GEORGE CHANEY

On 29 November, Private George Chaney was killed in action near Polygon Wood. George Chaney's father, Randolph, had been named after one of the first ships that brought substantial numbers of immigrants to Canterbury in 1850, on which he had been born. Randolph 's father, William, was a stonemason who had worked on Canterbury Cathedral in England and had been recruited for the proposed Cathedral for Christchurch. Frustrated at delays for this Cathedral, and irritated at having to build the Lyttelton Prison, William bought property at the northern end of Marshland's Road which even today bears the name Chaney's Corner. Randolph, however, moved his family of eleven children to Riccarton in 1895 to work in the newly opened Islington Freezing Works. George Chaney worked for the Bye Products Company in Sockburn before his enlistment in August 1916. At Featherston, George extended his final leave by an unauthorised three days, for which he forfeited the requisite amount from his pay. He arrived in France in time for the Messines offensive, and fought at Passchendaele, before being detached to the School of Instruction for further training in early November. Rejoining his unit on 20 November, he was killed nine days later and is commemorated at the New Zealand memorial at Buttes New British Cemetery at Polygon Wood.

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