Big crowds honour Anzac memory
A crisp, autumn day greeted the crowds attending Anzac services around the country yesterday.
In Wanaka a Nasa team added a poppy to the payload aboard a long-distance balloon flight.
In Wellington, Dame Patsy Reddy used her Anzac Day address as Governor-General to talk about the need to educate the young about the values and freedoms our soldiers fought to protect.
‘‘By giving our children knowledge of the past, we make a wise investment in the future. We want our young people to be better equipped to make informed democratic choices about what it means to be a New Zealander and what kind of nation we want to be,’’ Dame Patsy said.
Prime Minister Bill English delivered an historical reading during the service which saw representatives from numerous countries across the world lay wreaths in honour of those killed in battle. Five Royal New Zealand Air Force T-6C Texan II aircraft also performed a flyover.
Australian Secretary of Defence, Dennis Richardson, after 48 years in government, attended his first Anzac Day ‘‘in the other half of Anzac’’.
‘‘I’m grateful for the privilege of being here today to honour the sacrifice of New Zealanders, a sacrifice that is shared across the Tasman. Anzac is a bond between our two countries, unlike that shared between any others,’’ Richardson said.
New Zealand’s only living Victoria Cross recipient, Willie Apiata, was among thousands who reflected on our country’s experience of war during two Anzac Day services in Wellington. Apiata, a former corporal in the Special Air Service, warmly greeted both war veterans and several members of the public with a hongi and a handshake following the midmorning service.
Outside the Auckland War Memorial Museum yesterday, prayers were offered by chaplain Colin Mason, Royal New Zealand Navy, while Mayor Phil Goff placed a wreath on the cenotaph in remembrance of service people who have risked their lives at war.
Down south, at least 3000 people turned out for the Christchurch Anzac Day service in Cranmer Square. Two mounted soldiers dressed in the style of Gallipoli soldiers led the procession accompanied by an array of veterans, armed forces and local community groups.
Christ Church Cathedral Nelson reverend Mike Hawke said Anzac Day emotions’’.
In prayer, Hawke said the service was to acknowledge both the gratitude and grief of those who suffered in ‘‘mind, body and spirit’’ in a bid to spread peace and goodwill to the world. ‘‘As the grey shadows of the dawn appeared over Gallipoli, the men of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps received their baptism of fire as they joined the fight of justice and freedom,’’ he said. ‘‘At this hour, on this day, it is so fitting that we should gather here to honour the memories of those who went into the battlefields of war but did not return.’’
An estimated 10,000 people turned out in Dunedin.
In Gore, an 18-year-old exchange student from Australia carried his country’s flag. Harrison Lehman from Tamworth – Gore’s sister city – laid a wreath at the town’s memorial. ‘‘It’s been a bit of an honour. I feel very privileged to represent Australia here this morning.’’
In Cambridge, there was a reminder and a warning about the cost of conflict. ‘‘It was, you know, the war to end all the wars, but it didn’t,’’ Reverend Canon Adrian Gover said. ‘‘The only thing we learn from history, is that we learn nothing from history.’’
In Turkey, NZ Justice Minister Amy Adams and Australia’s Foreign Minister Julie Bishop joined hundreds of people on the former battlefields of the World War I Battle of Gallipoli, to remember those killed there. The solemn ceremony kicked off at dawn yesterday under tight security following a series of recent bombings in Turkey. aroused ‘‘mixed