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Obituaries
and Environment, Administration Services and some other management initiatives. In 1998 Ian decided to take early retirement and in July left the company after 36 years’ service. He and Christine moved to Napier where their retirement project was to become perfect parents and grandparents - in which they were spectacularly successful. The All Black’s Player Statistics site (courtesy of Old Boys’ University RFC), quotes Ian as Only 10st 9lb (67kg) and 5' 8" (1.73m) he had a deceptive gliding run which, combined with moving in or out to take a pass, enabled him to make many openings. After a term on the Club Committee (1962-64) he coached the 1st XV from 1975-78 and was the Club's representative on the NZ Universities Rugby Football Council until the end of 1986. He was an Auckland Colts selector 1974. Ian played for Wellington 1961-65 and 1968, Auckland 1966, Bay of Plenty 1967, in NZ trials 1963, 1965 and 1967, NZU 1963 and 1965. The overall calibre of the Club's teams had started to decline before he took over. Ian had a quiet, thoughtful approach to the game and to his role as a coach. Educated at Wellington College (1st XV 1959) and Head Prefect (1959), he came of a rugby family. His grandfather George played for Otago 1901 and North Otago 190311 while father Kenneth represented Otago 1932, 34, NZ Universities 1933 and played cricket for Otago, Wellington and the South Island. He won the Redpath Cup in 1938 as top batsman and was coach of the Jubilee Cup winning Victoria University rugby teams in 1950's. Blair Wingfield (1955-1959), lifelong friend, team mate at College and University, Shell Oil colleague and Best Man at Ian and Tink’s wedding recalls when they both played their first game for the 1st XV on the bottom field. It was against the much vaunted unbeaten championship leaders Varsity 3rd 1st team with Sam Rolleston on the wing and Mick Williment at Fullback. In that same year Mick, straight out of 3rd grade, went onto play in the Wellington Senior Rep team. Well we won the match with Ian scoring the first try in the Headmaster's House corner and the late Peter Mahon kicking a drop goal from a ‘mark’ from a 25 drop out. It was always exciting to watch Ian slide into a gap with his markers thinking that they could turn and catch him. It never happened, he was just too quick, The Lampstand | 2015
with either Ian scoring the try or his outsides getting the touchdown. As a first-five-eight in the 1st XV, Ian had rapid acceleration from a standing start and this often enabled him to glide past opposition players. What a thrill it was when Ian became an All Black and again when he scored the try for Wellington against the '65 Boks. Ian's sister Sue was married to the late Keith Sturrock (1956-1060) another outstanding WCOB. BOB WOOD Wellington College: 1928-1930
R
obin (Bob1) Wood was an Old Boy who typified an impressive generation of New Zealand WW II veterans, whose resilience, optimism and enduring humour somehow set them apart. He died in February 2015, aged 100, in Coffs Harbour on the New South Wales north coast. In his long and active life, Bob gave much back to the community after the hardship of war. He helped establish and maintain a 19th Battalion Memorial on the Cashmere Hills in Christchurch, with friends, such as Charles Upham,VC and bar. In Sydney where he lived for many years, he was involved in the early days of Birthright, the support organisation for war widows and families and maintained close links with fellow veterans, including the famous Wellington-born Resistance fighter Nancy Wake. Bob was a long standing member of the New Zealand Sub-branch of the Returned and Services League of Australia (NSW) in Sydney and as President, often led the WW II veterans’ contingent to Martin Place on ANZAC Day. He was involved with plans to commemorate in bronze, a Kiwi soldier at one end of Sydney’s ANZAC Bridge, dedicated in 2008. Bob Wood was one of the ‘first in - last out’ of WW II, having joined the Special Force in Wellington in September 1939. He embarked for Egypt with what became the 19th Battalion in the first echelon leaving in January 1940 and was commissioned in 1941. He saw action in the desert campaigns, until his capture after fierce fighting at Ruweisat Ridge in July 1942. His fellow Prisoners of War included ‘Tiny’ Armour, whose father was Headmaster in Bob’s day and several other Old Boys in Campo PG 47 Modena, Italy, among them my father. When confusion reigned in the camp after the Armistice was
signed and options given to leave or stay, Bob and two friends made a space in the roof of their barracks by climbing up a pipe and began leaving food and water in a bid to escape.
funeral, Phil Wood remembered his father as honest, forthright, funny, hard-working and generous. As a keen fly fisherman, he taught his boys the value of patience. Be a stayer, not a sprinter.
As the final batch of POWs was being transferred to other camps in Germany, Bob and a Christchurch friend, Hugh Flower remained for two days in the roof in extreme heat, with brief forays out. Finding that the wire was cut on the wall at the rear of their hut, and expecting a bullet at any time, they disappeared into the night, on a journey south of about 600km and three months through central Italy, across the Apennines as winter loomed.
Bob Wood had joined the AMP in Wellington from College in 1931 aged 16½, ‘in a new suit and with a touch of Brilliantine’. Managerial positions followed in Wangaratta, Victoria, then Melbourne, Christchurch, Sydney and as Chief Manager, UK until Bob retired from Head Office, Sydney in 1978. His memoirs were recorded in an in-house journal, Keep in Touch, with what a former colleague, John Lewis, called his inimitable wit, style and grace.
Friendly Italians sometimes sheltered and fed them and they stayed in barns, often with livestock, and in caves. They cautiously avoided towns and at times encountered other POWs on the move. Finally British commandos met them on an ice-covered ridge and escorted them to a base occupied by a New Zealand unit near Palombaro, in Abruzzo. Bob by now weighed 7 stone (44kg) and being deemed unfit for further service, was sent home to New Zealand via Egypt in December 1943. Bob Wood was one of the few escaped prisoners to return to active service after some months on furlough. He returned to Italy for the remainder of the war as Company Commander, promoted to the rank of Major with the 22nd Battalion Armoured Brigade. In 1945, he joined the POW Repatriation Unit in Margate, Kent and married his English fiancée Lyn in London. Lyn had herself survived an intrepid journey by vehicle overland from England to India via Afghanistan in the 1930s, with her then husband and another couple. Both men died of cholera in India. Bob and Lyn returned to Wellington and had two sons, Errol and Phil, now both living in Bellingen, New South Wales.
Bob remained a proud Kiwi and told Lewis after his move to Sawtell, NSW that on a good day, he could see New Zealand. And on a very good day, he could see the All Blacks giving the Aussies another beating. In August 2013, the New Zealand Veterans in NSW (WW II, Korea and Vietnam) celebrated at the Sydney Maori Anglican Fellowship Church of Te Wairua Tapu, Redfern. Frank Harlow from Taranaki (on Crete when the Germans dropped 6,000 paratroopers on Allied positions) had turned 100 the day before and Bob 99, the day after. Both were bestowed with a korowai, (feathered cloak) and a birthday cake. The occasion also marked the 75th anniversary of the New Zealand Sub-Branch of the RSL (NSW). Bob’s 100th birthday was suitably celebrated in Sawtell last August with a large gathering of family and friends. He was interviewed for the Saturday programme on Radio New Zealand National by Kim Hill on 30 June 2012. When she signed off she said, And that was Bob Wood, 97 going on 98. Bob added: And still dangerous! Rosanne Robertson, Family Friend
Delivering the eulogy at Bob’s