April 25th ANZAC Day – LEAST WE FORGET-

[Alan SHARP]

April 25th ANZAC day, the day we set aside to honour those ‘down under’ personnel who served their King and Country, and especially so in the WWI, ill fated Gallipoli Landings. Too many have paid the ultimate sacrifice.

I wish I had a WWI researched story to tell, but I don’t. Perhaps, in years to come, if I ever find the Mr Walters Walker, a WWI, American Pursuits Pilot Instructor. He impressed the RNZAF personnel on board the ‘SS Tamaroa’ when she re-provisioned at Curascao (7-10-1940) on their way to postings in the UK. If we ever find the cine8 footage he and his daughter took, it would be an ultimate success for this researcher.

Instead, I am able to share extracts with you, from my research project honouring four young men from Melville, a small rural community, on the outskirts of Hamilton City, NZ. Some 60,000 of their words have been transcribed from 30 letters that turned up in my Mother’s estate, plus the ALLEN diary and other material saved by both Bud ALLEN and Margaret LIVINGSTON.

Jack ALLEN, 10-5-1921 / 8-4-1941,
was my mother’s childhood boy friend, who in turn, was best mates with my Mother’s cousin,
George DOUGHERTY, 21-10-1921 / 4-9-1943.
Jack was the eldest of three teenaged siblings, their mother having died a few years previously.
Alistair ALLEN, 3-5-1922 / 15-9-1942,
was a year younger, and youngest brother was
Ross ‘Bud’ ALLEN, 22-1-1925,who joined the RNZN, as soon as he was able, after turning 16. My fourth subject was,
Peter DUFF DFC, 9-11-1920 / 14-9-1942,
a near neighbour to the others.
Only Bud returned to NZ.

Jacks brief service posting was with the 232 Hurricane Squadron based at Elgin / Lossiemouth, until circumstances saw them transferred to down to Montrose, Scotland.

Edited extracts from a work in progress follows.

‘CALLED TO SERVE’ © Alan SHARP and with consent to reproduce,
material ex © Estates’ R. SHARP; and of R. (Bud) ALLEN, plus,

‘FOR YOUR TOMORROW’ © Errol MARTYN.

Jack ALLEN Diary. – Elgin -

Sunday. 9th Feb. 1941.
Yesterday proved to be a hell of a day. Two planes u/s, two planes written off & two pilots killed in “B” Flight. “A” Flight was O.K. but touch wood. Two of the new boys, Fitzherbert & Weir both came back with the fabric torn off their fuselages. The good little boys say that they only dived at 280. What do we think....... The same afternoon “Wally” Poulton & P/o Burnett took off & failed to return. The planes were found about a mile apart, one burned out & the other buried in the ground. They found Wallie’s body but haven’t dug out the other plane yet & they think the pilots in it still. It was a hell of a do, all in one day. .....
Ev. & I have been set up to get leave from Feb. 25 to March 9, but the accident may upset the whole gist of things. There’s been hardly any flying & the last week has been very uneventful. Improvement in the weather is the only thing.

Saturday. 15th Feb. 1941.
WACO ! I saw my first Hun fly right over our ‘drome today at 1,000’. ! The weather is lousy & although we, that is Control had five of our planes up, they never made contact. Fancy the hound coming over the drome, though I was all for taking off without permission, but he was going flat out & would definitly have been in the clouds & out of harms way before we could have got near him. It was a Ju. 88 & although two of the “B” Flight planes went after him they came back after half an hour. There’s absolutely no hope of getting the B--- ! in these conditions. It’s the first bit of real action that we’ve had for [days crossed out] weeks now & it certainly has woken us up. If he comes back here again he’s in for a packet. I was on first readiness with Jeff Hardy & never even got off. At first they wanted one plane so Jeff went, & then shortly after they wanted another section so Ev. & F/o Brandt went. That left Walker & I on the ground, & they never even wanted us, but just kept us at stand-by. The two “B” Flight chaps went off without even asking permission.

Last Sunday morning the “Hoo-doo” continued when a tractor fell on an “A” Flight boy & crushed his leg terribly. He died in Hospital a few days ago. [Commonwealth Air Losses researcher Henk WELTING, believes it was AC2 John R. FOTHERINGHAM 999044, who died on 11-2-1941 and is also buried at Montrose]. ..... Had quite a few letters from home yesterday & everything is going well, except that one of the whitest men God ever made, Les Wright was killed while training. I don’t know whether I have mentioned Les before but we worked together for a couple of years in Hallensteins, & I respected him more than any other chap I have ever known. He certainly was very popular & very good at all sports & one of the most likeable chaps I have ever met. It’s very tough luck, & I feel very sorry for Mary, his girl friend, a really lovely A1 girl, & Mrs Wright & poor young Jean, his mother & sister.

Millar & Webb are both away on leave now & we are a bit short in the flight as Mason is not back yet. Lately we [having crossed out] have been doing plenty of dog fights & Ev. & I are getting pretty good. Well, we haven’t struck anyone yet who can get us off their tail - & some of the chaps have plenty of hours up. The weather has been particularly lousy lately, but we hope it will improve.

Saturday. 22nd Feb 1941.
........ There were a lot of Jerrie kites around yesterday & Control have reverted us to sections of three and there will be two standing patrols of an hour each, every day. Boy ! we may see some action soon. The ‘drome will probably be o/s again soon as we’ve just had about nine inches of snow.

Feb. 23rd 1941. 1300
.... Another three inches of snow last night damn it !. Poor old F/o Brandt evidently couldn’t judge his height from what I heard, he never levelled out properly & did a complete somersault. The plane is a write-of but he is feeling jake. There’s a lot of talk about an invasion but of course we are rather doubtful about this owing to Hitler being kept as busy in the Balkans. It seems pretty definite, however that he did have a crack at invasion once before, but the whole thing was suicidal. His barges were cut off both ways by our navy & just blasted out of existence, with the help of the Air Force. They reckon that there were bodies being washed up on the shores for weeks after. I remember that fact was mentioned in the papers at the time. Next time he’ll try gliders & I wouldn’t be at all surprised if he resorted to gas. The lousy B----!!. Pete Jordan is still away on leave & hasn’t sent for more money yet, so he’s having as good a time as Ev. & I hope to have. It’ll be great to see Jill & Mac again.

Feb. 25th Tuesday. 1941
Oh Boy ! What a day. Ev. & I are now travelling to London on the Aberdonian, due to arrive there about nine o’clock, We did our readiness including two one hour patrols. We landed from the second one just after one, & seeing we were due to catch a train at 2.30 from the Elgin Station................

March 9th Sunday 1941.
Ev. & I arrived back tonight after a most glorious leave. .... The odds are ten to one that we go to London on our next leave, although I don’t want to get in too deep. After all there’s a war on & I’m only nineteen.

March 10th 1941
Back to flying again today & was it any good. I did two & a half hours today & had a great time. I went up for a dog-fight with Ev. In Mr Webbs plane & did everything I could. Ev. lost me so I did some really hot aerobatics. It was a marvellous plane to aerobat & I could do a loop carrying out rolls the whole way. Damned if I could explain how I did it but it was the fun of cork (sic.). Ev. & I are absolutely par when it comes to a dogfight. Once one of us gets in position on the tail of the other we just stay there. I was doing loops with rolls off the top & Ev. never even new he was following me. There’s stacks of mail waiting for me & I’m scared to look at it.

14th March 1941 14-30
Since I’ve been back from leave we’ve had very good weather & the flying hours have gone up at a great rate. Last night Ev. myself, Hitching & Mr Webb all did four and a half hours night flying, making us all night operational in one bang. I didn’t get to bed until 2-30. One of the exercises was a height climb to twenty five thou. or more. Twenty eight thou. Was quite cold enough for me & unofficially I went down to within about forty miles of Glasgy. Jerry was giving that place a good beating up & I was sorely tempted to go in & risk Archie & try a crack at him. It was a beautiful moonlight night & possibilities were very high. About half an hour ago, Mr Miller Ev. & myself scrambled after a plane which passed over the drome. At first it looked like a Ju. 88 but turned out to be an American job. A Marten I think. The night before last Mr Miller & I went down to Dyce to do night readiness there, but every thing was quiet. Came back before breakfast the next morning. I’ve now got about fifty hours on Hurricanes & am day & night operational. There’s a rumour around that “A” Flight may be moved to Montrose. I’ll have to try & get that ten quid Pete owes me, or I may never see it again.

Thursday. March. 20th 41.
The rumour that we are going to Montrose is still in force, but applys now to next Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday. P/o Webb & Sgt. Mason of our flight were both killed this morning after a collission, when we were carrying out attacks on Wellingtons. F/o Brandt, Ev. & I were in Yellow Section & F/Lt. Miller Webb & Mason were Red. It appears that they were in Vie & were signalled line-astern & Mason, who was No. 3. cut it a bit fine & smashed into Webb. Mr Brandt saw the actual collission & Ev. & Mr Miller saw them going down, but yours truly didn’t know a damned thing until we had landed back at the ‘drome. There’s a lot of wondering as to why they didn’t bale out, as they were both going in approximately the same direction & the force of impact could not have been terrific.

I was lucky enough to get my back pays today & now feel quite wealthy once again. Haven’t seen Pete Jordan yet but hope to collect my first instalment before he busts it all on liquor. That guy’s going down in my estimation, fast. There’s been quite a lot of flying lately, but not much operational work. The other night we did four & a half hours night flying each. That was Ev. myself, Hitching & Webb. There was a full moon & it was that clear I was doing aerobatics. During the height climb I got down, unofficially to within about thirty or forty miles of Glasgow, & saw that place getting hell with a capital “H”. That was the night that they flattened Clydeside. I damned nearly kept on going & risking a crack at Jerry, but it wasn’t worth it. If Ev. had been with me we would definitely have carried on. I got to bed about two o-clock the next morning. At the moment I’m down at dispersal. Ev. & I are on readiness & have to spend the whole night here. When we get off we’ll have been here thirty hours on end with only three-quarters of an hour breaks for meals. Who says we pilots get an easy time.

Monday. 24th March. 41.
Six of us “A” Flight pilots & the Adj: had to go to Lossie this morning to escort Eric Masons body from the mortuary to Lossie Station. We only carried the coffin About forty feet & each saluted the body. It was my first experience of that sort of thing & I can’t say I felt terribly happy about the whole thing. Going over in the truck we were laughing & joking as usual, but coming back there was hardly a word spoken. It seemed as if just then we all realized what life meant to us & were wondering whether we would see the show out. Dick Webb is being buried in Elgin tomorrow, I think.

The last couple of days the weather has not been so good & flying has been slacking off somewhat. Iv’e taken over Webb’s plane & it’s much better than old ’98, which was losing all it’s compression. Mr Brandt now has “Butch” painted in dazzling colours on his Mae West & a carving knife & steel on his plane. Ev. has “Vampire” on his ‘west & a hideous representation of same on his plane & I have “Tiki” painted on the ‘west & am waiting for a copy of a “Tiki” to paint from, & then I think they’ll have to call us the “terrible Trio.” We were definitely on the trail of a Ju.88 yesterday, but the weather was pretty duff & although we chased every plane we saw, Jerry just gave us the go-by as usual. Any time now we’ll be getting Pip squeak & V.H.F., so folks just watch our dust then.

Thursday. 26-3-41 0545.
On readiness already. Very soon we won’t get any sleep at all. We didn’t finish until 2035 last night, & had to be down here by 0523 this morning. Yesterday the blasted weather went haywire & we had about five inches of snow. Snow is bad enough at any time, but this lot is accompanied with a raging blizzard & although Control will not let us fly, they keep us at readiness. And we thought Spring was here. Flight says its the lambing snows, so that the sooner that the lambs come the better. The day before yesterday Ev. & I had a dogfight & still cannot get the better of each other. The C.O. & Flight Commander think we put up a jolly good show. My new plane, 9310, goes like a bird.

Sunday. 6th April. 1941.
Well, for once rumour proved correct. “A” Flight has moved to Montrose, & so we have to do all readiness’s we are not going to get much time off. All the ground staff lads & our belongings came down here on Tuesday & it was intended that we should fly down seven machines on the same day. The weather packed in on us, though, & try as we might it was Saturday morning before we got here. I had quite a fairish growth on the old chin-chin & did it hurt when I had to shave with cold water. Montrose seems a very nice drome, but there are dozens of Masters flying around all the time. We fire a Red very light when we have a scramble & then it’s up to those wallahs to keep well out of the way. Our quarters, the mess & the food are all exceptionally good & I definitely don’t regret leaving Elgin. One trouble is that its a big station & there is a certain amount of bullshit floating around. F/Lt. Jeffries, Ted Lawrence & Pete Jordan, All from “B” Flight received overseas postings last night & were on their way today. I managed to get six quid of the ten he owed me, but it looks as though I’ve had the other four. Good old Pete. I bet he’s kicking himself for paying me back as much as he has.....

Monday. 7th April 1941. 0830
One flap already this morning. Jeff Hardy wet up after a crate last night but it proved to be an Anson. It passed right over the ‘drome & several cannons on the ground let fly. The Anson wasn’t very long in firing the colours of the day & I don’t know how near Jeff was to it but here’s betting that he wondered what the hell was happening. Yesterday afternoon I took King & Christian up for some formation practice. Chris had some trouble & had to make a forced landing, just South of Stonehaven. I didn’t know where he had gone & spent quite a bit of time looking for him. The V.H.F. is working very well & when we get Pip Squeak [Direction-Finding system] there just won’t be any stopping us. Working very hard here. Only one day off in four or five & night readiness every second night.

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[The next entry in Jack’s diary was in a bold lefty scrawl.]

Cheerio Jack old pal, The best friend & gamest lad I have yet met, & the most popular chap in the squadron.

So-long “Tiki”

Evan Julian N. Z.
“Vampire”
5 am Sunday,
8 th April 1941.

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April 11th 1941.

“Tiki” was buried today
at 2pm with full
Military Honours.

E.J.
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[ Even JULIAN then sent this letter to NZ ]

Sgt Pilot Julian 40235,
C/- N. Z. House,
24 Strand,
London.

Dear Mr Allen Auntie & the boys,

As Jacks close friend since our arrival in this country I have taken the liberty of writing to you & explaining a few points to your satisfaction.

The terrible night in question was a blitz night with Jack & self on night readiness, only two of us owing to shortages of pilots at the time. Other squadrons were four or more pilots so you can see we two had our hands full. The night was cloudy & dark, & we were up again & again eventually going to bed at 2 am not knowing when we would be called again. I may mention that other squadrons had called it a day long before we finished, but we determined to carry on in typical N. Z. style.

About 3.30 am Jack was called out to go up taking care not to wake me. After his patrol he returned to his base, but the lazy blasted chaps on the flare path slipped up failing to light the run way. Poor John just had to land or fall asleep, so down he came to land in pitch blackness landing O. K. but a tire burst & over he went on his back. I must have been a little crazy for I remember little after that, except that I dashed out in my pyjamas & dragged Jack free. He passed away with me holding on to him serene & calm & the tough little member of the squadron.

I blame myself in a way, I should have rushed out & stopped him, but what is done is done & no amount of wishing & blaming will ever give me back the greatest pal I ever had. The Fighter Group commended us, especially Jack, on the fine job we did & Jack’s death was felt by the whole squadron. He was our best pilot, our most popular pilot, commonly called “Tiki” & loved me like a brother. Never once did we disagree, or did a harsh word pass between us. We were never longer apart than ten hours, if that. Flying together, taking leave together, in fact we were called the twins, so you can see Jack’s passing has been the greatest blow of my life & try as I may I cannot or ever will completely forget.

Yours very sincerely,

Evan Julian.
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[Peter DUFF sent this letter to Margaret LIVINGSTON, Jack’s girlfriend.]
R. A. F.
Cranage,
Cheshire,
England.
Dear Margaret,
Would you please let me express my sincere sympathy with you in the unfortunate accident that Jack met with. You will no doubt realise that Jack was more or less a hero among the Melville boys, and I can assure you that, as far as I am concerned at least, I, always held Jack’s doings as a standard to judge my own attainments by. He was my ideal of the perfect airman and the perfect gentleman.

Since I have been in England it has come home to me how much you must have meant to Jack during his stay here. Until you get over here you don’t realise how much real friends back home mean.

I am sure I don’t know what else I can say or how to express my thoughts, but I can honestly say that the memory of Jack will always be with me, and a source of inspiration to me, and I think I can safely say to all the Melville boys.

Once again expressing my sympathy,

I remain,
Yours sincerely,
P. S. Duff.

Sgt. Pilot P. S. Duff
NZ 402859
C/- High Commissioner for H.Z.
N. Z. Govt. Officers.
416 Strand,
London.
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[The next entry in the diary reads]

Received from
F/L Evan Julian.
5-12-41

P/O E Julian
N.Z. 40235
New Zealand House address.
4-11-41

Dear Alistair,
I have just received another letter from your Auntie telling me of your expected departure from good old N.Z. but I feel this will arrive at New Zealand House before you arrive in this god forsaken joint.

Anyway on your arrival, wherever you are stationed before you are sorted out take this prop of advise. Now when we arrived at Uxbridge several chaps wrote the C/O of the station applying for fighters or whatever they wanted – it helps believe me, nothing like getting in the first punch.

Now I am going to send to you Jack’s diary & expect you to keep it up - Now do this Alistair it will please me greatly. The only reason I kept it was that it may of been lost on the homeward trip or grabbed by the Censor.

Dear old John’s grave is at Montrose, a place a little south of Aberdeen. A very pretty little cemetry near the town, you will naturally call there – don’t forget to pay my respects when you do – I certainly have not forgotten him by a long ways.

Ask the New Zealand House where I am. I may be overseas, I expect to go in the next week or two. At present I am at R.A.F. Ouston, New Castle on Tyne. Write me if I am in this country or if I am out of it.

Now work hard, don’t try any low level shoot ups or aerobatics, it never pays & a poor view is generally taken.

Keep your hands on your cash & watch your tail.

Best of luck
Cherio
Evan.
Upon receiving this letter I immediately wrote to Evan & assured him that I would carry out his wish. His address was care of the Army so I expect he is overseas but I still hope to meet him some time in future.
Alistair William Allen.
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[An entry for December 8th and another for December 15th ]

8-12-41
Arrived in Aberdeen at 9am on Monday morning & after obtaining lodgings for the night Terry went off to see some people & Murray & I went to Montrose. We barged into an Airforce station there & were directed to Sleepy Hollow. It is a very pretty little cemetry, but as yet they have ommitted to mark Jacks grave. I paid Ev’s respects as he had requested me. Later on we went back to Aberdeen.
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15-12-41
Went to see the Station W.O. & afterwards to the C.I.’s office & what a jolt we got there. We were told that we had volunteered to tow gliders, above all things. So we are stuck here to fly harts, an older version of the hind. We have quite a good mess so we should be all right.

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[ The following is an excerpt from Volume One (Fates: 1915-1942) of the trilogy 'For Your Tomorrow - A record of New Zealanders who have died while serving with the RNZAF and Allied Air Services since 1915 ]

Tue 15 Sep 1942
Flying Training Command
Glider towing training
4 Glider Training School, RAF (Kidlington, Oxfordshire - 23 Group)
Hector I K9706 - took off at about 0155 towing a General Aircraft Hotspur II glider (BT505) for a single circuit. About five minutes later in low cloud the combination flew into high ground near Wytham, 4 miles SSW of the airfield. The pilot of the Hector and both occupants of the glider died, the former being buried at Kidlington.

Pilot: NZ412180 Sgt Alistair William ALLEN, RNZAF - Age 20. 542hrs (485 solo - 362 on Hector)
Allen's brother, John Herbert Allen, died on 8 April 1941 while flying with 232 Sqn, RAF.

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[ A distraught Major W. H. ALLEN made this last entry, after the diary had been returned to NZ. Today’s consensus is that any ‘censoring’ that was done was actually done by Alistair’s flying mates, when they packed up his personal effects. Alistair’s diary notes stopped on May 7th though he kept, on the back page, a diary record of inwards and outwards letters until August 14th The Major served in WWI and did one tour in the Pacific in WWII, between the wars he as a Territorial Officer, based at Hamilton, and a partner in Reynolds & Allen, accountants.]

Sgt. Pilot A.W. Allen Killed in aircraft accident in September. Remainder of diary taken out of book by a damn-fool airforce outfit. What did it matter if “Jerry” Knew that a Sergt. Pilot by name of “Allen” was towing gliders or not ? Any information contained in his diary could not have altered the course of the war one iota. That is the point upon which many of us just simply write the authorities at Home off as a blundering, stupid lot of fools, of no use either to God, man or mammon ! WHA.

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If you have read this far, thanks from down under, for having taken the time to participate and acknowledge our day of remembrance. The next time you are meandering through a cemetery and see the Commonwealth War Graves headstones, please make some time to pause, and honour, those who paid the ultimate price, because most of us will never have the chance to walk by, on your side of the world.

The Sleepyhillock Cemetery at Montrose, looks peacefully down upon the estuary basin, and in the WWII section lies Kiwi’s J. H. ALLEN, B. S. BURTON, J. B. COURTIS, F. T. MARTYN and H.S. SHEARER. [Plus E. W. BURTON in the Great War section.] Jack’s brother A.W. ALLEN lies at St Mary’s Kidlington Cemetery, Oxford.

Thanks to Oxford man, Pete DORWARD www.pixture.co.uk who’s parents were at Montrose, for supplying me, in 2006, with photos of the CWG headstones, plus airfield photos and maps. [Now the Scottish War Graves project, has Montrose photos that can be viewed on line.]


- LEAST WE FORGET –

Alan SHARP, New Zealand.

[theKiwi]

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning,
We will remember them.

from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ode_of_Remembrance

http://roger.lisaandroger.com/getperson ... tree=Roger is a link to a Great Uncle - Robert Alexander Dewar who took part in the Gallipoli landings apparently. (I must confess I haven't researched this in any depth, just going on something his sister wrote of his life later on).

Lest We Forget!!

[Montrose Budie]

Given my deep interest in matters military, genealogical, and Scottish, I can only encourage TS members to understand the quite incredible contributions made in the Boer War, WWI and WWII, by the ANZAC, - A[ustralian] N[ew] Z[ealand]
A[rmed] C[orps] and associated forces on land, at sea and in the air, never mind similar contributions from Canada,
S Africa in the widest sense, i.e. Rhodesia etc., and elsewhere.


On my latest visit to NZ I paid a repeated visit to the preserved 6 in gun turret of HMNZS Achilles, now relocated to the NZ naval museum in Auckland, just to stand there and imagine how it was in action against the German pocket battleship Admiral Graf Spee, along with the Royal Navy ships HMS Ajax and HMs Exeter at the Battle of the River Plate in December 1939.


That NZ involvement, however seminal in naval terms, is minor in terms of the incredibly important contributions of NZ, Australian, never mind Canadian as well, as well as other nations, to the Boer War, WWI, and WWII.


In commemmoration of April 25th as ANZAC DAY 2010, I can only comment,

"They gave their tomorrow for our today"

Orraverybest

mb

[Wee Ann]

Just back from oure local Anzac Day parade. Far from being "Past it's used-by date", as has been suggested lately in the press, in our little town, the turnout seems to grow year by year. Young couples with their families! Older people who do indeed remember, Brownies, Guides and Boy Scouts and representatives from all the schools in the area took part.
The Army was there, (there is a base nearby), and we had a fly-past of a single plane, but mostly it was the community, gathering to remember, and acknowledge what was given.
It was a beautiful ceremony, the only sounds during the minute of silence were those of small children and birds singing.
Lest we Forget.
Ann

[Alan SHARP]

Thank you Anne.

As I am privilaged to hold the contributing material, I thought the Northern Scott's might appreciate a personal account through a Kiwi's eyes, what it was like defending the Northern Skies and out across the ocean. I had trouble editing it down to what I see as a complete digest, so knew it is more of an article than a forum post, but had hoped that the administrators could have allowed us the oportunity to post for a day, or two, on the general and higher viewed forum, than the one dedicated to affairs of the Pacific. Their loss.

Our community experience was very similar to yours. Our family has been in the comunity over 100 years and the notable thing about our obilisk / cenotaph is it's inscribed 1914 - 19 and it was not until I offered, to the community, to act as an 'Adopt an ANZAC' convener to collect Bio's on the named individuals, that the unveiling newspaper clipping turned up. It was unveiled on Octover 16th 1918. Nearly a month before THE ELEVENTH DAY OF THE ELEVENTH MONTH !

How's that !

At our service the Presbyterian and Anglican congregations hold a 10:30 am public function starting at the Cenotaph then moving into the adjacent hall for for a reading of the honoured names, stories etc, where they are less drowned out by our state highway. We then have a pot luck lunch.

I did not do a head count, but from memory we have chairs for approximately 200, and we had people standing. So it was a good turn out. (We only have two churches in the community, but are also joined by the WEC East / West Campus. I felt compassion for one of their students, because he was noticably standing alone, and even more so when I discovered, after the event, that he is a German attending the Bible College.)

Alan SHARP.

[Ann In the UK]

Thanks for the reminder.

Although our Walter (Carrick) was born in Liverpool (1883), his father was a Scot, born in Rothesay (1850). I found him a while back thanks to the kindness and generosity of the folk here. His father drowned at sea weeks before he was born, and his mother died too, just before he was 18. He'd emigrated to NZ c1903 and served with the NZEF on the Western Front in WW1. Fortunately, he survived, but I'm still not sure how in tact he was. He was in A1 health in 1917 when he joined up, but his medical aboard the SS Raranga on the way home in 1919 suggested he was suffering from all kinds of stomach troubles, Emphysema and occasional dyspnoea. He never married, or had kids and died, seemingly alone, of cororonary thrombosis and diabetes in Auckland hospital in 1938. He's buried in the soldiers' section of Waikumete cemetary. His last known address was 53 Khyber Pass Rd, Grafton/Newmarket, Auckland. His funeral arrangements were made by the Public Trustee in Auckland, and his death certificate was signed by the undertaker. A funeral notice was put in the local paper, but his family was 2000 miles away...

However, at the end of last year Walter's 2x great nephew emigrated to NZ and, a few weeks ago, was able to put flowers on his 2x great uncle's grave and tell him he's not been forgotten and will not be, by this generation, or the next.

[Montrose Budie]

I meant to commemmorate Captain Charles Hazlitt Upham, VC and bar, 20th Canterbury–Otago Battalion, i.e. he won the VC twice, one of only men three ever to do so, and the only combat soldier ever to receive the award twice; the other two being members of the RAMC (Royal Army Medical Corps), or its predecessor.


Captain Charles Upham won his first VC for outstanding leadership and courage during fighting in Crete in May 1941. Despite being wounded by a mortar shell, he carried a wounded man back to safety. Eight days after this, he killed twenty-two Germans with a sub-machine gun during an attack.

In 1942, Upham, fighting in North Africa, captured a German position, destroying a tank and several vehicles with grenades despite his injuries. His arm had been shattered by a machine gun but he only stopped fighting when blood loss made him faint. Only then did he have his wounds dressed. Regardless of his wounds, Upham stayed with his men, continued to fight and suffered further injuries.

Captured during the war, Captain Charles Upham was an "awkward" prisoner, he kept on trying to escape, so was eventually sent to Colditz, where he spent the rest of the war as a POW.

He died in New Zealand in November 1994, aged 86.

The above quote is from www.historylearningsite.co.uk . The Wikipedia entry has full copies of the citations from the London Gazette.

He is one of very few private individuals to be accorded the honour of a memorial service on 5 May 1995 in London's St Martin-in-the-Fields church; in Charles' case, attended by representatives for the Royal Family, senior New Zealand government and political figures, senior members of the British and New Zealand armed forces, Valerian Freyberg, 3rd Baron Freyberg, grandson of the commander of the Allied forces in Crete and 7th Governor General of New Zealand, representatives of veterans' organisations and other VC and George Cross holders.

I've visited his grave in the graveyard of St Paul's Church Papanui, Christchurch, and been priviledged to talk to another ANZAC who fought alongside him in 20th Canterbury–Otago Battalion in Crete.

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[Roxy]

Sadly, 4 Kiwi airman joined the long list of Servicemen to die in the service of their country today. A Huey helicopter from No 3 Sqn RNZAF crashed en route RNZAF Ohakea to Wellington to take part in the ANZAC commemoration. All on board died; one in hospital.

RIP

Roxy

[Alan SHARP]

Greetings Roxy.

Thanks, I've tidied up for the night and come back to the computer wondering what I was going to add. As you can see above our local community service, and that of We Ann in Australia, when without a hitch. Closed down the computer, went and shifted some cattle, and came back for tea and the 6pm TV news, expecting to see world wide coverage of how ANZAC's the world over paid their respects, only for a large portion of our HEAD LINE news to be coverage of this terriable accident.

On duty, and on the way to a formal ANZAC service. Being such a small country and them being part of an elete team, both our Prime Minister and leading Army Officials have cut short their formal attendance at Gallipoli and are heading home to NZ.

Our condolences to both the Service and the extended Families.

Alan SHARP.

[Roxy]

Alan,

I have just helped host personnel from No 5 Sqn RNZAF on Exercise in Scotland and have colleagues in serving with the RNZAF. I am aware of just how small that community is; this will hurt deeply.

My thoughts and condolences to all affected; particularly the family and those at Ohakea.


Roxy