South Canterbury War Memorials  

Memorial services are not about glorifying war but commemorating courage and sacrifice so that we might live in peace and to remind us of its waste. We show our respect by still having a parade on Anzac Day, April 25th. The day will never come when New Zealand will forget them.

Servicemen  ||  Memories, Memorials & Medals  ||  The Marquette Angels  || Poppies  

Many communities in the South Canterbury area have war memorials standing at intersections or overlooking the countryside. Schools, business establishments and churches have honour boards e.g. St Mary's. The Memorial Library at Timaru Boy's High School was built to commemorate former pupils of the school who lost their lives in the wars of the 20th century. Let us not forgot those who served in the defensive wars fought overseas.  Anzac Day 2009 TH photos

Some names appear on more than one memorial in South Canterbury. e.g. Capt. L. O'Callaghan's name appears on five war memorials. On the Waimataitai School, St Mary's Church, Timaru, Sherwood Downs, and Timaru's South African War Memorials. He attended school at Waimataitai, farmed on Sherwood Downs, was a member of the Anglican Parish, and served in the South African War and WWI. Memorials were erected years after the war when the funds had been raised for it and peoples memories were fading. There was no hard and fast rule how to select names and every community had a different idea. The odd memorial has a spelling mistake in the inscription or serviceman's surname.

Waimate District

Strathallan District

As the number of old soldiers decreases each year, the crowds who gather to commemorate them grows.

For ex-service cemeteries and memorials and Commonwealth War Graves Commission contact: 
Ministry for Culture and Heritage, NZ
An Agency of the Commission, responsible for war graves in New Zealand.
Heritage Operations
Ministry for Culture and Heritage
PO Box 5364
Wellington
New Zealand  
Tel: (04) 499 4229
E-mail: brodie.stubbs@mch.govt.nz

New Zealand Defence Force
Personnel Archives
Private Bag 905
Upper Hutt
NEW ZEALAND
E-mail address: personnel.archives@nzdf.mil.nz

The Sorrow and the Pride: New Zealand War Memorials / Chris Maclean and Jock Phillips; [Wellington N.Z.: Historical Branch ; GP Books, 1990. 177 p. : ill. (some col.) ISBN: 0477014755 (pbk.) 

McGibbon, Ian  New Zealand Battlefields and Memorials of the Western Front. 112pp 2001 b&w photos, maps  More New Zealanders died there in two and a half years fighting from 1916 to 1918 than in WW2. A guidebook which directions for those who wish to visit the graves of their forebears or to examine the places in which so much New Zealanders fought. Brief descriptions of the various battles in which the New Zealanders took part are provided to give the visitor a perspective on the numerous New Zealand battlefields, monuments and cemeteries. Review

NZ World War One Memorials
NZ War Memorials
    - Napier
    - Dunedin Council  WW2
The National War Memorial
New Zealand Rolls of Honour
NZAMP  defaulted
The Maple Leaf Legacy Project
British War Memorial Project
firstworldwar.com 
Address at Memorial Service for Unknown Warrior by Helen Clark

Passage of time clouds soldiers' Sacrifice

Written in 1941 by a Spitfire pilot.

Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of earth
And danced the skies on laughter silvered wings:
Sunward I've climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds - and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of - wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov'ring there
I've chased the shouting wind along and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air.
Up, up the long delirious burning blue
I've topped the windswept height with easy grace,
Where never lark or even eagle flew.
And, while with silent lifting mind I've trod
The high untrespassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand and touched the face of God.

John Gillespie Magee was 19 when he wrote those lines. He was still 19 when he died a few weeks later.

South Canterbury NZGenWeb Project