but at least one member, Sidney Holland, made it clear that he was doing his duty against his better judgment.

‘Some people would like to see conscription. 1 believe it would meet with the approval of the majority … but the Government, in its wisdom, had decided on a voluntary system. The decision rests with the Government and ours is the job to translate it into action.’ Press, 22 Dec 39, p. 8

The Prime Minister broadcast, appealing to sense and sensibility; the generals and mayors made speeches; the final parades of the First Echelon at Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch were vigorous rallies. The Observer of 10 January said briefly what other papers were saying at more length: it deplored the volunteer system but congratulated the government on greater energy—‘At last some attempt is being made to kindle patriotic fervour. Last week's parades were memorable events. Those long columns of eager young soldiers provided a splendid inspiration.’

The First Echelon marches were undoubtedly moving. At Auckland on 4 January the Herald reported a steady stream of volunteers at the Drill Hall, some obviously straight from jobs, in aprons, minus coat or wash; and on the 10th the steady stream yielded 97 men. At Wellington the total for 5 January was 105, and 114 on the 8th—a record. The Evening Post, interviewing recruits on 4 January, wrote that the ‘call of adventure and the roving spirit’ seemed the main motives—though men do not necessarily speak their hearts to reporters. Said one: ‘When I saw three of my pals in the march yesterday I realised for the first time that they are really in for a trip round the world and I wanted to be in the swim too.’ A good job and obligations had kept a 36-year old from joining sooner but when he saw the troops in the city he simply had to go. Another said, ‘It's well worth the risk to be in the swim with the other boys’, and the next that soon a man would have to be in uniform to get a girl.

The enlistment rate quickened sharply. On 30 December volunteers numbered 18 858, but by 6 January there were 20 541,

Otago Daily Times, 15 Jan 40, p. 6

and by 27 January there were 25 140

NZ Herald, 6 Feb 40, p. 9

—some 6000 in four weeks. Various devices were used:.vans with loud speakers toured Auckland streets, and outside recruiting booths brightly dressed girls on lorries did tap and Highland dances. In Auckland, Dunedin, Christchurch and Hamilton low-flying aircraft rained paper ‘bomphlets’ (‘If this were a bomb, where would you be? Enlist today’) on Friday night shoppers. Wellington and Auckland tried to sing men into the Army with community sings plus recruiting speeches. At Westport it was proposed that prominent citizens should make speeches at picture theatres, and the clergy of the Buller district were asked to mention volunteering in their sermons.

Press, 8 Jan 40, p. 6

At Christchurch during a football match troops marched round the grounds with gaps in their ranks and 22 joined in ten minutes.

NZ Herald, 29 Apr 40, p. 9

There were parades of weapons, of bands, Territorials and returned men; there were speeches and more speeches. Still there was talk of conscription, rumours that it would be introduced soon, rumours which, it was feared, would shrivel the drive to enlist. For instance a major, recruiting at Wellington, said that he had been given fifteen different dates for its introduction,

Evening Post, 12 Jan 40, p. 9

and Dunedin people in February heard that conscription cards were being printed and would be issued in March.

Otago Daily Times, 19 Feb 40, p. 6

While recruiting activity grew, those who enlisted and their families began to feel hostility to the others who inevitably appeared as selfish job-holders. Families in which several sons had enlisted looked askance at those which had yielded none. The first call was for single men, but some men with sizeable families enlisted, and if their wives consented they were accepted,

F. Jones in Evening Post, 12 Apr 40, p. 6

though some citizens regarded this as economic folly or even criminal evasion of responsibility.

Press, 2 Dec 39, p. 9; Otago Daily Times, 6, 20 Oct 39, pp. 6, 8

Under recruiting pressure some men doubted if a wife and one or two children justified remaining. ‘I am beginning to feel that perhaps I am shirking,’ wrote one. ‘If conscription was introduced I would have no difficulty—I would know that my time would come eventually.’

NZ Herald, 18, 20 Jan 40, pp. 12, 14

Another newspaper column held this heart-cry:

Today my husband enlisted. We are very proud of him and at the same time very sad. I have a small son four years old…. My friends say my husband is foolish and ask why he did not wait for conscription. Why give up a position with £6. 10s. per week for a soldier's pay. Yes, Sir, this is what the people are thinking. Why doesn't the Government wake up. Conscript the men; also conscript the money. Give everyone soldiers pay; then men will enlist. Why should my boy be separated from his daddy when there are single men left behind…. My husband is only 29, his best years are ahead of him. We were married in 1934, had two years on relief, and now when his country called he has answered, but there are too many men who don't mind how loud or long the country's bugle calls…,

Evening Post, 22 Jan 40, p. 6

White feathers appeared, but not widely; the National Council of Women disapproved, quoting the Queen who hoped there would be none.

Ibid., 6 Oct 39, p. 11

In the House, Sidney Holland, whose military service in 1914–18 was beyond question, exhibited a feather he had received, declared that they were being sent to other returned soldiers, and hoped that it would be made a heavily punishable offence.

Otago Daily Times, 28 Sep 39, p. 10

Another feather was sent to the redoubtable ‘Starkie’, hero of Robin Hyde's Passport to Hell.

Wanganui Herald, 9 Jan 40, p. 9

A few newspaper letters and articles

Taranaki Daily News, 8 Jan 40, p. 8; NZ Herald, 9; Press 16 Jan 40, p. 5; Otago Daily Times, 18 Mar 40, p. 10; Southland Times, 8 Jun 40, p. 15

condemned the senders as impertinent and presumptuous. A colonel who said that conscription would not be needed if decent women refused to dance or play tennis with non-volunteers was firmly rebuked by an editorial and letters in the Christchurch Press.

Press, 22, 23, 26, 28 Dec 40, pp. 8, 10, 4, 5

Truth also reproved.

Truth, 24, Apr, 17 Jul 40, pp. 9, 14

In Taranaki a man who received white feathers went into the Army, leaving his mother, sick father and two young brothers on a 200-acre farm. The 11-year-old boy drove the lorry to the factory, as his mother could not drive and she ‘was told all would be OK’. However, she was taken to court and fined for aiding and abetting her son to drive while he was under-age to hold a licence. This led to the elder son's release from camp.

Information from Mrs P. Duckett, Waitara, Sep 69

The claim, strongly advanced by the RSA, that rejected or waiting volunteers should be distinguished by a badge was recognised by Cabinet in February,

NZ Herald, 22 Feb 40, p. 10

though it was not until mid-June that these badges were issued. Many ex-soldiers joined or rejoined the RSA, some not having been members for 15–20 years. This increase, begun before August 1939 and intensified with the war, was more than 7500 in the first year, giving a total membership of 30 496 by September 1940.

Evening Post, 21 Nov 40, p. 5

They joined partly from general interest and to identify themselves with a body knowledgeable and important at the time; partly to avoid, by use of the Association's badge, misunderstandings and the attentions of the distributors of white feathers.

Press, 2 May 40, p. 8

While leaders of the community busily worked for volunteers, conscription and anti-conscription movements were developing. The RSA and Chambers of Commerce had advocated compulsory national service since 1939, farmers considered it necessary if production were to be increased and the Defence League, very quiet since the beginning of the war, at the end of January 1940 wrote to 317 local bodies urging compulsory national service, with all citizens allotted suitable tasks. Of 224 replies, 89 declined giving an opinion, 30 thought it the government's business, 2 opposed the idea, and 103 favoured it— 63 of these speaking for bodies and 40 as individual conncillors;

NZ Herald, 10 Apr 40, p. 11

a few councillors were sharply critical of the League and its purposes.

Ibid., 7 Feb 40, p. 12 (Mt Albert); Press, 9 Feb 40, p. 10 (Westport), 1 Mar 40, p. 14 (Paparua); Evening Post, 13 Feb 40, p. 4 (Lower Hutt), 9 Feb 40, p. 8 (Makara), 15 Feb 40, p. 10 (Wellington)

The League's proposal was echoed by at least one private person who called himself'a democrat, an anti militarist, an ex-serviceman and a socialist', who scorned as hypocritical and inconsistent the many supporters of the volunteer system who cheered the volunteers, saw the glorious side of war, believed it to be unavoidable, never missed a parade, and ‘let George do it’; surely to allot tasks to every serviceable person would be more efficient, democratic and wholesome than the ‘obnoxious campaigning of the recruiters whose stereotyped jingo phrases and methods are sickeningly reminiscent of the last war to end war’.

Evening Post, 24 Jan 40, p. 4

Newspapers, in editorials, news reports and correspondence columns, lost no opportunity of assuring the public that the public considered the voluntary system neither efficient nor fair. How far newspapers suppressed or diminished the views of those opposed either to the war itself or to conscription in particular can only be guessed—and perhaps only by those who have tried to express other opinions opposed by those newspapers

In this survey, newspaper letters are given a place as expressing, in the phrases of the moment, views by random people. That few letters appeared opposing conscription cannot be taken to mean that opposition was not felt or expressed, only that it was not published.

—but a few appeared. Some

Press, 26, 28 Dec 39, pp. 5, 3; Southland Times, 23 Feb 40, p. 9

said that men who followed their consciences in refusing to fight needed as much courage as soldiers and should be respected. Others held that those who would not have to go were the most avid for conscription, and hoped that in a referendum only those of military age or their parents could vote;

Press, 9 Oct, 29 Dec 39, pp. 5, 3; Southland Times, 8 May 40, p. 4; NZ Observer, 1 Nov 39, p. 8

some pointed out that conscription propaganda was inimical to volunteering.

Evening Post, 17 Feb 40, p. 12

A few suggested that older men should enlist or be conscripted, urging the value of maturity and previous training, or that young men, who had no responsibility for the war, should not be the first to go—‘the economy of drafting off the broken-mouths and retaining the two-tooths is obvious. As a fighting force a body of matured men will, under modern conditions, be superior to one composed of youths in every respect except perhaps mobility.’

Press, 12 Sep 39, p. 5; also Dominion, 19 Sep 39, p. 9; Press, 9 Oct 39, p. 5; Evening Post, 10 Feb 40, p. 10, NZ Herald, 2 Mar 40, p. 13 (Bishop Cherrington)

Some thought that the government should know the real need, and that there were enough volunteers. An Otago man complained of the slogan ‘equality of sacrifice’:

Believe me, there is no equality of sacrifice under conscription or any other form of recruitment…. If two men are fit for war service of whom one is engaged in an essential industry and the other goes to fight, where in the name of common sense is the equality of sacrifice. Hoping to see in the future more appeals to the intelligence of the people than to their stupidity….

Otago Daily Times, 12 Oct 39, p. 11

Leftists held that all men would be needed here if New Zealand were invaded and that self defence was the first duty. Britain was involved in Europe, all kinds of surprises were possible, conscription would not be needed to get New Zealanders to defend their own country, but the government should make sure that they had the necessary weapons. This view was shared by the Roman Catholic Church, with the New Zealand Tablet of 25 October declaring that there were several ways in which New Zealand could pull its weight, but wholesale conscription would not be a reasonable service to the Empire, ‘and it would be a traitorous disservice to our own country’. Communists, of course, who opposed the whole war at this stage, opposed conscription vigorously, in the People's Voice, in leaflets, and in any unions where they had influence.

Some Labour bodies passed resolutions urging the government to stand firm against pressure for conscription, pressure from Labour's political enemies. Thus a deputation from the Labourers' Federation went to the Minister of Defence on 14 November 1940, and on 7 February a stop-work meeting of 1000 Wellington watersiders by a large majority opposed conscription; as did the Rotorua Labour Representation Committee.

People's Voice, 16 Feb 40, p. 1

The Union Record (of the Carpenters and Joiners Union)

The Record supplanted the Borer as the voice of the Amalgamated Society of Carpenters and Joiners in 1940. Like its predecessor it was prepared and published in the Auckland area, but was made available to Union members throughout the country. In July 1951 appeared the first issue of a national journal, the New Zealand Building Worker.

in communist-tinged phrases demanded ‘stern unbending refusal’, and held that conscription would be unnecessary if New Zealanders were positive that the troops would be used only against the Nazis and not for policing India or for any other imperialist activity.

Union Record, 15 Jan 40, p. 2

The New Zealand Railway Review (of the New Zealand Amalgamated Society of Railway Servants) warned against the constant talk of conscription—‘It is just the old idea that if you say a thing often enough and convincingly enough you will change the opinion of the next person’; New Zealand had a big enough job feeding Britain without worrying about conscription.

NZ Railway Review, 5 Jan 40, p. 3

The People's Voice, which would surely have reported all the anti-conscription motions it heard of, recorded only a handful: the Auckland Carpenters and Ruawai Left Book Club (issue of 19 January); Dunedin Furniture and Related Trades (16 February); New Plymouth Watersiders (8 March); Otago Labourers (28 March); Ngauranga Freezing Workers (12 April).

Labour authorities, while holding firmly to the voluntary system, were cautious. On 19 December Langstone, when asked directly if there would be a referendum before conscription were introduced, replied, ‘We have been elected. A referendum was taken at the last election.’

Evening Post, 20 Dec 39, p. 12

The Standard repeatedly reproved debate about conscription: ‘If the issue ever arises it will be time enough to start agitating for a referendum.’ The government opposed conscription and ‘it is a certainty that conscription will not be introduced here except in an extreme emergency.’ Meanwhile the best way to counter propaganda for conscription was to give full support to the voluntary system.

Standard, 28 Dec 39, p. 6. 1 Feb 40, p. 4

Labour's rank and file was, of course, in difficulties: conscription was right against the traditional grain, but to agitate against it betokened lack of confidence in their leaders. The outspoken Union Record voiced the suspicions of the section of the movement not silenced by the fear of embarrassing its own government.

Union Record, 15 Mar 40, p. 7

Meanwhile, in mid-January, pacifists and a wide range of leftists at Wellington started the Peace and Anti-Conscription Council,

Ibid., 15 Feb 40, p. 6

urging New Zealand to withdraw from the war, oppose all conscription and protect civil liberties. Branches appeared in Christchurch, Auckland, Palmerston North and Nelson.

People's Voice, 19, 26 Jan, 16 Feb, 15, 29 Mar 40, pp. 5, 1, 5, 1, 2; Union Record, 15 Jan 40, p. 8

At least some of its meetings were well attended—about 1000 crowded the Wellington Trades Hall on 18 January

Tomorrow, 24 Jan 40, p. 188

after the Mayor had cancelled its Town Hall booking;

Evening Post, 15 Feb 40, p. 10

and the Evening Post reported more than 800 at a Miramar meeting on 4 February.

In December the West Coast Trades Council had condemned the war as imperialist,

Press, 6 Dec 39, p. 8

with consequent furore among its affiliates.

Dominion, 8 Dec 39, p. 10; Grey River Argus, 9 Dec 39; Press, 12, 13 Dec, pp. 8, 14; People's Voice, 22 Dec 39, p. 1

Although it was rescinded on 10 February,

Press, 12 Feb 40. p. 8

this anti-war expression, plus other anti-conscription activities, led to a joint conference of the executives of the Labour party and the Federation of Labour, which on 21 February made a statement on war policy. It was an interesting statement, floodlighting Labour's image of itself. In well-rounded party-rallying phrases, it condemned Nazi aggression, and stressed that New Zealand's high standard of living, won by democracy and trade unionism within the British Commonwealth, depended on that Commonwealth. The British government was at last standing for collective security, as New Zealand had repeatedly advised; it would now be ‘politically irresponsible or worse’ if New Zealand Labour did not give Britain fullest support. The six peace aims of British Labour were endorsed: no revengeful peace, but restitution to victims; right of all nations to self determination; the outlawing of war; rights of minorities; an effective international authority; an end to colonial exploitation and trade monopoly. Recalling that the labour movement had stated its opposition to conscription on 13 July 1939, sure that there was no need for it, that young men would rally willingly to the defence of freedom, the statement continued

We now unconditionally reaffirm that statement…. in our opinion there is no good reason for either conscription or anti-conscription movements in New Zealand. There is no conscription in New Zealand, and there will be no conscription whilst Labour is in power. The best possible guarantee against conscription therefore is to participate in the work of the Labour and Trade Union Movements, to help to keep Labour in power, and to support the Government's voluntary recruiting campaign.

Social Security registration forms were now being used for a national register (this had been announced on 13 February), but it was for organising economic and industrial life, not for conscription. Freedom of speech was upheld, with some rather vague qualifications.

It is hard to think that the men who compiled this statement

Several Cabinet ministers were present. Evening Post, 21 Feb 40, p. 11

did not realise that conscription would come sooner or later, but they were running politics. Savage, whose personal hold was very strong, was dying (though this was firmly denied till early March); there was the dissident pull of the left wing and they were concerned to hold the party steady. (For instance, a series of mass demonstrations of Labour solidarity and confidence in the Prime Minister and the government had been planned in December and January, the first to take place at Auckland on 10 March,

Press, 23 Jan 40, p. 8; NZ Herald, 31 Jan 40, p. 11

but Savage's sinking health made them obviously unsuitable.) It was not a time for unwelcome changes. ‘No conscription’ was so deeply graven on many stalwart Labour hearts that to depart from it during this mild and muddled phase of the war might well have shaken faith in the leaders. Moreover, if the rumours of impending conscription were scotched, enlistment would quicken.

The declaration so assuaged the Canterbury Peace and Anti-Conscription Council, which had been very active issuing pamphlets and canvassing houses, that it decided to suspend all anti-conscription efforts.

Press, 12 Apr 40, p. 10

The Wellington body continued its preparations for a general conference at Easter and the Labour party executive instructed that no Labour member might attend that conference.

NZ Herald, 13 Mar 40, p. 10

About 100 delegates and observers attended, however, from trade unions, pacifist organisations, youth groups and women's movements. They held that the government should initiate a peace conference of workers as well as governments of all nations or, failing that, withdraw New Zealand from the war; they condemned the Emergency Regulations and the restrictions of civil liberties, denounced the compilation of the national register and called on the government to declare unconditionally against conscription.

Auckland Star, 26 Mar 40, p. 9

At the same time the annual conference of the Federation of Labour heartily adopted the February Statement of War Policy, with only 28 (against 223) voting for a leftist amendment calling for immediate peace, disarmament, socialism, and national independence for Czechoslovakia, India, Ireland and Poland.

Standard, 28 Mar 40, pp. 7, 14

The concurrent Labour party conference severely condemned the Wellington Peace and Anti-Conscription Council as a political anti-Labour organisation, contrived by Communists, to whom all opposition to the war was widely attributed. Fraser recalled that when war was declared there was no opposition from anyone in the country, except the pacifist Ormond Burton, until Moscow gave orders. The conference adopted the war policy statement by 821 votes to 104. One speaker remembered that in 1935

Actually 1937; see Standard, 8 Apr 37, p. 1

Fraser had told conference that its decisions were only recommendations, not binding on the government. In fact, Fraser's 1937 statement was very close to what actually happened in 1940. He had said that motions of conference were expressions of opinion, not necessarily binding on the government, which would interpret them in the light of existing circumstances; the final word lay with Cabinet, after consulting caucus and the national executive. ‘The Labour Party, as the Government, was now responsible for the welfare of the whole community not merely of its own supporters.’

Ibid.

But in March 1940 it was necessary to reassure conference of its own power. Fraser denied having said that conference decisions were not binding, only that the government could not accept decisions contrary to its election pledges; in such a case it would be necessary to call a special conference.

Ibid., 4 Apr 40, p. 14

Here Fraser forecast, as he was later to claim, the special meeting that was called on 2 June, called to endorse, not to discuss, the change in government policy on conscription. Meanwhile several newspapers

NZ Herald, 27 Mar 40, p. 11; Otaga Daily Times, 27 Mar 40, p. 8

assured their readers that if conscription seemed necessary to fill the drafts, the question would first be considered by a Dominion-wide Labour conference.

Subsequently, several Labour branches expelled members who belonged to the Peace and Anti-Conscription Council.

Standard, 11 Apr 40, p. 1; Press, 13 Apr 40, p. 12

Only a few were involved, but this action was significant as part of the change taking place in the party. By inentifying these people with the discredited Communists, Labour's executive gave warning to other die-hard anti-militarists in its rank and file that Labour demanded full loyalty to its present self and was prepared to discard people and principles that clashed with its new task, the task of keeping Labour in power while running the war. It could be said that Labour adjusted itself to war, or that the need to fight the war changed Labour. This was already being shown by the Lee affair at this same Easter conference,

See p. 48

and by the silencing of pacificists; in due course conscientious objectors were to meet firm discouragement where, remembering an earlier Labour party, they might well have expected more tolerance.

Meanwhile the Auckland Carpenters Union

Union Record, 10 May 40, p. 6

and the Auckland Builders and General Labourers Union in April decided to affiliate with the Peace and Anti-Conscription Council,

NZ Herald, 22 May 40, p. 13

‘pursuing the traditional policy of the Labour movement’ and recalling that in 1916 Peter Fraser had been national secretary of a body of that name.

Ibid., 24 May 40, p. 10

The 1940 Peace and Anti-Conscription Council was soon effectively suppressed. Two prominent Australian members, K. Bronson and N. Counihan, were quietly deported,

People's Voice, 26 Jun 40, p. 2; Evening Post, 12, 16 Sep 40, pp. 13, 9

halls for meetings were not available or were cancelled at the last minute,

People's Voice, 5 Mar 40, p. 5; NZ Methodist Times, 24 Feb 40, p. 347

and on 30 June even the Trades Hall was permanently denied it by the police.

People's Voice, 9 Jul 40, no pagination

Labour's repeated reaffirmation that there would be no conscription did not put heart into enlistments. From 1–27 January, 6282 men enlisted, bringing the total to 25 140, and in each of the next three weeks about 1000 enlisted. But only 730 signed on in the week ending 24 February, and for the next three weeks, till mid-March, the weekly average was 571, with a low tide of 534 in the week ending 9 March. Some areas were brimming their quotas, notably Wairarapa–Hawke's Bay–Gisborne and Auckland,

Evening Post, 11 May 40, p. 14; NZ Herald, 16 Apr 40, p. 9

but in several South Island districts quota figures loomed heavily above enlistments.

Otago Daily Times, 5 Feb, 10 Apr 40, pp. 8, 8; Press, 17 Apr 40, p. 10

The Minister of Defence on 14 March maintained that recruiting was quite satisfactory, but on the same day at Christchurch Sidney Holland had declared: ‘We are at our wits' end. We have had meeting after meeting. We have made speeches until we are sick of speaking. We have had demonstrations without end, and we still need 615 men.’ On 22 April Christchurch business and sporting men proffered such suggestions as: employers should let fit men without genuine reasons for holding back know that they would lose their jobs if they did not enlist; they should also let the men know that they themselves were sincere in their assurances that there would be places for them when they came back; appeal should be made to intellect as well as emotions; marching feet were the best recruiting sergeants in the world; school children should go home and ask their brothers why they had not joined up.

Evening Post, 23 Apr 40, p. 11

One or two Press letters criticised recruiting methods. One, on 19 April, hoped that future efforts would avoid a ‘mixture of martial music and platitudes … an insult to our intelligence’; another thought that the recruiting committee, like a keen young salesman, had been ‘overselling’; if it were to cease activities for a few weeks the news from Europe would fill Canterbury's quota.

Press, 16 May 40, p. 3

These instances may be taken as illustrative of not only Canterbury's difficulties, but probably those of many other districts where newspapers were less candid. Complaints of public apathy by perplexed mayors and other recruiting citizens were widespread; if there were real fighting going on, there would be real recruiting. ‘The thing to kick them along would be to learn that the New Zealanders are in action. They would move quickly enough then,’ said an Otago footballer.

Otago Daily Times, 21 May 40, p. 6

In the first fortnight of March Fraser, still Deputy Prime Minister, toured both Islands giving, as the Standard put it, an inspiring lead by frankly explaining the vital issues from platforms holding representatives of both political parties. Adam Hamilton assisted, appearing mainly at different towns, though Invercargill and Wanganui had the privilege of hearing the leaders of both government and Opposition give the same message from the same platform; Hamilton's photograph appeared in large advertisements— ‘Now is the time for service…. We have a high and sacred cause…. Young men … I appeal to you, you with the blood and traditions of your fathers, to spring to the side of your mates in the struggle today….’

eg, Press, 20 Mar 40, p. 14

Parades of troops and returned men garnished these political forgatherings, which some Nationalists viewed hopefully as a sign of approaching coalition.

NZ Herald, 16 Mar 40, p. 17

The victorious HMS Achilles, having shared in destroying the pocket battleship Admiral Graf Spee at the River Plate in mid-December, returned late in February; her men were feted in their home towns and welcomed in the main cities with more parades and speeches. In the last half of March the Second Echelon went on special leave, carrying their khaki message even to remote places, and returned to give mass parades in provincial centres during April.

The impact of one such public appearance, the departure after final leave at Dunedin, with a band, returned soldiers' speeches, and hundreds of friends, was described by the Otago Daily Times with unwonted feeling:

Without ostentation or display, hundreds of farewells were spoken. Quietly, almost abstractedly, in the manner of those who say one thing while they are thinking of something else, the men filled the last moments before the troop train steamed away…. one realised how the sword draws its power from within itself, although in peace time it lies idly in the scabbard with hardly a soul to do it reverence. The scene was profoundly impressive….

In heavy type, the article made its conclusion: Surely more than anything else, such unrehearsed incidents in the progress of the war will awaken a higher realisation of the national peril and a higher resolve to see things through.

Otago Daily Times, 28 Mar 40, p. 5

In the last week of March the weekly enlistment rate climbed to 726, at which figure it remained steady all through April. April passed quietly, though on the 10th newspapers had inch-high headings, ‘Norway and Denmark Invaded’. Under the well-prepared lightning stroke, Denmark crumpled in a day. In Norway, although Britain had mined part of the coast two days earlier, the assault from Oslo to Narvik was so swift that it eluded the British fleet and secured crucial airfields. On 14 April British forces landed at several points but finding that they could not make headway quietly withdrew, except at Narvik where they continued fighting throughout May. They actually captured the town on 28 May but then, not being able to make anything of this gain, withdrew on 10 June.

New Zealand papers treated all this quite calmly. Denmark with her small army and undefended frontiers was an undersized easy victim—though her butter and cheese and bacon would be missed by Britain. Norway, relying on her neutrality, was also an easy kill, while the British withdrawals seemed inconspicuous but almost successful. To New Zealanders the fall of Norway and Denmark proved again that the Nazis were aggressive villains and that the ‘Fifth Column’ was a special danger; it did not follow that Nazi villainy could really threaten man-sized powers like Britain or France. A Press correspondent on 19 April wrote that the British propaganda machine made the Norwegian campaign ‘look like a fight between Joe Louis and one of the Dionne quins. One almost feels sorry for Germany.’ There was only a modest increase in recruiting though the age limit was raised from 35 to 40 years.

Evening Post, 12 Apr 40, p. 6

April yielded 2717 volunteers for the army, March had given 2462, and February 3779. By 27 April volunteers totalled 34 900; of these 15 636 had gone to camp (and overseas), and 6720 were available for posting; 1860 were in reserved occupations.

Ibid., 1 May 40, p. 11

For Services other than the Expeditionary Force, enlisting was much keener. In February a special railway unit required 370 men and 1142 volunteered, while 600 offered for a forestry unit wanting 160.

Otago Daily Times, 29 Feb 40, p. 8

Early in October, when ordinary enlistments were slackening, 900 ground positions advertised in the RNZAF had drawn more than 2000 applications in five days.

Ibid., 6 Oct 39, p. 12

Those volunteering as pilots, air gunners and observers greatly outpaced the selection committees. By mid-February 4300 had applied and 2000 had been interviewed;

NZ Herald, 14 Feb 40, p. 10

by mid-April the Air Force numbered 387 officers and 3064 airmen, including educational and civilian staff, with 2096 awaiting selection interviews.

Otago Daily Times, 19 Apr 40, p. 8

Meanwhile, as the rate of intake was limited, many of those waiting to be called took preliminary mathematics courses—and sought volunteer badges to show their purpose. When the Navy in February asked for technicians and tradesmen, many hundreds applied, quenching the demand in a few days while more than 500 yachtsmen volunteered for the ten positions offered to them.

Ibid., 17 Feb 40, p. 12

During these first eight months, in fact and in feeling, New Zealand was getting used to its war. Khaki was making its impact. Relatives and friends of volunteers felt that they were in the war; those who gave to patriotic appeals, or entertained soldiers, or packed parcels, or made hussifs

A tape-tied cloth folder containing needles, thread, buttons, scissors, etc. Evening Post, 23 May 40, p. 12

for the troops, felt they were doing their bit, though a bit that changed their lives very little. As yet no New Zealand soldiers had met the enemy, though there was, of course, the Achilles, and the RAF included some 400 New Zealanders who had joined before the war; from time to time their photographs appeared in New Zealand papers—decorated, missing, wounded, dead. The newspapers after mid-February also showed pictures of the Kiwis in Egypt. The Second Echelon was getting ready to go overseas. To the small towns soldiers came back on leave, the aura of here-today-and-gone-tomorrow about them, a hint of force and danger. In the cities near camps—Auckland, Wellington, Christchurch—hundreds appeared every weekend, some to be the private lions of their families or friends, a few to accept the hospitality of strangers or near-strangers, others to rove the streets and the places of entertainment, slowly augmented by Welcome Clubs, teas and socials and dances run by the churches, the YMCA, the YWCA and various clubs. They hoped for beer and girls and a bit of fun; often they found only boredom and beer of which they could not afford much. In the streets the sound of heavy black boots, moving in rapid groups, made heads turn with a tinge of awe, a self-conscious awareness of their protectors—or with disapproval if those protectors showed signs of drink. The soldiers swaggered a little; they were New Zealanders bound for overseas and they felt they were the All Blacks; they sang the old songs, they sang ‘Roll out the barrel’ and ‘We'll hang out our washing on the Siegfried Line’. The war was still far away, and there seemed to be no hurry about it.

New Zealand knew little of the storm that hustled the Chamberlain government from office as the sluggish war ended in the first days of May 1940, with the Allied retreat from southern Norway after a three weeks' campaign, reports of which had been pedestrian but optimistic. True, the dailies of 6 May briefly quoted the Manchester Guardian on shallow ministerial optimism and the Prime Minister's dangerous capacity for self-delusion, the Daily Mail's view that British leaders had been fooling themselves and the public, and the South African papers which charged the Ministry of Information with deceiving press and public. But that same day the Evening Post's war news column held that the set-back in Norway, apart from its implied reflection on the British government's conduct of the war, was not of vital consequence in the long distance strategy of the war.

Editorials in the New Zealand Herald (7 May) and the Press (9 May) complained about official secretiveness and evasion, of treating British people as if they had no reserves of moral courage, but the Evening Post (8 May) held that ministerial frankness should be qualified by strategic necessity. The Auckland Star on 6 May, however, said that through muddle and dissension in London many Anzacs at Gallipoli had died needlessly and in vain; some apparent errors in Norway were unpleasantly reminiscent of Gallipoli and it must ‘be made clear to the British Government that the Dominions would not permit their troops to be sent and sacrificed in any ill-conceived or badly organised adventure.’

Reports of the debate on Norway and the conduct of the war in the House of Commons on 7 and 8 May gave much space to the explanations of Chamberlain and Churchill, the former claiming that all was not yet lost in Norway and that the Germans had paid heavily for their gains. It was also clear that there was vigorous criticism of the government, both in the press and in the House. While some New Zealand papers printed more of these criticisms than others, there was general mention of attacks by two Conservative members, Admiral Sir Roger Keyes

Keyes, Admiral of the Fleet Sir Roger, 1st Baron of Zeebrugge and of Dover ('43) (1872–1945): MP 1934–43; Dir Combined Ops 1940–1

and Leo Amery.

Amery, Rt Hon Leopold Stennett, PC, CH (1873–1955): Sec State Cols 1924–9, Dom Aff 1925–9, India and Burma 1940–5

The Admiral declared that the Norway campaign was a shocking story of ineptitude, repeating the Gallipoli tragedy, and he expressed the frustration of the fighting Navy. There were restrained reports of Amery's censuring the lack of decisive consistent action and demanding a reformed government with fighting spirit in which the Opposition took a share of responsibility, but there was no stress on the final Cromwellian thrust that helped to sharpen the mood of the House.

Harold Nicholson, one of the Conservatives who turned against Chamberlain, wrote of Keyes's ‘absolutely devastating attack’ on naval bungling, and Amery's ‘further terrific attack’. The latter switched attention from Norway to the whole conduct of the war, concluding with Cromwell's dismissal of the Long Parliament: ‘You have sat here too long for any good you have been doing. Depart, I say, and let us have done with you. In the name of God, go.’ Nicholson, Harold, Diaries and Letters 1939–1945, p. 73; also Dalton, Hugh, The Fateful Years: Memoirs 1939–1945, pp. 304–11; Calder, Angus, The People's War: Britain 1939–45, pp. 81–2

The complaints of Attlee,

Attlee, Rt Hon Clement Richard, 1st Earl Attlee ('55), Viscount Prestwood ('55), KG, PC, OM, CH, FRS (1883–1967): MP (Lab) 1922–55; Leader Oppos 1935–40, 1951–5; Deputy PM 1942–4, Sec State Dom Aff 1942–3; PM 1945–51; Min Defence 1945–6

Sir Archibald Sinclair

Sinclair, Rt Hon Sir Archibald, 1st Viscount Thurso of Ulbster ('52), KT('41), PC, CMG (1890–1970): MP (Lib) 1922–45; Sec State Air 1940–5; Leader Parl Liberal party 1935–45

and others on muddling mismanagement were briefly noted. Lloyd George's

Lloyd George, Rt Hon David, 1st Earl of Dwyfor ('45), PC, OM (1863–1945): MP (Lib) 1890–1931, (Indep Lib) 1931–44; PM 1916–22

call to Chamberlain to set an example of sacrifice by giving up the seals of his office was widely reported, as were the cries of ‘Resign, resign’ that greeted the vote in which the government's majority fell from about 240 to 81.

The vote was 281:200, showing many Conservative absences apart from those who marched into the Opposition Lobby.

But the second day's reports gave much space to Churchill's explanations, and the New Zealand Herald (10 May) declared, ‘Highest honours in a searching debate go to Mr Churchill.’ Many of the rebel Conservatives who insisted on coalition were named, and it was ‘understood’ that Labour leaders had told Chamberlain that they would not serve under him. Nevertheless the inevitability of Chamberlain's resignation was not sharply apparent. The Evening Post (9 May) saw the vote as the government's survival and a united shoulder to the wheel; the New Zealand Herald and the Dominion on 13 May saw Chamberlain's May 10 (British time) resignation, with a comfortable loyal majority, as unnecessary, but in the highest traditions of British statesmanship.

Churchill was warmly welcomed, the bulldog fit to meet the bull-like rush of the new war. On the day he took office as Prime Minister, 10 May, Germany launched its great attack in the west, first invading Belgium, Holland and Luxembourg. By 18 May startled New Zealanders were reading that the Germans had overrun Holland and were thrusting into France. In that week, along with details of Churchill's all-party cabinet, they also read Labour statements that there was no earthly reason for coalition in New Zealand: Britain was due for an election in 1940, but in New Zealand the government had a large majority, neither party wanted coalition, and lack of it was not impeding the war effort.

Evening Post, 14 May 40, p. 6; Standard, 16 May 40, p. 1

They also read resolutions from chambers of commerce and farmers' unions, renewing their demands for conscription and an end to the 40-hour week, and many editorials on lack of leadership and inadequate war effort. Suddenly the remote, unreal war was high and threatening; dismayed New Zealanders felt that they must do something, and old discontents boiled up with new fervour. Some farmers' suggestions were far-reaching: thus in Hawke's Bay they wanted coalition including outsiders of ability, conscription of all wealth and manpower, a moratorium on debts, interest and rents, all males on Army pay, graded from private to colonel according to ability in farming and industry, and vigorous production of armaments.

NapierDaily Telegraph, 17 May 40, p. 4

At Gore they proposed a ‘fight or work’ policy, with a national register to maintain both the overseas forces and essential industry, and a British-style cabinet which would also include the presidents of the Farmers' Union and the RSA.

Otago Daily Times, 18 May 40, p. 10

On 13 May Adam Hamilton urged that Parliament should be called immediately, but Fraser adhered to the date already set, 13 June. On 19 May Hamilton, finding that the National party, despite its restraint and co-operation in the past months and despite the British example, was not being invited to join a coalition, made a forthright attack on the government for this, for its ‘shilly-shallying’ war effort and the long silence of Parliament in its seven-month recession.

Evening Post, 20 May 40, p. 8

The same night, a Sunday, Fraser met the rising challenge with a singularly inept broadcast, quite out of touch with the urgency felt by many as they turned to their radios. The Prime Minister commended Britain's change of leadership, but found endorsement for his own government in Labour's victory at the by-election for Savage's old seat. He spoke of the German crimes against the Netherlands, of the pressing dangers to Britain and France. New Zealand was sustaining its part and the government was prepared for a long war. He announced a new plan for increasing home defence forces but otherwise presaged no major change. He told how the government was helping to replace enlisted farm workers by subsidies on housing and inexperienced labour and by a personal approach to men on public works. Men capable of bearing arms either at home or abroad should come forward now. The rest of the country could serve best by going about their daily tasks and working with a will. He commended the efforts of women and, with a final unlucky touch, of watersiders who had loaded ships at the weekend, at overtime rates.

Ibid.

Hard upon this pedestrian statement came Churchill's sonorous promise to demand, in the coming battle, the utmost effort from all. ‘Interests of property and hours of labour are nothing compared to the struggle for life and honour, for right and freedom, to which we have vowed ourselves’. In its context, the contrast was disturbing, and during the next few days helped bring the general unease and restlessness to a quite remarkable pitch, not lessened on 23 May by news of the British Emergency Powers Defence Act, putting all manpower and property at the service of the government. Rarely except at the height of elections had so many people gone to so many meetings. It seems worthwhile to examine the several streams that together made a flood.

There was anti-alien

See p. 859ff

excitement. The Nazi ‘Fifth Column’ was prominent in Norway and the Low Countries; in Britain there were warnings about parachute landings and temporary wholesale internment of aliens. New Zealand could hardly expect paratroopers, but fear of a ‘Fifth Column’ sprang up overnight. On 15 May Wellington city councillors considered the possibility of enemy spies acting as saboteurs, and reviewed precautions about fires and water and electricity supplies.

Evening Post, 16 May 40, p. 10

The same day A. J. Moody,

Moody, Allan John (d 1973 aet 85): barrister & solicitor; chmn Auck Hospital Bd 1938–47

a lawyer and chairman of the Auckland Hospital Board, declared that ‘every German national should be interned at once. The Government should know that the responsible section of the community is greatly concerned about the large numbers of Germans who are at present free.’ He would employ no German doctors at Auckland hospital; it was ‘monstrously unfair’ that they should practise in New Zealand while New Zealanders were fighting to make refugees safer in future, and enlisted doctors would return to find their work taken over. These views, he said, were being freely expressed in Auckland, and he uttered them not to criticise government officials, but to strengthen their hands.

NZ Herald, 16 May 40, p. 8

The Herald reported that there were 290 Germans in Auckland, only 11 of them interned. Fraser rapidly replied that the government had full information and was watching all aliens, that public vigilance was commendable but the circulation of alarms without foundation would be harmful and unhealthy.

Evening Post, 16 May 40, p. 13

Moody's lead proved popular, touching off newspaper editorials and a rain of letters on the theme ‘play safe and intern the lot’; a week later he spoke of receiving letters and telegrams of approval from all over New Zealand and saw public demand for stringent measures.

NZ Herald, 22 May 40, p. 8

He was backed by Sir Carrick Robertson,

Robertson, Sir Carrick, Kt('29), FRCS (1879–1963): b Scotland, to NZ 1905, 1NZEF 1915–16: Pres Auck and NZ branches BMA

president of the Auckland BMA, who said, ‘We do not suggest that all or any of these aliens are spies, but what we do know is that their roots for generations have been nurtured on German soil, and it is difficult to believe that just because of their mass expulsion during a political upheaval they are not at the bottom of their hearts loyal to Germany.’

NZ Herald, 28 May 40, p. 6

Of course less inflamed views were also expressed. Some Auckland university professors led in asking for discrimination among aliens, and warned that working up crowd hysteria damaged the war effort by diverting emotion and energy from constructive action,

Ibid., 24, 25 May 40, pp. 11, 14

while several people in various places wrote in strains similar to A. R. D. Fairburn:

Fairburn, Arthur Rex Duggard (1904–57): lecturer Elam School Fine Arts; freelance journalist & script writer; 3 years with Broadcasting Service; poet and savant

‘I find it difficult to imagine that any person past adolescence and not subject to chronic hysteria would regard the presence among us of a handful of Germans (most of them victims of the enemy we are fighting) as a potential menace to this small and remote Dominion. On the other hand, a good deal of undeserved suffering will be caused if the public sets about boycotting and persecuting German refugees. Trying as the times are, let us do our best to avoid stupidity and inhumanity.’

Auckland Star, 23 May 40, p. 6 (slightly abridged); NZ Observer, 5 Jun 40, p. 2

In Wellington, A. Eaton Hurley

Hurley, Albert Eaton: b 1904; barrister & solicitor Wgtn 1929–76; Sec Municipal Assn NZ 1936–52, legal adviser 1949–76; Ombudsman Auck 1976–80

and Edward Dowsett wrote that in Britain recent steps against certain categories of refugees were precautions against parachute or other invasion, but it could hardly be thought that New Zealand was in the same degree of danger. All refugees had been closely scrutinised by the authorities before coming here, many had suffered in German concentration camps such as Dachau or Buchenwald and, if they filled the positions of men in the forces, regulations made their tenure temporary. Any Fifth Column activities would be settled by competent investigation, not by wholesale accusations, and the writers believed that most refugees would welcome tribunals, as in England, to investigate their credentials. War against Nazi tyranny would be won by the morale of the Allies as much as by military prowess, and the morale of people depended on the justice of their cause, not on the bitterness of their emotions.

Evening Post, 1 Jun 40, p. 7

It was, however, the views of Moody's ‘responsible section’ that had nation-wide repetition and that were endorsed by Adam Hamilton, who declared his intention of seeking a full return of aliens who had arrived during the last few years. ‘The Government has utterly failed to deal with subversive elements in our midst…. Traitors, whether individuals, small groups, or members of some “fifth column” must be given no opportunity and shown no quarter.’

Wanganui Herald, 23 May 40, p. 4

These views were not new: for instance some Dunedin RSA men in October had suggested that all enemy aliens should be behind bars,

Otago Daily Times, 25 Oct 39, p. 10

there had been occasional grumbles that a German could earn £1 a day while a soldier got 7s, and Truth on 17 January had anticipated Moody's opinions about Jewish and New Zealand doctors. A week later, however, Truth published a statement by the Refugees Emergency Committee that the number of refugee doctors was small.

With about 1400 doctors on the Medical Register, there were only 11 Jewish doctors in practice, and fewer than 20 training in Dunedin. Truth, 24 Jan 40, p. 7

The RSA entered swiftly. Its anti-alien attitude was well established, but it now concentrated on ‘compulsory universal national service’. The RSA held, and it was widely agreed, that it had earned a leading voice in defence matters, with which it linked concern about the enemy at home, disloyalty and aliens. It strongly claimed to be a non-political body, but basically it felt that only those who had served or been willing to serve before were fit to lead the country now, to ask young men to enlist and to expect willing sacrifice from all. The Labour government, of which several had been ‘conchies’ in 1914–18, did not qualify. However it was also a soldierly duty to support elected leaders, and this the RSA did scrupulously. Though it had long wanted a national register and universal national service, it had campaigned actively for volunteers, and it heartily accepted Fraser as Prime Minister.

For instance, on 8 April the Christchurch executive declared that Fraser had already shown his courage and capacity, his appreciation of the needs of the country at war, and that he would not allow subversive elements to go unchecked. ‘Mr Fraser is our leader in this time of crisis. We stand or fall by him’. Press, 9 Apr 40, p. 6

On 22 May the central executive urged the government to meet the crisis with a national register and universal national service, and telegraphed its 90 branches to demand these things during the coming week, especially on 30 May. ‘The New Zealand Returned Services Association calls upon the people of New Zealand to stand to.’

eg, Southland Times, 23 May 40, p. 6

District bodies stood to with a will. In many places they called or took a leading part in meetings well before that date.

In Auckland a new body, the National Service Movement, sprang up. On 20 May its first public meeting, convened by B. H. Kingston, was attended by 300 people including returned soldiers, farmers, city businessmen and other representative citizens. Besides endorsing the RSA demands, it called for internment of all aliens and a war council under a ‘strong and driving personality’. It also set up a committee of 50 with power to co-opt.

NZ Herald, 21 May 40, p. 9

A further meeting, strongly advertised,

Such phrases as ‘This crisis demands your presence’, ‘Better to sweat ourselves now than be sweated by the Nazis for ever’, ‘A call for ACTION’, plus large photographs of Churchill with slogans from his speeches, struck a note of urgency and authority.

drew about 2000 on the morning of 23 May. The RSA had announced its active support of the Movement, which would endorse its own campaign for adequate pensions and rehabilitation of soldiers.

NZ Herald, 23 May 40, p. 13

This meeting, widely reported and unusually excited, declared its non-party basis and approved the recent home defence measures, but attacked the government for not leading the country into sacrifice and effort. The chairman, Moody, called for a national register, compulsory universal service, a national government, and a war council of the best brains, co-opted if need be. The Rev P. Gladstone Hughes,

Hughes, Rev Percy Gladstone (d 1949): b Wales; Presbyterian minister; Dom Pres LoN Union

a prominent Presbyterian, said that Fraser's speech had ‘left us cold and angry’, that Parliament should meet immediately, that sectional interests were behind the government's go-slow war effort. He was wildly applauded. Labour member F. W. Schramm, attacking Hitler, Communists and all lazy workers, promised to tell the Prime Minister all about the meeting, and Coates was suggested as Minister of Defence. Copies of the Movement's constitution and aims, given as the immediate summonsing of Parliament, a British-type cabinet, a war council of the best brains, and compulsory national service, plus support of the RSA's efforts to improve pensions, were to be circulated throughout the country, ‘many districts’ having expressed a desire to form similar organisations.

NZ Herald, 24 May 40, p. 9; Auckland Star, 23 May 40, p. 8

At Hamilton on 24 May a hurriedly convened meeting of 600– 1000 reiterated the demands of the National Service Movement and also wanted the internment of all enemy aliens, the protection of key positions and the suppression of all subversive propaganda. A returned soldier who interjected when the government was attacked, was ejected amid cries of ‘Communist’ and ‘Concentration camps’.

Waikato Times, 24, '25 May 40; NZ Herald, 25 May 40, p. 13

Meanwhile a remarkable surge of excitement was spreading through Taranaki and beyond. It was triggered off by the Hawera Rotary Club, disturbed by pamphlets urging that Britain should make peace.

Patea and Waverley Press, 24 May 40

On 21 May more than 50 Hawera citizens, representing trading, farming and professional interests, resolved that Parliament should be summoned immediately and a non-party government formed to intensify New Zealand's war effort. ‘There is no reason,’ said one speaker, ‘why a match struck in Hawera should not spread a flame throughout the whole of New Zealand.’

Hawera Star, 22 May 40

They forthwith sent envoys—‘flying squads’, the Taranaki Herald of 23 May called them—to all the towns between New Plymouth and Palmerston North urging them to hold public meetings in support of these resolutions, and to join in a mass deputation to the Prime Minister—by special train if possible—stressing that the will to serve and sacrifice was widespread but leadership was lacking. A telephone committee prepared mayors and a few citizens for the envoys, who in each town met the RSA and the business men to arrange public meetings a day or so later.

Evening Post, 22 May 40, p. 15; Taranaki Daily News, 22 May 40, p. 6; NZ Herald, 24 May 40, p. 9; Patea and Waverley Press, 24 May 40

By 23 May the Taranaki Daily News reported rapid progress: public meetings had been arranged throughout Taranaki, at Hamilton and Wanganui; an ‘organisation’ was established at Palmerston North and from there the movement had radiated to Dannevirke, Hastings, Napier, Levin and the Manawatu. It was stated that 500 members of the Defence League at Wellington would march to Parliament with the Taranaki visitors.

A coal shortage precluded the special train and on Friday 24 May the Prime Minister announced that Parliament would meet the following week to legislate on the lines of the Emergency Powers Defence Act just passed in Britain.

See p. 95

Most of the Taranaki meetings were held on that same day—at Waverley, Patea, Manaia, Opunake, Kaponga, Eltham, Stratford, Inglewood, Waitara, New Plymouth, Hawera—and where shops were closed they were impressively large. It was repeated that the movement did not attack the government but wished to inspire it to still further efforts. All meetings were prominently supported by the local RSA and almost all, besides calling for an immediate Parliament and an all-party War Cabinet, endorsed the RSA demand for compulsory universal national service. Many speakers urged that labour hours be extended and some were anxious about aliens and subversion, but these were not included in the motions. Though Nash had just broadcast that New Zealand had done everything Britain had asked, that more food was in store than there were ships to carry it and more volunteers in hand than could be trained, there was at these meetings strong feeling that more must be done. There was talk of being conquered—New Zealand would be a German colony, New Zealanders would not be allowed to walk on the footpath and would be known not by their names but by numbers. As Kaponga speakers put it, a feeling of shame was sweeping the country, easy times and good living must go, it was time to get down in the scrum and push.

Taranaki Daily News, 25 May 40, p. 9; Patea and Waverley Press, 24 May 40

Hawera's own meeting numbered 1000 people, but critical comment came in a letter from one of them. ‘The people who sponsored the meeting meant well, but there was an atmosphere of aimless panic about it all; the type of situation that often confronts a cattle drover when his charges get scary and commence what is known in cattle men's parlance as “ringing”’.

Taranaki Daily News, 28 May 40, p. 8

At Palmerston North, the Taranaki envoys found a very vigorous branch of the Defence League which on the 20th had expressed disappointment in the war effort, demanding a national government representing all sections, universal national service, and that all economic and other resources should be organised towards maximum war effort, controlled by a war cabinet of four. On the 23rd, a ‘vast audience reminiscent of election times’ repeated these demands, adding that the government should immediately deal with aliens and any disloyal elements. The tone was belligerent; speakers condemned the government as ‘wrapped in grave clothes’ and ‘colossally self-complacent’ about its inadequate war effort. Fraser's suggestion that the widespread call for a national government was being worked up for political ends was, declared the Mayor, insulting: the patriotism of the people transcended such petty things.

Palmerston NorthTimes, 24 May 40, p. 7

Nor did Fraser's proposal, on 26 May,

See p. 104

for an advisory representative war council and conscription of manpower and other resources ‘as required’ give satisfaction; further demands were telegraphed from Palmerston North—for total conscription and a war cabinet of unrestricted power, composed of Nash, Semple, Coates and Holland, with Fraser as chairman.

Evening Post, 27 May 40, p. 11; see pp. 106–7

A meeting arranged by the RSA at Feilding on the 25th called for conscription of manpower and material and a war cabinet of those most competent, whether inside the government or not, and representing all sections.

Palmerston NorthTimes, 27 May 40, p. 3

Woodville's meeting, which gave the RSA and Defence League as its begetters and the sounding of public opinion as its task, moved for compulsory national service and said that the government was not doing its job about increasing production and working hours, or about aliens.

Ibid., 25 May 40, p. 4

At Hastings ‘extensive ground work … by influential committees’ prepared for a mass meeting on the 27th, but it was cancelled after Fraser's weekend announcements.

Hawke's Bay Daily Mail, 24, 27 May 40, pp. 8, 7

Napier had no meeting though its paper gave accounts of those elsewhere.

At Wanganui, the Taranaki bearers of the fiery cross met both a strong RSA and the Dominion Farmers' Union conference, and together they raised a bonfire. The farmers on 23 May scrapped most of the agenda and instead demanded immediate conscription of all manpower and wealth (‘better to come out of this with only our shirts so long as we are still under the Union Jack’), internment of all enemy aliens and disloyal elements, a war cabinet representative of all sections, and abolition of the 40-hour week for the duration. Next morning many shops closed for an hour, the pipe band played, 200 returned men marched to the Opera House, followed by 100 Farmers' Union delegates, and 3000 people heard speeches stressing the national emergency and the need for unity. It was urged that the present war effort was a miserable failure and that if the government could not do better it should let someone else have a go. Attempted amendments by two Labour men were drowned by waves of cheering, booing and counting out, in which the Dominion's report on 25 May saw ‘remarkable evidence of the refusal by an overwhelming majority of New Zealanders to tolerate any discordant note in the demand for vigorous leadership and action in the present crisis’.

Dominion, 25 May 40, p. 16

Similar unanimity and enthusiasm occurred at a very vigorous RSA-sponsored meeting in Dunedin on Friday evening, 24 May, where 5000 attended,

Otago Daily Times, 25 May 40, p. 12

and at Christchurch where 400 met in the afternoon. Both these meetings pressed for total service and a non-party government; at the latter, which was convened by ‘citizens who have been prominent in the war effort … in response to a request from the North Island’ and which spoke of sending delegates to join the proposed North Island deputation to the Prime Minister, W. Machin,

Machin, William (1879–1958): b UK, to NZ 1919; Gen Mngr NZ Farmers' Co-op Assn 1926–39; Home Guard QM 1938–41; 1st chmn EPS Chch 1941–4

president of the Employers' Federation, made a very forthright attack on Nash.

Press, 25 May 40, p. 10

These seem to have been the main South Island meetings of the week, though many bodies meeting for normal purposes passed resolutions urging a national government, conscription, etc. On the 22nd at Blenheim 100 women, meeting for patriotic work, urged national service for both men and women as part of the home defence plan, with women filling the positions of Territorials at training.

NelsonEvening Mail, 23 May 40, p. 3

At Oamaru on the 24th about 100 citizens anxious to speed up the war effort persuaded the Mayor to call a public meeting on the 29th that would be ‘constructive and helpful’;

Auckland Star, 25 May 40, p. 17

by that date the Prime Minister's announcements had silenced the most urgent complaints, and the meeting was a rally calling for 100 per cent war effort—with conscription of manpower and of national resources, under national government.

Oamaru Mail, 30 May 40

At Wellington, criticism of the war effort came mostly from the right-wing People's Movement, founded at the end of November 1939. Adam Hamilton had remarked that its ideas were indistinguishable from those of the National party, except that it did not seem to know there was a war on,

Evening Post, 2 May 40, p. 13

while its leader, E. Toop,

Toop, Ernest Richard, CBE('65) (1895–1976): Wgtn City Council 13 years, Dep Mayor 3 years; Wgtn Harbour Bd 13 years, chmn 5 years

charged the National party with being inarticulate.

Evening Post, 4 May 40, p. 7

On 11 and 16 May, the Evening Post printed Toop's demands for immediate Parliament, compulsory military training and service for production, and a non-party war council of the best brains in the country. On 22 May Toop further suggested that the government's persistent inactivity was due to promises concerning conscription and other matters given to trade union leaders

Ibid., 22 May 40, p. 11

—an idea commonplace in National party circles. Wellington's Mayor on 25 May announced a public meeting about the war effort, universal service and a national war cabinet for the 28th, but later cancelled it.

This survey of the week's meetings, while not complete, may show the truth of the Opposition's claim that they were spontaneous expressions of public opinion; indeed they were not arranged by the National party as such, nor addressed by Nationalist members— save at Tauranga where F. W. Doidge told 1000 people, who demanded conscription and a national government, that the Prime Minister could best serve the State by giving up his office.

Dominion, 27 May 40, p. 11

But there were also grounds for Labour's view that these meetings were organised by anti-Labour persons, and the RSA was clearly involved in most of them.

In response some Labour bodies

Exec Council ASRS, Evening Post, 23 May 40, p. 13; Wanganui Rlwy Workshops, Wanganui Herald, 23 May 40, p. 8; Otahuhu and Hillside ASRS, exec P & T Employees' Assn, NZ Herald, 25 May 40, p. 13; Addington Rlwy Workshops, Press, 30 May, p. 8; Hutt Rlwy Workshops, Evening Post, 31 May 40, p. 8; Taranaki Trades Council, Taranaki Daily News, 24 May 40, p. 8; New Plymouth LRC and Wellington district sections of NZ Workers Union, Evening Post, 27 May 40, p. 11; exec Westland branch of NZ Timber Workers Union, Chch Sth and Shirley branches of Lab Party, Press, 28 May 40, p. 8; Waitara Freezing Workers, Taranaki Daily News, 31 May 40, p. 8; Blenheim Engineering and Allied Trades, Marlborough Express, 8 Jun 40; Canty Freezing Works and Related Trades, Press, 11 Jun 40, p. 12; Wairarapa Trades Council, Wairarapa Times–Age, 28 May 40

published motions of confidence in the government's war effort, and deplored scaremongering and attempts by the ‘exploiting sections’ to use the war to obtain conscription and coalition, to press against the 40-hour week and working conditions. Inevitably these appeared both frail and stubborn among the reportings of dissatisfaction. Some defence came from the Chamber of Commerce. Several branches had been prompt in demanding abolition of the 40-hour week, a national government and immediate calling of Parliament.

eg, NZ Herald, 21 May 40, p. 11; Gisborne Herald, 22 May 40, p. 6; Evening Post, 22 May 40, p. 6; Otago Daily Times, 22 May 40, p. 6

But on 23 May W. S. MacGibbon,

MacGibbon, William Smith, OBE('52) (1890–1962): b Scotland, educ NZ; Pres Assoc Chambers of Commerce 1940

president of the Associated Chambers, when about to lead a deputation to the Prime Minister, made a very moderate statement pressing for a war cabinet or national government, for conscription and universal service. He complained that the country did not know what was being done and, while allowing that those in charge were sincere, doubted if ministers in charge of departments could give the undivided attention needed by the war effort; he added that the country was fortunate in having a Prime Minister who gave co-operation and help and was receptive to what was said to him—a note very different from the widespread scolding that Fraser received that week. He concluded: ‘Do not allow in the Dominion anything of panic. There has been a suggestion in some centres that there should be a march on Parliament House perhaps to force the Government to do something. I say we are a democracy and must not have anything out of sympathy with democracy. We must have law and order and not get panicky. It is not British to do so.’

Press, 23 May 40, p. 8

Newspapers in the main solidly advocated coalition, conscription, universal service and a vastly more vigorous war effort, but a few minor editorial voices advised more precision and less noise. Thus the Dannevirke Evening News on 23 May remarked that neither farmers nor workers had shared in arranging Dannevirke's public meeting, but only business men, executives and the RSA. Further, did people realise that they would have to surrender a lot if the government acted on their requests for compulsory national service and organisation of the country's economic resources? The Wanganui Herald on 24 May, after commenting that such widespread public outcry had not been heard since the bad Depression days of the Coalition government, pointed out that rousing sentiment had replaced reasoned statement and that farmers' unions, chambers of commerce and the RSAs had been advocating conscription without being clear whether it was for overseas service or for home defence. Meanwhile trade unions were busy talking of no conscription of manpower without conscription of wealth, and again no one had defined what this meant.

On Sunday 26 May the Prime Minister broadcast plans for civil, military and financial national service ‘as required’. Each step, as needed, would be taken by Order-in-Council with proper consideration and organisation; the government realised the need for mighty effort. He also proposed a representative war council, of the six cabinet ministers most concerned with war, three members of the Opposition, and representatives of industrialists, employers, trade unions and farmers. It would have powers necessary to keep the war effort at its maximum, and joint sessions of cabinet and war council would be held when needed.

The government had out-manoeuvred its critics. The RSA declared its support, though the Dunedin branch, always dour, demurred.

Otago Daily Times, 29 May 40, p. 6

The Taranaki surge was spent. The government's political opponents found that their reproaches, their cries of emergency, had prodded the government into taking increased powers, in which they themselves would have only a limited share. Labour traditionalists were placated: they could believe that conscription of manpower and of wealth were bracketed, while the anathema coalition was not conceded.

The Emergency Regulations Amendment Act, authorising regulations that would place persons and property in the hands of the State, passed without division on Friday 31 May, while the BEF was fighting back to Dunkirk. On 3 June, while the Navy and the little ships were taking off thousands of empty-handed Allied troops,

In the main exodus from Dunkirk, 26 May–4 June, 338 226 men were taken to England; 27 936 had already gone. Roskill, S. W., The War at Sea 1939–1945, vol I, pp. 216, 227, 239, 603

emergency Labour conferences met in Wellington, called to ratify, not to debate, major changes in government policy. In crisis-laden tones, Fraser stressed the dreadful and sudden changes that were going on, changes that had sent some people into a panic, fanned by Labour's political opponents; he said that the government could cope with the war only if given a completely free hand (including the question of forming a national government);

Evening Post, 4 Jun 40, p. 9

its supporters must sacrifice some of their hard-won privileges. It was now as wrong to boggle about holidays or overtime as to haggle over profits. Since wealth as well as manpower was being conscripted, there was no break with traditional policy. There had been no time to call conferences before taking action, it was a question not of days but of hours—‘Our duty was clear. We either had to lead the people in the hour of crisis or give place to others.’ James Roberts, president of the Labour party, repeated the message: unless the delegates gave their own government the mandate it asked for, another government would take its place and such powers would be forced upon them. These warnings and the logic of events carried the conferences. With the condition that none should profit unfairly from the sacrifices of the workers which would be for the wartime only, they promised full support for conscription ‘as required’ of wealth and manpower. The Federation of Labour's voting was 275:50, the Labour party's 903:100.

Standard, 6 Jun 40, pp. 1, 2; Minutes of Emergency Conference, NZ Labour Party, 3 Jun 40

Meanwhile, the Parliamentary Opposition had rejected the proposed war council as no real coalition, a sop, an attempt to acquire their support without giving them enough power to represent those behind them effectively. As the Greymouth Evening Star of 28 May put it, ‘The suspicion is general that pressure may be brought to bear on the Labour Government, by prominent supporters, to adopt a policy calling for conscription of wealth more than for conscription of men.’ The press in general—with the powerful exceptions of Truth on 29 May and the New Zealand Tablet on 5 June—declared that the coalition offered was quite inadequate: measures so far-reaching demanded the wholehearted response of the entire community, and could not be carried by a party representing about 55 per cent of the electorate and tied to pledges made in peace time. All pointed to the British example, not yet a month old, declaring that the all-party Cabinet there had instantly created unity from top to toe. A cartoon in the Auckland Star of 28 May showed a small war council trailer behind a cabinet limousine, with Fraser, wrench in hand, worrying over the tow rope, while Voice of the People thundered, ‘Stop monkeying about, Peter—you must all ride together.’ Minhinnick's Fraser, his back turned to symbols of British national government, gazed into his Labour looking-glass saying, ‘Magnificent! I salute it! But it's not politics’.

NZ Herald, 21 May 40, p. 8; Evening Post, 23 May 40, p. 13; Southland Times, 25 May 40, p. 6

The New Zealand Herald, on 28, 29 and 31 May, collected and summarised resolutions from sundry bodies throughout the country, such as the Rotorua Chamber of Commerce, the New Zealand Manufacturers' Federation, the South Island Dairy Association and several local farmers' unions. These maintained, with varying intensity, that both the situation itself and the far-reaching emergency regulations required full coalition.

NZ Herald, 28, 29, 31 May 40, pp. 9, 11, 10

The Dominion president of the Farmers' Union, W. W. Mulholland,

Mulholland, Sir William, Kt('56), OBE('46) (1887–1971): Dom Pres Farmers' Union 1936–44, Pres Fed Farmers 1945–6; fdtn member NZ Royal Agricultural Soc

said that if Fraser did not now lead the country into real unity, he would face the same position as had Chamberlain in Britain.

Otago Daily Times, 29 May 40, p. 6

At a special East Coast meeting, one speaker said, ‘I do not say that a Coalition Government will be better than the Government of the present time, but it will inspire confidence.’

Gisborne Herald, 30 May 40, p. 6

The Wairoa Harbour Board also demanded, lengthily, a government holding the confidence of all electors.

Wairoa Star, 5 Jun 40

A newspaper correspondent, H. Kitson,

Kitson, Henry (1882–1959): chmn Employers Fed 1940; local govt and bds member; HQ Southern Military District 1942–5

who had chaired the public meeting at Christchurch, wrote that if there were to be only a ‘nebulous War Cabinet’ the Opposition should walk out and find more useful occupation.

Press, 28 May 40, p. 14

Palmerston North's special committee, headed by the Mayor, thought the new proposals insufficient.

See p. 100

In Invercargill, 145 business firms petitioned Fraser for coalition: while endorsing his proposals for action, they wanted ‘an heroic Prime Minister and Government that will devote itself to the formation of a national Government which will truly represent each and every class in the Dominion and devote itself to victory.’

Southland Times, 31 May 40, p. 4

The most strident demands came from the new-born National Service Movement. On 27 and 28 May full-page advertisements in the Auckland papers declared that three objects of the Movement, rejected by the government seven days earlier, were now promised— immediate calling of Parliament, national service, and a non-party war council. Three demands remained: non-party coalition government, internment of aliens, and removal of anomalies in the pensions of present soldiers. The meetings set for 28 May were postponed at Auckland and at country centres, but further announcements would follow. A women's branch was enthusiastically formed on 27 May, mainly to support the coalition drive, but it also advocated internment of aliens and discussed taking on men's jobs.

Auckland Star, 28 May 40, p. 11

On 4 June a meeting of 3000 in the Auckland Town Hall responded to the question, ‘Do you want a lead and a leader?’ with cries of ‘Gordon Coates’. Speakers demanded a coalition thinking of victory not votes; a non-party war cabinet with full powers; compulsory national service and equality of sacrifice, speedy suppression of all subversion, ‘Communist, Nazi, Pacifist or just plain disloyalty’; justice and proper protection for the men, women and children of New Zealand who would fight or suffer in the war.

NZ Herald, 5 Jun 40, p. 12

These demands were also printed in widely distributed leaflets, which gave the Movement's purpose as: ‘one people, one aim, one voice, united action on the part of a loyal and determined people bent on giving all and doing all to win the war’.

Auckland Star, 15 Jun 40, p. 12

At Pukekohe on 10 June, the Rev Gladstone Hughes and another National Service speaker from Auckland spoke to about 500 people, who passed the usual motions for coalition, conscription and internment.

NZ Herald, 11 Jun 40, p. 9

The Morrinsville branch on 11 June held a public meeting, with shops closed for it, chaired by the Mayor and forebodingly addressed by Hughes.

Morrinsville Star, 7, 11 Jun 40

Two days later at Rotorua an enthusiastic meeting of nearly 200 called by the local Chamber of Commerce, with two speakers from Auckland, formed a branch of the Movement.

NZ Herald, 14 Jun 40, p. 9

On 13 June the Auckland chairman, B. H. Kingston, declared the Movement's growing impatience for unified control of the war effort, but on the 15th the Attorney-General, H. G. R. Mason,

Mason, Hon Henry Greathead Rex, CMG('67), QC (1885–1975): MP (Lab) Eden, Auck Suburbs, Waitakere 1926–66; Attorney-General, Min Justice 1935–49, 1957–60, Min Education 1940–7, Native Affairs 1943–6, Health 1957–60

said that the Movement must dissolve. Its intentions might be very good, but it was starting up the path which Hitler's organisation had taken. Its propaganda, with an ‘indefinable expanding range of aims’, showed it likely to become a body rivalling constitutional authority, with an irresponsible committee deriving power from mob violence.

Auckland Star, 15 Jun 40, p. 10

Later in Parliament Mason reviewed leaflets giving these aims and giving also the impression that the Movement was getting and would get things done. Further, a circular asking for ‘say, £ donation and £ 1 per week’ at the discretion of the donor suggested permanence, and another envisaged a very large organisation: should an emergency arise calling for any form of activity within minutes of a telephone call or telegram from the centre ‘the whole of New Zealand would be placed in motion, you in your area playing your part with the rest of the nation’. Mason said that the Movement's publicity man was just putting too much energy and combativeness into his job, but large advertisements could in excited times quickly work up troublesome emotion.

NZPD, vol 257, pp. 235–6

There were some protests from Adam Hamilton and from some newspapers,

Auckland Star, 15, 17 Jun 40, pp. 8, 6; Evening Post, 17, 20 Jun 40, pp. 6, 5; NZ Herald, 17 Jun 40, p. 6

saying that the government's judgment in this matter had astounded and distressed many worthy people and that it would be better employed chasing the Fifth Column. The Movement advertised a meeting of badge-wearing supporters on 17 June to discuss the government's action, but cancelled it after telephone talks with the Prime Minister that warned of police action.

At Te Awamutu, a meeting to express dissatisfaction, set for 17 June, whose promoters claimed to have no association with any organisation, was postponed indefinitely in view of the government banning ‘a similar meeting which was to have been held in Auckland today.’ Te Awamutu Courier, 17 Jun 40

Expressing dismay at such misunderstanding, it rapidly amended its aims to general zest for the war effort and the establishment by constitutional means of a united representative government.

NZ Herald, 17, 27 Jun 40, pp. 6, 11

By 19 June the Observer could write: ‘the Government's little brush with the National Service Movement seems to have been just a piece of harmless shadow sparring with a happy ending for everyone, except perhaps for those who would have tried to use the Movement as a screen for political attack on the Government.’ The Evening Post on 15 June explained that in Australia a somewhat similar unofficial movement, ‘a sixth column’ encroaching on the duties of police and defence authorities, had ‘raced like a bush fire’ to an alleged membership of 30 000 and mass meetings before being frowned upon by the Federal Prime Minister.

Evening Post, 15 Jun 40, p. 13

The Movement withered quickly. Its offer in early July to load a ship that watersiders were reported unwilling to work after midnight proved unnecessary.

NZ Herald, 6 Jul 40, p. 13

In mid-July newspaper correspondence showed that when the War Cabinet was formed, some Movement members, including Kingston, the Auckland chairman, were satisfied,

Ibid., 18, 23, 30 Jul 40

while others, including Gladstone Hughes, wanted a ‘new movement to convert the parody of national unity expressed by the War Cabinet into a real unity.’

Ibid., 19, 20, 22, 24, 27 Jul 40

In August the Movement turned its attention to physical culture classes to improve the fitness of civilians,

Ibid., 8, 9 Aug 40, pp. 11, 8

while the women's section arranged itself in groups concerned with clerical training, knitting and sewing for patriotic purposes, soldiers' wives, journalism, anti-waste, and canteen work; also a spinning circle to revive interest in an ancient craft and to ease the knitting wool shortage.

Ibid., 16 Jul, 10, 29 Aug, 24 Sep, 5 Oct 40, pp. 11, 17, 4, 11, 16

With the principle of conscription conceded, and even a narrow place offered to the talents of business and property, the edge was taken off the National party argument and now the urgency of the moment swung behind the government's proposals; to stand out for larger powers looked like party politics at the war's expense. The manoeuvrings about the War Council and the War Cabinet are told elsewhere.

Wood, pp. 139–42

Here it can be noted that a War Council concerned with production for war, war finance and emergency regulations, was announced on 18 June: six cabinet ministers, one representative of the farmers, one of employers, two trade union men, four returned soldiers (one a Maori) and an independent member of Parliament— National party members had refused places.

Ministers on the War Council were P. Fraser (Prime Minister), W. Nash (Finance), F. Jones (Defence), D. G. Sullivan (Supply) and R. Semple (National Service), with P. C. Webb (Labour) and W. L. Martin (Agriculture) alternating at meetings according to their topics. Other members were W. W. Mulholland, president of the Farmers' Union; C. C. Davis, of the Employers Federation; R. Eddy, president of the NZ Workers Union; A. McLagan, president of the Federation of Labour; W. Perry, president of NZRSA; E. T. Tirikatene MP, returned soldiers, representing the Maori people; Sir Andrew Russell and L. G. Lowry MP, returned soldiers, appointed by the government; H. Atmore, Independent member for Nelson. Evening Post, 18 June 40, p. 8

This became merely an advisory body when further negotiations led in mid-July to a War Cabinet of Fraser, Nash, Jones, Hamilton and Coates to handle war matters, while Labour's Cabinet retained control of the rest of the country's affairs. Nationalist interests, having exerted as much pressure as they reasonably could, accepted both the emergency and its compromise, while hoping for more in the future—the Chamber of Commerce, for instance, while welcoming the War Cabinet, hoped that it would be the forerunner of a national government.

NZ Herald, 18 Jul 40, p. 8

Meanwhile, during all this expression and creation of public opinion, the enlistment figures more quietly reflected the views of the men actually involved. During April and the Norway campaign 726 men enlisted weekly. This rate was falling slightly by the end of the month: 1232 in the fortnight ending on 11 May. With the attack on the western front it quickened; 928 joined up in that week and 1339 in the week ending 25 May, when the agitation for conscription and coalition reached its peak, making a total of 38 399 enlistments before conscription was promised. Thereafter, with the French news growing worse, between two and three thousand volunteered weekly, the highest number, 3480, being for the week ending 29 June, when France had capitulated and it had been announced that volunteering would end on 22 July. In the last week, 3087 anticipated conscription by signing up, with 1947 more on the final day, Monday 22nd. At that date volunteers for 2NZEF, including the Maori Battalion's 4103, numbered 63 740.

Ibid., 24, 29 Jul 40, pp. 8, 6

Many who volunteered for the Air Force but failed to meet its exacting physical requirements, enlisted in the Army, and the Prime Minister on 19 September 1940 gave the total registered for voluntary service with the NZEF as 65 063. By then more than 16 000 had volunteered for the Air Force, and nearly 3000 were already serving in the Navy.

Auckland Star, 19 Sep 40, p. 15; other figures in this paragraph are from weekly totals published in most newspapers

For the mercy of Dunkirk and other evacuations, whence between 20 May and 26 June 1940 a total of 558 032 troops were ferried across the Channel,

Roskill, vol I, p. 239. Of these, 189 541 were Allied troops, the rest British

there was deep thankfulness. It was something to set against the shattering realisation, in the days that followed, that the French, who last time had slogged out four stubborn years, were now crumpling in less than six weeks. Newspapers were restrained: the headlines were big and bad, the reports of attack and defeat were confused and confounding, but hopeful notes were sounded where possible; the German radio paid tribute to the fighting quality of the British; the morale and courage of the French forces were high and they had withdrawn without being encircled. It was stressed that the Allies were fighting back steadily against tremendous odds, against millions of men and thousands of tanks, thrown in reckless of loss, that German gains were made at enormous cost, that the enemy would soon exhaust his effort and find his lines of communication too long; that staying power would count. On 13 June the headlines declared that Paris would never submit; two days later Paris, an open city, received the invaders, her leaders seeing no worthwhile reason for risking her destruction; Reynaud,

Reynaud, Paul, GCVO(Hon) (1878–1966): French statesman; PM 1940, 1946–8

the premier who talked of last ditch fighting from North Africa, was replaced by Marshal Pétain,

Pétain, Marshal Philippe (1856–1951): French soldier/statesman; Gen-in-Chief 1917; Sec War 1934; Chief French State 1940–44

the 84-year-old veteran of Verdun, who on 18 June sought an armistice.

Now, more even than in the first days of the war, ‘the news’ dominated conversation, people waited at their doors for the paper, hung about the radio—a Waikato man complained to his Primary Producer Council that the frequent BBC broadcasts from Daventry were affecting production, as farmers instead of working remained at home, hoping that something fresh would be announced.

Evening Post, 26 Jun 40, p. 6

There was awe, dismay, apprehension, but no widespread sense that France's fall was any more than the fall of France. Nor was there any immediate railing against France in the daily papers or radio—sorrow not anger was the note. At first editors, as in the crises of September '38 and March '39, shook their heads but passed no judgment; it was too large a matter, too much was obviously not known. Leading articles merely warned that it all showed how close the war was, how necessary that all energy should be directed towards it. Churchill's effort to rally French resistance by a solemn act of union between the two countries, which failed almost before it was heard of, did not sink deeply into New Zealand consciousness. Papers gave prominence to the messages of the King (5 June), of Fraser (14 June), of the British Government (15 June), and of Churchill (18 June), all speaking of French heroism, fortitude and devotion, which had been praised by many lesser witnesses at Dunkirk and after. A terrible misfortune had fallen on a valiant people and the size of the disaster measured the might of the enemy. Press and radio gave forth and echoed the words of Churchill, powerful, restrained oratory that contained the emotions of the moment.

The news from France is very bad. I grieve for the gallant French people who have fallen into this terrible misfortune. Nothing will alter our feeling towards them or our faith that the genius of the French will rise again.

What has happened in France makes no difference to the British faith and purpose. We have become the sole champions now in arms to defend the world cause. We shall do our best to be worthy of that high honour. We shall defend our island….

But sympathy was soon overrun by anger. On 19 June the New Zealand Herald and other papers quoted a BEF correspondent who wrote that a huge confederacy of spies and Fifth Column agents had beaten France, and that the nation was as rotten as an old tree inside; such reports continued, and the resurgence of Laval was viewed with misgiving. On the morning of 24 June, with the armistice terms not fully known, the Christchurch Press, more restrained than many papers, said ‘It is a betrayal, but more pitiful than infamous.’ Later that day, when the terms were declared, all remaining sorrow turned to anger, and editors thundered all over the country. The Press (25 June) declared that Pétain's government must be charged not merely with deserting an ally but with becoming an accomplice of the enemy. France, conceding every conceivable point, had openly and shamelessly betrayed her British ally, said the New Zealand Herald. The Evening Post (24 June) held that the Pétain government's contract with Hitler ‘is a breach of faith that admits of no denial and of no extenuation. Within the bounds of common morality that Government is left without a feather to fly with …’, while the Otago Daily Times (25 June) stated that France, without suffering a final defeat on the field, possessing a great empire and a powerful ally, had, through the panic precipitancy of the government, been forced into an undertaking which spelled degradation and servitude for a whole proud people, and had become ‘an unprotesting agent’ against Britain. Everywhere it was seen that France had made itself a springboard for the attack on Britain with no attempt at the scorched earth policy by which the Russians in 1812 and the Chinese at present fighting Japan snatched the fruits of victory from the invader. The French fleet was supposed to be demobilised and interned, but Germany and Italy would use it, as they saw fit, to defend the coast of France; the thin pretence that French ships would not act on German orders comforted no one.

There was no recognition that France with her armies in full retreat and her population confused and helpless had only her fleet to bargain with, and that only by compromising was she able to obtain any independence. Editors concluded that, by agreeing virtually to collaborate against Britain, France had won dubious secret promises of better terms following German victory.

Several papers at the same time published the Daventry report of the Dunedin Rhodes Scholar, journalist Geoffrey Cox,

Cox, Sir Geoffrey, Kt('66), CBE('59) (1910–): Rhodes Scholar 1932; foreign & war correspondent 1936–40; 1st Sec & Charge d'Affaires, NZ Legation Washington 1942–3; dep chmn Yorkshire TV UK; Dir Tyne–Tees and Trident TVs UK

telling how the ministers, then at Bordeaux (but soon to move to Vichy, which gave its name to the French collaborationist government), outvoted premier Reynaud, the fierce little fighter, and installed Pétain, the ancient hero of Verdun, to sue for peace. Everywhere, he said, was the spirit of defeat; France was weary from the last war and the years since of struggle between Left and Right. The tired-eyed, drooping Pétain epitomised this weariness and the reluctance to face again the slaughter of Verdun. A cartoon by Minhinnick, ‘The Hollow Tree’, appeared in several papers, showing a great fallen tree cracked through at its base, hollow and black within. Waving his small ‘Blitzkrieg’ axe and shouting ‘I did it with my little hatchet’, Hitler stands over a shallow cut in the trunk, with monkey-Mussolini peering from behind.

NZ Herald, 27 Jun 40, Southland Times, 2 Jul 40

Articles and reports from various overseas papers were published, so that while all agreed on treachery and betrayal from within, accounts of the forces and interests behind these evils differed widely. Thus about 26 June it was copiously reported from the Chicago Daily News that breakdown was due to the Belgian collapse, plus treachery, inefficiency and graft in France. Early in July The Times supplied the view that lack of foresight, fear of responsibility, divided counsels, outmoded military thinking, and inability to understand Nazi intentions had brought France to her knees. Hindsight makes it clear that from this time ‘Maginot-thinking’ became anathema; never again would a people deceive itself that a fixed, defensive wall could protect a nation.

The ‘slothful orgies’

NZ Herald, 18 Jun 40, p. 6

of Blum's Popular Front regime of 1936– 8 were widely named as the basic evil. Both the New Zealand Tablet of 26 June and the Otago Daily Times of 3 July repeated a Sydney Bulletin article which laid the blame on Communists and the Popular Front's 40-hour week, with its diminished production of armaments, especially aircraft, and the squandering of French weapons in the Spanish war which had aligned Italy with the enemy. This view was repeated by the Tablet on 10 July. It was independently set forth, minus the Spanish details, on 15 August by the Southland Times, which concluded that following the labour troubles of 1938 ‘the French nation was like a building riddled with borer. The ultimate collapse was by no means surprising. Communism is hand in glove with the Nazis’. Zealandia, on 11 July, repeated the cry ‘Le communisme, voila l'ennemi!’ and warned against Moscow-drugged minds which attributed the collapse to pro-Fascist politicians. In the House on 12 July F. W. Doidge claimed that France had been reduced to helplessness because Blum, like the Labour government in New Zealand, repeatedly made concessions to militant unions. Fraser replied that this was ‘sheer tripe’ and ‘misrepresentation of one of the finest men France has ever had and one who is suffering today.’

NZPD, vol 257, p. 489

Readers of Truth

Truth, 10 Jul, 7 Aug 40, both p. 14

were told that the betrayal was planned long before the war by Bonnet,

Bonnet, George Étienne (1889–1973): French politician; Min Finance 1933–4, 1937–8; Ambassador USA 1937; Min State 1938, Foreign Aff 1938–40; member Nat Council 1941

Flandin

Flandin, Pierre Étienne (1889–1958): French politician; Min Finance 1931–2, 1932, Public Works 1934, Foreign Aff 1940–1; PM 1934–5; 5-year sentence for collaboration 1946; Leader Left Republican Party pre-war

and Laval, who disliked the Left more than they disliked Hitler, and that high officers contributed to domination by philo-Germans. This view was also put forward by the Hawke's Bay Daily Mail:

Hawke's Bay Daily Mail, 9, 11 Jul 40, both p. 7, quoting the British magazine Cavalcade

factors contributing to France's fall were ‘the purblind interests of big money and a pathological fear in certain high places of impending social upheaval.’

Censorship was also given as a cause. France, blinkered by official secrecy and press censorship, had stumbled to inevitable disaster, said the Otago Daily Times,

Otago Daily Times, 11 Jul 40, p. 12, quoting the SydneyDaily Telegraph of 3 Jul 40

adding the Manchester Guardian's warning that if the British press became merely the mouthpiece of official news and opinion it would begin treading a path that notably contributed to the ruin of France. The menace of the ‘Maginot mind’ was discussed, linked with the false calm induced by censorship which hid disaster till the last moment.

Otago Daily Times, 13 Jul 40, p. 17

The Auckland Star

Auckland Star, 15 Aug 40, p. 14

explained that France had suppressed unpleasant truths and encouraged pleasant falsehood; the New Zealand Financial Times

NZ Financial Times, Sep 40, p. 388, quoting the Economist

said: ‘rumour breeds best in a vacuum; and to take the tragic lesson of France again, our nearest Allies fell to pieces largely because they were not told what was happening.’

These scattered, desultory opinions, however, occupied little space. Having poured forth its wrath in one burst, the press in the main dropped France very quickly. It was clearly no use to cry over spilt milk, clearly impolitic to dwell on military and moral disaster. By 28 June 1940 Japanese foreign policy and New Zealand's budget had driven France from the centre pages. It returned for a few days early in July when Britain as a last resort took action against part of the French fleet at Oran, action which, although some ships escaped to Toulon, could be rated as a much-needed victory, removing the threat of a German-controlled French fleet in the Mediterranean. It was even suggested that Britain was better off without France. For instance: ‘Our task becomes clearer,’ said Truth. ‘At last we fight our own war, hopefully blotting out Essen, Hamburg, Kiel, Boulogne, Havre, Brest or any other German strongholds.’

Truth, 10 Jul 40, p. 14

Churchill's words were echoed: Britain had left the slough at the bottom of the hill, and was toiling slowly upwards morally and physically far better equipped, despite the loss of allies, to meet the Nazi menace than it had been a year before.

Wanganui Herald, 3 Sep 40, p. 6

In a few months cables and articles began to appear explaining that the French people, distinct from their government at Vichy, desired British victory, accepted the leadership of de Gaulle,

de Gaulle, General Charles André Joseph Marie (1890–1970): French politician, soldier; Chief Free French, then Pres National Committee 1940–2; Pres Committee National Liberation Algiers 1943, Provisional Government French Republic & Head Chief of Armies 19