NZ Remembrance Army cleans Whanganui service graves

Alison Morris with volunteers from the 5WWCT battalion at Aramoho Cemetary on Saturday afternoon. Photo / Supplied

One hundred graves of New Zealand service personnel buried in Whanganui were cleaned up over the weekend, thanks to the efforts of the New Zealand Remembrance Army and volunteers from the 5th Wellington, West Coast, and Taranaki Battalion (5WWCT).

The Battalion volunteers were in town to take part in a reunion.

Founded in 2019 by Simon Strombom, the New Zealand Remembrance Army has now cleaned close to 12,000 graves around the country, with 3,500 volunteers lending 14,000 hours of their time so far.

In 2009, Strombom was awarded the Distinguished Service Decoration for his duties in Afghanistan.

Alison Morris, Whanganui area co-ordinator for the group, said 70 ceramic poppies, made by potters in Wellington, were placed on graves on Friday afternoon, and the work began on them the following day.

"Having those poppies on the graves makes them really stand out and it's a lot easier to find them," Morris said.

"I think we got 19 or 20 of them done in the space of about two hours, which is really awesome. I was chuffed."

Morris said the Remembrance Army focused solely on service memorials, of which there were at least 450 in one section of the Aramoho Cemetery alone.

It had taken her six months to learn and be able to identify all the emblems, badges and initials that marked out service graves, Morris said.

"For a lot of them it's just a small piece of a service number.

"I spotted an H.N on a headstone on Saturday, and Simon [Strombom] said 'that's a Neptune'.

"It was a headstone for a sailor who had served on HMS Neptune, which was part of the worst naval disaster in New Zealand history."

HMS Neptune sank 30km off the coast of Tripoli, Libya, early on December 19, 1941, after hitting enemy mines. Only one crew member survived.

Of the 736 men who lost their lives, 150 were New Zealanders.

Afghanistan war veteran and New Zealand Remembrance Army director Simon Strombom cleaning a grave on Saturday. Photo / Supplied

The group's goal is to see every service grave in New Zealand restored to the same as their comrades' overseas.

Morris said the graves the group looked after covered all parts of New Zealand history, not just "WWI and after".

"They came from all walks of life.

"There's a Swedish immigrant up there [Aramoho Cemetery] who had only been in New Zealand for a few months before WWI started. He volunteered and went, and made it home.

"It's a history lesson that you'd never learn at school."

The New Zealand Remembrance Army relied on sponsors such as Resene and Bio-Shield, as well as their volunteers, to get the work done, Morris said.

"It doesn't take a lot of people to get the job done. I usually go up there for two hours and can get three headstones done. That's pacing myself as well, because I know my limitations.

"I think the biggest issue is that a grave is owned by the family.

"We're getting to the point now, 100 years on, where so many of the men that came home never married, so there is no family.

"It's a wee bit sad, but there are still people out there who do give a damn."

For more information on the New Zealand Remembrance Army, email nzra.wanganui@gmail.com or visit www.rsa.org.nz/nz-remembrance-army

To donate to the New Zealand Remembrance Army, use the following bank account number: 15-3971-0122354 -00