Clutha Mackenzie

Sir Clutha Nantes Mackenzie (11 February 1895 – 30 March 1966) was a New Zealand politician and worker for the blind. He was briefly a Reform Party Member of Parliament.

Biography

Mackenzie was born in Balclutha in 1895. He was the youngest child of Sir Thomas Mackenzie, He was blinded at Chunuk Bair during the Gallipoli campaign and was sent to the No. 2 New Zealand General Hospital at Walton-on-Thames to convalesce. At the hospital he was one of the patients of his sister Mary, who was a member of the Voluntary Aid Detachment here. After recovering he was sent to the live with other blind soldiers in a house in Portland before attending St Dunstan's, the Institute for the Blind Soldiers and Sailors. Later that year he was awarded the King George V Silver Jubilee Medal. In 1953, Mackenzie was awarded the Queen Elizabeth II Coronation Medal.

Mackenzie died in Auckland in 1966, and his ashes were buried in the Dunedin Northern Cemetery.