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WALTER GREENWOOD
due from him for some sharpness with which he might have addressed the men (there was cries of “not at all”). If he had done so it had been with the best intentions. A gentleman from Shanghai who had recently witnessed them at seven pounder gun drill had expressed the opinion that the Shanghai artillerymen could not hold a candle to them. In May the Governor congratulated the Volunteers on their smartness at the Queen's Birthday parade. In November the Daily Press noted “The Volunteers are very fortunate in the officers they have elected to command them, for since the time they were appointed they have shewn an enthusiastic interest in the welfare of the Corps. During the past week Captain Francis has been busily engaged in getting up a field day at Kowloon so as to give the men a good introduction to the new equipment of small arms and mountain guns which were sent out in the Telemachus, with the additional attraction of a knife and fork drill at Mr. Chater's bungalow afterwards”. In June 1884 a volunteer complained to the press of having to drag guns up and down the parade ground for over an hour. However Francis seems to have been absent from the colony at that time. In 1886 and again in 1887 he was acting Commandant but his active participation in the Corps was coming to an end. He was absent from the Annual Meeting and there was a critical letter in the press about that. He tendered his resignation and in 1888 was placed on the retired list as an honorary member with the rank of captain. However that did not end his contributions to the Corps. In December 1892 he was a member of a committee formed to re-establish the Corps on a new basis and in January 1893 he was chairman of a recruiting committee which met at his chambers on Tuesdays and Fridays at 4-5p.m. In 1897 he contributed to prizes for a firing competition. The firing point was on an eminence near Wong Nei Chong Gap and the target at Deepwater Bay. Common and shrapnel shells were used and “some good practice was made”. Francis presented a cup for competition known as the "Francis Cup" but it seems to be no longer in the possession of the Volunteers. And as one of his obituaries noted he "took a keen interest in military matters and was seldom absent from any important parade or display in his uniform". Francis himself said "I would rather any day attend a military parade or march in front of a military band than march in a procession in Westminster Hall headed by the Lord Chancellor and the Lord Chief Justice. If I have one proclivity more than any