Colonel Begg’s record

Referring to the death in London (from influenza) of Colonel C. M. Begg, C.B., C.M.G., Director of Medical Services, New Zealand Expeditionary Forces, the Evening Post says: The news of Colonel Begg’s death will be received with sincere regret throughout the country, and especially in Wellington, where he was so well known and so greatly admired. By those who knew the value of his work for the New Zealand army, both here and abroad, his demise, terminating so

suddenly a brilliant career, is regarded as a great loss to the country. Colonel Begg, who was only 39 years of age, was the son of the late Mr A. C. Begg, of Dunedin, and came of a family famous in ecclesiastical and legal circles in Scotland. He was educated at the Otago Boys’ High School and at the University of Edinburgh, where he took his doctor’s degree in 1905. He was also a Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons, Edinburgh, and being also a member of the Royal College of Physicians, Edinburgh, he was recently elected to the Fellowship as an honour for his war services. Thus he had the unique distinction in New Zealand of Fellowships in both the Colleges of Physicians and Surgeons. He had the reputation for organising ability and firmness of decision well in advance when he was responsible for collecting at short notice the medical equipment necessary for the Gallipoli campaign. He was awarded the C.M.G. on the peninsula. In France he added to his laurels, and was mainly responsible for

the excellence of the medical arrangements of the New Zealand Division. He was later promoted Director of Medical Services to the Second Anzac Corps, being the only medical officer in the whole of the armies in France who had attained a position of this importance who was an amateur, and not a professional, soldier.