Tomorrow is Armistice Day, and 100 years since the end of WWI. As part of the commemoration, a Field of Remembrance has been created on the lawn at the Auckland Musuem. There is a cross (or a Star of David) for every one of the more than 18,000 New Zealand men and women who died in that conflict.
This evening, hundreds of people walked through the field, many looking for specific ancestors. The Big T and I found both of his great uncles; one who died at Gallipoli, the other in the Third Battle of the Somme.
There is a separate area of the field commemorating the 1461 dead who also lost siblings, children or fathers in the conflict.
In a country of around a million people, New Zealand’s loss of 18,000 young men and women is tragic. Hardly a family in the country would have been untouched.
But how much worse for those families who lost more than one son or daughter. Tonight I can’t stop thinking about those mothers; especially the nine for whom the war robbed them of four of their children.
Posted to Six Word Saturday. Well, my title conforms.
It really makes an impression. How I wish we could live in peace.
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So do I 😀
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Beautifully said Su …
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A sombre reflection. Tomorrow people have been asked to join in a Roaring Chorus to mark the centenary https://ww100.govt.nz/join-the-roaring-chorus but I am not sure I am in the mood. Sorrow and remembrance are too far to the fore in my heart.
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I’m with you on this. I can see it degenerating into mindless farce. I think, especially after going to the domain tonight, that I’ll stick with quiet reflection.
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🙂 🙂
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https://codatocoda.bandcamp.com/album/iwm-ww1-armistice-interpretation the moment when the guns fell silent. Eerie!
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Thanks for sending me this link. Eerie indeed.
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❤
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This is such a touching tribute, Su, which I honour in every way, but I find I’m increasingly angry that we ordinary mortals do the remembering, while, for example, UKUS governments continue to sell bombs that are presently being dropped on innocent people.
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I am with you here Tish. I get so angry seeing the TV adverts asking us to donate £2 OR £4 to help send medicine or food to Yemen children who are starving because of the war. A war WE are helping to continue by selling arms to the Saudis! Such irony! But where are the protesters? Too busy yakking about bloody BREXIT. Sometimes I am ashamed to be British. Sometimes I am ashamed to be Human.
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Yemen is only the tip of the nasty ice berg too. There seems to be quite a programme for regime change in sovereign states. The US apparently has 800 military bases in over 70 countries. Russia has around 11, mostly in former Soviet bloc countries. I’ve just joined Stop the War Coalition:
http://www.stopwar.org.uk/
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Thanks for the link Tish. That US number is truly shocking!
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Thanks for the link Tish. Our mainstream news media here never covers Yemen, or indeed much “foreign” news unless there is rugby or royalty involved. Or they can find a “kiwi connection” ☹️
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I feel the same way far too often. Actually I’ve stopped saying I’m British, though I suspect that is more peevishness than anything.
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I feel the same way Tish. Governments seem to have long since stopped representing people in favour of big corporates.
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So moving. I have a Remembrance Day post scheduled for tomorrow as well.
We, as humans, never seem to learn. I just don’t know why we can’t all just get along. Well, I do, but you know what I mean.
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Yes, I know what you mean 🙁
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A deeply touching post so appropriate on the day we call Remembrance Day in Canada! The thousands of crosses are a reminder of the tragedy of war and a call for peace in our troubled world. Thank you, Su!
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Thanks Peter. Canada, like NZ, answered the call to support the British Empire in both world wars, and your losses were terrible too.
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I used to go and sit and eat my lunch in a little churchyard in Doncaster years ago. The church was no longer in use as a church, but the old graveyard was still kept nice and tidy. I would wander around reading the headstones and remember being totally shocked at finding one which belonged to a family where not only had three sons been killed in the war, but also the father. My heart broke for that poor woman. How did these people bear all that pain. No wonder it was called the lost generation; so many women of that time never married.
And yet twenty years later we went through it all again.
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That part of the Field was so incredibly heart-breaking. I really liked the fact that the plaques acknowledged the terrible pain and sacrifice of the families. And that the (female) nurses were remembered too.
When I was a child I had a bunch of, large,y honorary “maiden aunts” who had never married because their young men died inWWI. It’s terrible in one respect, but they were women who had travelled and had careers and done so much more than other women I knew. Out of their loss, they forged really meaningful lives and were my greatest role models.
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WWI is really the forgotten war. WWII got much more attention. Lovely tribute and valid questions/thoughts, Su. Tomorrow (and officially on Monday) we in the US celebrate Veteran’s Day. It’s meant to honor living vets, with Memorial Day for those who’ve given their lives. But I think of both groups on both days and want to never forget them.
janet
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Interestingly, it seems the other way round here. I guess there are all sorts of reasons, including the fact that NZ had such a high casualty rate, and our troops’ participation at the disastrous Gallipoli campaign is a defining point in our sense of nationhood. Plus, US troops only entered WWI right at the end, so your casualties would naturally be very much lower than other combatant countries.
Whatever conflict, whatever day we commemorate though; the important thing is not to forget.
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I agree.
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I learn so much from blogging — 🙂
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😀 so do I.
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Such a terrible waste. And for what? If only it had truly been the war to end all wars.
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beautiful post, Su
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Thanks Yvette 😀
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poignant.
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A deeply touching tribute. What a waste of life for such a small country…
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Thank you Inese. I totally agree.
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What a heart breaking sight all those crosses are and the lost lives they stand for… Overshadowed by Germany’s role in both the World wars but foremost the second, Armistice Day isn’t well known around here, although there are a few remembrance events I think.
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Yes, the scale of the field really brings home the numbers. German casualties were very high in both wars, so it is sad to think they are not remembered. A friend of mine’s husband is the German Consul here in Auckland. They attend all. The Remembrance events, along with Japanese and Turkish representatives.
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