Further Decorations for

the FMF Outstanding Effort of Small Colony

FURTHER decorations awarded to Fiji Military Forces personnel, were announced in Suva on December 8.

Lieut. Col. F. W. Voelcker, MC, com mander of the 3rd Battalion, FMF, who recently was decorated by the Americans with the Bronze Star, for gallantry while in command of the Fijians on Bougain ville, has now been awarded the DSO.

He won the Military Cross in France in World War

I, and is a New Zealand resident.

Lieut. - Col.

J. B. K. Tay lor received the QBE.

C o 1 o n e 1 Taylor was a s s o c i a ted with the Army in Fiji before the war, when he was an officer in the Fiji Defence Force. In April, 1940, h e became Command e r of the First Battalion and was re sponsible for its training.

When the Battalion left for the

Solomons, Colonel Taylor went in com mand to Guadalcanal, Florida and

Kolombangara. When it was transferred to Bougainville, Colonel Taylor went ahead of the main body and, during his first night on the island, he was badly wounded in the head by splinters from a Japanese bomb. As a result, he had to relinquish command of the Battalion and was not with it during the months when it fought with such conspicuous success.

He is in NZ and is still suffering the effects of his wounds. Just before the war he managed a Fijian Rugby football team that toured New Zealand unbeaten.

The award of MBE has been made to Major Alistair Ross.

Military Crosses have been awarded to Major Mervyn Corner, Captains H. M.

Booth and E. Cakobau, and Lieutenants Mickey Boulton, Paul Lobendahn and Barry Philpott.

Ratu Edward Cakobau, one of the best known Fijian chiefs, is a lineal descend ant of the Cakobau who made the ori ginal offer to cede Fiji to Queen Victoria and whose name heads the list of the chiefs who eventually signed the Deed of Cession,

Capt. E. Cakobau in 1937, when on his way to the Coronation of George VI. He receives the MC.