Passchendaele – 97th Anniversary Yesterday, in the Hall of Memories at the Auckland War Memorial Musuem I attended the commemoration of the 97th anniversary of the Battle of Paschendaele. It was for New Zealand the most devastating and tragic loss of life by New Zealand soldiers in our history. In four hours on 12 October 1917, New Zealand lost 845 men killed and its total casualties, including wounded, were 2700. It’s hard to imagine the terrible slaughter of so many of our young soldiers in what was a futile battle. In wet autumn conditions, the artillery supporting the New Zealand soldiers sank further into the mud with each shell fired. That changed the trajectory of the shells many of which landed on our own men, leaving intact the barbed wire and the German machine-gun posts with disastrous results. Inscribed on the walls around us in the Hall of Mirrors were the names of those from the Auckland region who had perished in the WWI. Each name represents a tragedy for their families, some of which lost two or three sons. We honour the courage, resilience and readiness to lay down their lives for their mates and their country of those who died. As we reflect on the toll of human lives, we must also question how much we learn from history. Just 22 years later, New Zealand service personnel were again, in Europe and the Pacific, fighting the Second World War, the seeds of which were planted in the events and consequences of the First. ‘Lest We Forget’ applies not only to the lives of the soldiers who bore the ultimate sacrifice but also to the failure of our thinking and our institutions which have still to find a better way of resolving conflict.
Posted on: Sun, 12 Oct 2014 22:55:40 +0000
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