Home is the soldier...
Nov. 12th, 2004 06:55 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
arysteiaArmistice Day, Remembrance Day, Veterans' Day.
Known by different names in different countries, November 11 is not observed as a holiday in New Zealand, though its significance is known to many. We mourn our dead, and commemorate their sacrifices, on April 25, Anzac Day. The ANZACs (the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps) landed on the beaches at Gallipoli on April 25, 1915, and over the course of the next nine months sustained massive casualties. Rightly or wrongly, the campaign, a debacle by any standards, is remembered in New Zealand as the last hurrah of the colonial cannon fodder concept - namely that New Zealand troops were deliberately and callously sent to the most dangerous positions by British officers. Anzac Day, then, bears an additional significance as the birth of an independent, individual New Zealand, and our spiritual break with Mother England.
This year, however, was different. November 11 saw the fulfillment of a ninety year old dream as the remains of an unidentified New Zealand soldier killed at the Somme were exhumed from the Commonwealth Cemetery in France, and repatriated to Wellington to be buried in a new tomb at the National War Memorial. Just as Anzac Day now commemorates all wars New Zealand has fought, so this man will represent all New Zealand's dead and missing.
An eerie silence descended on the capital as the cortege passed from Parliament to the new Tomb of the Unknown Warrior, accompanied by a military honour guard and a Maori war party. The interment ceremony was beautiful, and the new tomb is too, its black marble simplicity more reminiscent of the Vietnam Memorial in Washington than the baroque splendour of the Cenotaph which previously served as locus for the tens of thousands of New Zealanders buried overseas.
New Zealand lost more soldiers, per capita, in both World Wars than any other country. Eighteen thousand in WWI, for example, out of a population of less than a million. That would be the equivalent of seven million in America today. I weep just thinking about it. These days our army focuses on peace keeping operations, but it still deserves its reputation for bravery, honour, and good humour. I'm proud to wear my red poppy today.
Known by different names in different countries, November 11 is not observed as a holiday in New Zealand, though its significance is known to many. We mourn our dead, and commemorate their sacrifices, on April 25, Anzac Day. The ANZACs (the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps) landed on the beaches at Gallipoli on April 25, 1915, and over the course of the next nine months sustained massive casualties. Rightly or wrongly, the campaign, a debacle by any standards, is remembered in New Zealand as the last hurrah of the colonial cannon fodder concept - namely that New Zealand troops were deliberately and callously sent to the most dangerous positions by British officers. Anzac Day, then, bears an additional significance as the birth of an independent, individual New Zealand, and our spiritual break with Mother England.
This year, however, was different. November 11 saw the fulfillment of a ninety year old dream as the remains of an unidentified New Zealand soldier killed at the Somme were exhumed from the Commonwealth Cemetery in France, and repatriated to Wellington to be buried in a new tomb at the National War Memorial. Just as Anzac Day now commemorates all wars New Zealand has fought, so this man will represent all New Zealand's dead and missing.
An eerie silence descended on the capital as the cortege passed from Parliament to the new Tomb of the Unknown Warrior, accompanied by a military honour guard and a Maori war party. The interment ceremony was beautiful, and the new tomb is too, its black marble simplicity more reminiscent of the Vietnam Memorial in Washington than the baroque splendour of the Cenotaph which previously served as locus for the tens of thousands of New Zealanders buried overseas.
New Zealand lost more soldiers, per capita, in both World Wars than any other country. Eighteen thousand in WWI, for example, out of a population of less than a million. That would be the equivalent of seven million in America today. I weep just thinking about it. These days our army focuses on peace keeping operations, but it still deserves its reputation for bravery, honour, and good humour. I'm proud to wear my red poppy today.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2004-11-12 01:24 pm (UTC)