Howard Chamberlain with his New Zealand flag at Caterpillar Valley Cemetery.
Howard Chamberlain with his New Zealand flag at Caterpillar Valley Cemetery.
Howard Chamberlain from Waikanae was part of a 26-strong group of people who took part in a Passchendaele 100th Anniversary Tour.
The tour during October in France and Belgium was organised by Steve Parsons, from Palmerston North's House of Travel, and involved tour historian Glyn Harper, who is professor of war studies at Massey University, and tour guide Bob Beelen, who could speak a number of languages, which proved invaluable.
A bullet exposed during road works at the Trench of Death.
Howard, who is the honorary curator of the Engineers Corps Memorial Centre, at Linton Army Camp, joined the tour because of his keen interest in military history.
The tour party went to about 13 well-maintained war cemeteries including the extensive Tyne Cot, outside of Passchendaele, Belgium, where many New Zealanders are buried.
At Tyne Cot they attended two services, including a day service which Prince William addressed, and a night service where a light was placed on each headstone which "really showed something," he said.
From Caterpillar Valley cemetery, Longueval, France, the Butts New British cemetery, in Polygon Wood, Belgium, to the the small Thistle Dump cemetery, in Longueval, a real sense of loss was felt.
"And that's a deep feeling," said Howard, a noted military medal mounter.
An extra special service was at the Menin Gate Memorial, at Ieper, Belgium, on October 12, to mark the centenary of the "greatest loss in one day [Battle of Ypres] for New Zealanders in World War One - something like 850 odd killed and 2000 wounded".
More than 50,000 British and Commonwealth soldiers are commemorated at the memorial.
At Dixmude, Belgium, they walked through the Trench of Death, which was one area where the Belgians didn't get overrun by the Germans.
Howard brought home a piece of shrapnel from the area, unearthed from roadworks, which is now in the museum he looks after.
Many of the hotels the tour party stayed in had their own museum, including one in Ieper, Belgium, that had a sword of a New Zealander who had joined the British Army as a soldier and rose to command a battalion, and who had four gallantry medals and four mentions in dispatches.
"There were so many sorts of things like this."
Some of the other many tour events included visiting the site in Compiegne, France, where the Armistice was signed, the Arras tunnels in Belgium where the New Zealand Engineers Tunnelling Company did a lot of work, La Basse-Ville, Belgium, where many New Zealanders died, a monument to Maori All Black Sergeant Charles Rangiwawhia, and the memorial nearby to Corporal Leslie Wilton Andrew who was awarded a Victoria Cross, and later became a Brigadier during World War Two.
The tour visited the Nine Elms Cemetery, Belgium, and viewed, the headstone of the first All Black captain Dave Gallaher, who led the team to victory in Britain in 1905.
The grave of Sergeant Dave Gallagher.
The Bagneux Cemetery, France, was also visited and is a little more remote than most; 181 New Zealand soldiers are buried there and two rather lonely Chinese Labour Corps men whose headstones are marked in Chinese characters but also have in English, "A Good Reputation Endures For Ever".
Howard, a former Warrant Officer Class One in the Royal New Zealand Engineers, said the tour was very educational.
"And I think after what I have read over the years, it has become much more live and much more meaningful."
