Claude Weston

File:Claude Horace Weston horse.jpg Billy in Egypt, in February or March 1916. The two other soldiers in the picture are Billy's groom and Weston's batman (servant).]]

Weston was born in Hokitika in 1879.{{cite web |title=Weston Claude Horace |url=http://patria.homestead.com/patriadsoweston.html |publisher=The Pro Patria Project |access-date=28 March 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130802052352/http://patria.homestead.com/patriadsoweston.html |archive-date=2 August 2013 |url-status=dead }} His parents were Maria Cracroft Weston (née Hill) and Thomas S. Weston, and judge and later a member of the House of Representatives for electorates on the West Coast of the South Island.{{sfn|Gustafson|1986|p=389}} Claude Weston received his secondary education at Christ's College and graduated with LL.B. from the Canterbury University College.{{sfn|Gustafson|1986|p=389}} Weston was a Captain of the Taranaki Rifles.{{cite news |title=The Defence Act |url= https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&cl=search&d=WDT19040127.2.29 |access-date=28 March 2014 |work=Wairarapa Daily Times |date=27 January 1904 |volume=XXVIII |issue=7675 |page=6}}

Together with his elder brother Thomas Shailer Weston Jr., he took over his father's legal practice in November 1902, with offices in New Plymouth, Inglewood, and Waitara. Their firm was known as Weston & Weston.{{cite news |title=Partnership Notice |url= https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&cl=search&d=TH19021129.2.55.1 |access-date=28 March 2014 |work=Taranaki Herald |date=29 November 1902 |volume=L |issue=12134 |page=5}} He was appointed crown prosecutor in 1915.{{sfn|Gustafson|1986|p=389}} In the same year, he joined the Wellington Infantry Battalion and embarked on 14 August for Suez in Egypt.{{cite web |url=https://www.aucklandmuseum.com/war-memorial/online-cenotaph/record/C58281 |title=Claude Horace Weston |via=Online Cenotaph |publisher=Auckland War Memorial Museum |access-date=9 July 2022}} He became a lieutenant-colonel and was awarded a Distinguished Service Order in the 1918 New Year Honours.{{cite news |title=The New Year Honours |url= https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&d=ODT19180103.2.6 |access-date=28 March 2014 |work=Otago Daily Times |date=3 January 1918 |issue=17202 |page=3}} The citation reads:

{{Centered pull quote|For gallantry and devotion to duty. This Officer’s work throughout has been of a very high order. He has earned the respect of all ranks for his coolness and leadership in action. When commanding 2nd Battalion, Wellington Regiment during the action at Messines and La Basse Ville his work was excellent and the success of the Battalion in these operations was largely due to his work and example.}}

He was severely wounded in the war and was eventually discharged as unfit for further service. He wrote a book about his war time experiences, Three Years with the New Zealanders, which was published in 1918. He returned to New Plymouth, where he resumed law practice, but also engaged in farming.{{sfn|Gustafson|1986|p=389}} He was commandant of the New Zealand command of the Legion of Frontiersmen from 1926 to 1933,{{cite web |title=Past Commandants |url= http://frontiersmen.homestead.com/commandant.html |publisher=Legion of Frontiersmen |access-date=28 March 2014}} and was chairman of the New Plymouth repatriation committee.

He resigned as crown solicitor in New Plymouth in 1931 before he moved to Auckland.{{cite news |title=King's Counsel |url= https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&cl=search&d=AS19340310.2.72 |access-date=29 March 2014 |work=Auckland Star |date=10 March 1934 |volume=LXV |issue=59 |page=10}} At the end of 1933 he moved to Wellington.{{cite news |title=King's Counsel |url= https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&cl=search&d=EP19340310.2.87 |access-date=29 March 2014 |work=The Evening Post |date=10 March 1934 |volume=CXVII |issue=59 |page=14}}

Weston was sworn in as King's Counsel on 12 March 1934 at the Wellington Supreme Court. Others who took silk at the same ceremony were Alexander Johnstone and John Callan. Michael Myers as Chief Justice presided, four other judges sat on the bench, and the Speaker of the House of Representatives (Charles Statham) and the Minister of Justice (John Cobbe) attended in official capacity.{{cite news |title=New "Silks" |url= https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&cl=search&d=EP19340312.2.68 |access-date=29 March 2014 |work=The Evening Post |date=12 March 1934 |volume=CXVI |issue=60 |page=8}} In 2013, the Crown Law Office published a list of King's and Queen's Counsel appointed since 1907, but Weston is missing from that list,{{cite web |title=Queen's Counsel appointments since 1907 as at July 2013 |url=http://www.crownlaw.govt.nz/uploads/qc_since_1907.pdf |publisher=Crown Law Office |access-date=4 September 2013 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140329220631/http://www.crownlaw.govt.nz/uploads/qc_since_1907.pdf |archive-date=29 March 2014 |df=dmy-all }} and according to the Law Society, he is the only omission on the official list.{{cite web |title=Crown Law lists Queen's Counsel appointments since 1907 |url=http://my.lawsociety.org.nz/news/crown-law-lists-queens-counsel-appointments-since-1907 |publisher=my.lawsociety |access-date=4 September 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140329220844/http://my.lawsociety.org.nz/news/crown-law-lists-queens-counsel-appointments-since-1907 |archive-date=29 March 2014 |url-status=dead }} By coincidence, a Claude Weston from Sydney, New South Wales was appointed King's Counsel just a month earlier. Whilst they were not related, they later met.{{cite news |title=New King's Counsel |url= http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article17045808 |access-date=30 March 2014 |work=The Sydney Morning Herald |date=6 February 1934 |issue=29,982 |page=10}}{{cite news |title=News of the Day |url= https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&cl=search&d=EP19440422.2.20 |access-date=29 March 2014 |work=The Evening Post |date=22 April 1944 |volume=CXXXVII |issue=95 |page=6}}

The United Party (known as the Liberal Party until 1927, except for a short period between 1925 and 1927 when it used the name "National Party") and the Reform Party were in a coalition, known as the United–Reform Coalition, since {{NZ election link year|1931}}. Weston was one of the key figures who organised a conference for 13 and 14 May 1936. Together with two others, he drew up a draft constitution prior to the conference, and he was chosen as chairman for the conference. The outcome was the formation of the New Zealand National Party through the merger of United and Reform.{{sfn|Gustafson|1986|pp=8f}} At the conference, Weston proposed Sir George Wilson as the party's president, and the motion was carried. Within a week, Wilson was forced to make a decision between the presidency or a directorship of the New Zealand Insurance Company, and Wilson decided in favour of the commercial appointment.{{sfn|Gustafson|1986|p=14}} The presidency thus transferred to Weston,{{sfn|Gustafson|1986|p=389}} who had the task of overseeing the establishment of the party's Dominion organisation,{{sfn|Gustafson|1986|p=167}} and he was one of the trustees of the party's periodical, The National News.{{sfn|Gustafson|1986|p=195}} Whilst The National News performed an important part during the party's formative years, the venture was expensive and following the {{NZ election link|1938}}, it was changed to a quarterly schedule, before being discontinued in September 1939 just after the outbreak of the war.{{sfn|Gustafson|1986|p=196}}

The seven-member Dominion publicity committee, of which Weston was a member, engaged three advertising companies to jointly prepare for the 1938 election. Two of those companies, John Ilott and Charles Haines,{{cite web |last=Phillips |first=Jock |title=Advertising - Advertising agencies, 1891–1970 |url= http://www.teara.govt.nz/en/advertising/page-2 |publisher=Te Ara: The Encyclopedia of New Zealand |access-date=26 January 2014 |author-link=Jock Phillips |date=13 July 2012}} remained joint agents for the National Party until 1973.{{sfn|Gustafson|1986|p=196}} Weston was succeeded as president by Alex Gordon in 1940.{{sfn|Gustafson|1986|pp=38, 289}} Weston was also the first chairman of the Wellington Division of the National Party (1936–1937).{{sfn|Gustafson|1986|p=389}}

In the {{NZ election link|1946}}, Weston was a candidate for the National Party in the {{NZ electorate link|Wellington Central}} electorate. He died suddenly on 10 November 1946 in Wellington and was replaced as a candidate by his wife, Agnes Weston.{{sfn|Gustafson|1986|p=389}} The election was won by Charles Chapman of the Labour Party.{{cite web |title=The General Election, 1946 |url= http://www.atojs.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/atojs?a=d&cl=search&d=AJHR1947-I.2.4.2.38 |publisher=National Library |access-date=1 January 2014 |page=11 |year=1947}} His wife was later appointed onto the New Zealand Legislative Council as part of the suicide squad.{{sfn|Wilson|1985|p=166}}

Weston was New Zealand consul to the Netherlands and was appointed Knight of the Order of Orange-Nassau.

Weston married in 1905.{{cite news |title=Obituary |url= https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Claude_Weston_Evening_Post_obituary.jpg |access-date=17 June 2014 |work=The Evening Post |date=1946}} His wife was born Agnes Louisa Steuart, the daughter of Fred J. Steuart, who was at one time Mayor of Stratford.{{cite news |title=The Fallen and the Wounded |url= https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&d=NOT19161006.2.12 |access-date=2 April 2014 |work=North Otago Times |date=6 October 1916 |issue=13692 |page=2}}{{cite news |title=The Stratford Railway |url= https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&d=AS19010329.2.4 |access-date=2 April 2014 |work=Auckland Star |date=29 March 1901 |volume=XXXII |issue=75 |page=2}} The funeral service for Weston was held at St. Paul's Cathedral, after which he was cremated.{{cite web |title=Details|url= http://wellington.govt.nz/services/community-and-culture/cemeteries/cemeteries-search/details?id=7061&serviceType=Cremation |publisher=Wellington City Council |access-date=29 March 2014}} His wife died in 1972 and was also cremated.{{cite web |title=Details|url= http://wellington.govt.nz/services/community-and-culture/cemeteries/cemeteries-search/details?id=35611&serviceType=Cremation |publisher=Wellington City Council |access-date=29 March 2014}}

His daughter, Claudia Lillian Weston, trained to become a medical doctor. On 8 February 1937, she married Tom Shand, who became a member of the House of Representatives in the 1946 election for the {{NZ electorate link|Marlborough}} electorate.{{DNZB|Templeton|Hugh|5s12|Shand, Thomas Philip|27 March 2014||Hugh Templeton}}{{sfn|Wilson|1985|p=233}}

• {{cite book |last=Weston |first=Claude Horace |year=1918 |title=Three Years with the New Zealanders : Weston, C H |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=UUfAtgAACAAJ |publisher=Skeffington }}
• {{cite book |last=Weston |first=Claude Horace |year=1932 |title=Contractors' and Workmen's Liens |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=pasgIgAACAAJ |publisher=Butterworth }}
• {{cite book |last1=New Zealand Army |last2=Weston |first2=Claude Horace |first3=Charles Archibald Lawrance |last3=Treadwell |author-link3=Charles Treadwell |year=1937 |title=Handbook of Military Law as Applicable to the New Zealand Military Forces |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=YsGetgAACAAJ |publisher=G.H. Loney, Government Printer }}
• {{cite book |last=Weston |first=Claude Horace |year=1945 |title=The Ultimate Socialism |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=l3caHQAACAAJ |publisher=Whitcombe & Tombs }}

{{Reflist}}

• {{cite book |last = Gustafson |first = Barry |author-link = Barry Gustafson |title = The First 50 Years : A History of the New Zealand National Party |year = 1986 |publisher = Reed Methuen |location = Auckland |isbn = 0-474-00177-6}}
• {{cite book | editor-last = Scholefield | editor-first = Guy | editor-link = Guy Scholefield | title = A Dictionary of New Zealand Biography : M–Addenda | volume = II | year = 1940 | publisher = Department of Internal Affairs | location = Wellington | url = https://www.nzhistory.net.nz/files/documents/dnzb-1940/scholefield-dnzb-v2.pdf | access-date = 6 October 2013}}
• {{cite book |last= Wilson |first= James Oakley |title= New Zealand Parliamentary Record, 1840–1984 |edition= 4th |orig-year=First published in 1913 |year= 1985 |publisher=V.R. Ward, Govt. Printer |location= Wellington |oclc= 154283103}}

{{Commons category|Claude Weston}}

• [http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&cl=search&d=EP19340310.2.87.3 Portrait photo from 1934]

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{{s-bef | before = Sir George Wilson}}

{{s-ttl | title = President of the National Party|years=1936–1940}}

{{s-aft | after = Alex Gordon}}

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{{NZ National Party}}

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Weston, Claude Horace}}

Category:1879 births

Category:1946 deaths

Category:Knights of the Order of Orange-Nassau

Category:People educated at Christ's College, Christchurch

Category:University of Canterbury alumni

Category:New Zealand military personnel of World War I

Category:New Zealand King's Counsel

Category:People from Wellington City

Category:People from New Plymouth

Category:New Zealand National Party politicians

Category:New Zealand Companions of the Distinguished Service Order

Category:20th-century New Zealand lawyers

Claude

Category:University of Canterbury Faculty of Law alumni