Remembrance Day: Police honour fallen comrades

Paul Bartlett and his daughters Phoenix and Gabriel joined Kaitaia's constabulary for last week's Police Remembrance Day Service, in special memory of Constable Jackie Bartlett, who died on January 28, 2013.

The 32 police and traffic officers who were slain in the line of duty since 1886, the 40 who died as a result of their police duties, serving and former staff who died in the last year, were remembered at the Kaitaia police station on Friday.

Police Remembrance Day is observed on September 29, the feast day of Archangel Michael, the patron saint of police.

Kaitaia police chaplain Pastor Louis du Plessis said the reading of the names of those who had fallen had reinforced his view that they were more than "just numbers".

Every member of the force was part of a police family, he said, a truth felt especially keenly by Senior Sergeant Geoff Ryan and Detective Sergeant Paula Drewery, who read the list of names of those who had died as a result of their duties.

She and Mr Ryan had worked alongside the last three of those named, and had known them well.

The service also had special meaning for Paul Bartlett and his daughters Phoenix and Gabriel, whose wife and mother, Jackie Bartlett, died after a long illness on January 28, 2013. She had served as a constable in Kaitaia from May 2005 to September 2011.

Pastor du Plessis said the sense of common loss was shared with colleagues and friends in Australia and the islands of the South Pacific.

"May this service and the spirit of love, faith and compassion that binds us together bring comfort and hope to everyone," he said.

"May our loneliness be eased, our hurt healed and our hope rekindled as we remember that death is not the end but rather the completion of our life here on Earth.

"May the God of peace and hope guide each breath and every step as we continue our journey of life and faith."

The Remembrance Day pin worn on Friday was designed as a feather of the now extinct huia, whose tail plumage was regarded by Maori as rare and special, the inclusion of the police chevron symbolising the honouring of someone special, now lost to the police.