Claude Weston

Claude Horace Weston DSO KC (28 December 1879 – 10 November 1946) was a New Zealand lawyer, a lieutenant-colonel in World War I, and effectively the first president of the National Party (1936–1940).

[4] 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.

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.

[13] By coincidence, a Claude Weston from Sydney, New South Wales was appointed King's Counsel just a month earlier.

[16] At the conference, Weston proposed Sir George Wilson as the party's president, and the motion was carried.

[19] Whilst The National News performed an important part during the party's formative years, the venture was expensive and following the 1938 election, it was changed to a quarterly schedule, before being discontinued in September 1939 just after the outbreak of the war.

[20] 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,[21] remained joint agents for the National Party until 1973.

He died suddenly on 10 November 1946 in Wellington and was replaced as a candidate by his wife, Agnes Weston.

On 8 February 1937, she married Tom Shand, who became a member of the House of Representatives in the 1946 election for the Marlborough electorate.

Major Claude Weston (sitting) with his horse Billy in Egypt, in February or March 1916. The two other soldiers in the picture are Billy's groom and Weston's batman (servant).