{"id":439,"date":"2014-08-05T00:14:30","date_gmt":"2014-08-05T00:14:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.otago.ac.nz\/thehockenblog\/?p=439"},"modified":"2014-08-05T00:14:30","modified_gmt":"2014-08-05T00:14:30","slug":"centenary-of-declaration-of-the-great-war-in-europe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.otago.ac.nz\/thehockenblog\/centenary-of-declaration-of-the-great-war-in-europe\/","title":{"rendered":"Centenary of declaration of the Great War in Europe"},"content":{"rendered":"

George Malcolm Thomson was MP for Dunedin North from 1908-1914. At the time war was declared Thomson was in Wellington as Parliament was sitting. He was in the habit of writing a diary entry most days, recording a mix of parliamentary activity, letter writing and family news.<\/p>\n

What follows are extracts from his 1914 diary, along with snaps of the original text.<\/p>\n

Monday \u2013 Augt. 3rd<\/p>\n

The declaration of war by Germany on France and Russia was the engrossing topic of conversation today. I spent the day in the library at the Education Bill. Prof. Prince came to tea with me, & and later we went together to the Town Hall & heard a delightful recitation by Mr. Watson on \u201cNicolas Nickleby\u201d. Letter from Grandma<\/p>\n

\"3aug\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Tuesday \u2013 Augt. 4th<\/sup><\/p>\n

Education Committee met this morning, and Bishop Cleary was cross-examined by Canon Garland and Prof. Hunter. In the afternoon the House sat till 5 o\u2019clock, & after getting through some work adjourned till 2.30pm tomorrow.<\/p>\n

The atmosphere was electrical, party distinctions seemed to completely disappear, and the expected news came through at night that the Germans had violated Belgium territory & the British Army was mobilising, which amounted to a declaration of War. It is the beginning of the most appalling struggle known in the history of the world. Wrote John.<\/p>\n

\"4aug\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Wednesday \u2013 Augt. 5th<\/sup><\/p>\n

Letters from Stuart & John. Education sat again in the forenoon. In the afternoon we adjourned the House for an hour, & at 3 p.m. from the library entrance the Governor announced to a crowd of 3-4000 that the Empire had declared war against Germany. The House then adjourned till tomorrow. I went out to tea with Gertie and then wrote to Malcolm & Stuart. Earthquake shock at 9.30 p.m.<\/p>\n

\"5aug\"<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

All images are from George Malcolm Thomson’s diary\u00a023 May 1914-30 October 1916 \u00a0(AG-926\/004). The Hocken holds Thomson’s papers<\/p>\n

For further information on George Malcolm Thomson see the Dictionary of NZ Biography entry on him from this link>http:\/\/www.teara.govt.nz\/en\/biographies\/2t40\/thomson-george-malcolm<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

George Malcolm Thomson was MP for Dunedin North from 1908-1914. At the time war was declared Thomson was in Wellington as Parliament was sitting. He was in the habit of writing a diary entry most days, recording a mix of parliamentary activity, letter writing and family news. What follows are extracts from his 1914 diary, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14625,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15311,15412],"tags":[15434],"class_list":["post-439","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-archives-and-manuscripts","category-world-war-i","tag-politicians"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.otago.ac.nz\/thehockenblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/439","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.otago.ac.nz\/thehockenblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.otago.ac.nz\/thehockenblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.otago.ac.nz\/thehockenblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/14625"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.otago.ac.nz\/thehockenblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=439"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.otago.ac.nz\/thehockenblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/439\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.otago.ac.nz\/thehockenblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=439"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.otago.ac.nz\/thehockenblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=439"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.otago.ac.nz\/thehockenblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=439"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}