Joan MacBeth, Tom Matiaha and Jacq Dwyer stand by the gates of Pātea Domain, where Pātea's RSA will celebrate 102 years.
Joan MacBeth, Tom Matiaha and Jacq Dwyer stand by the gates of Pātea Domain, where Pātea's RSA will celebrate 102 years.
Howitzer guns, World War II tanks and tents and a battle re-enactment by 40 members of the Historic Reenactment Society will enliven Pātea's Taranaki Anniversary Weekend.
The free event on Saturday, March 6, marks 102 years for the Pātea Returned and Services Association (RSA), secretary-treasurer Joan MacBeth said. She andhusband John met members of the Historical Reenactment Society (HRS) during a visit to Hamilton and got them involved.
"They were very keen. They have done a visit here already to scope it out," she said.
A decision about whether to postpone the day due to Covid-19 will be made in late February, and publicised on the Pātea Historical Society Facebook page.
Tom Matiaha is Pātea's RSA president. He was a regular force cadet in 1964 and then in the Corps of Royal New Zealand Engineers for 12 years. He retired to join the 5 Wellington, West Coast and Taranaki Battalion with an infantry platoon in Pātea and Waverley.
He's expecting hundreds at the centennial and encourages them to wear the medals of their forebears - but only if they know how.
"A cautionary word to pretenders and wannabes - they will be recognised by the incorrect way of wearing those medals. I certainly will be calling them out," Matiaha said.
The event begins at 9am on March 6 at the Pātea Domain in Stafford St.
Military gear from the World War II era on display. There will be two tanks, Land Rovers, a helicopter, tents set up, trucks, six pound guns, vintage fire engines and a fly over by a military aircraft. About 40 HRS members will be dressed in the uniforms of the Allied and Axis forces.
At 10.30am blanks will be fired from three Howitzer guns - two from each - and Pātea people have been warned to lock up their pets.
"These guns are capable of firing a projectile out to 12 miles. Waverley wouldn't be safe if we pointed them that way," Matiaha said.
At 1pm the re-enactors will stage a mock battle for 10 or 20 minutes, "depending on how stubborn the enemy is going to be". The action will be similar to a section battle drill and they will fire blanks from rifles and machine guns.
At 2.45pm people will walk and military vehicles will drive down closed roads to the cenotaph in Memorial Park for a ceremony. The main speaker will be Army Sergeant Major Wiremu Moffitt who is from Pātea. His mother was Freda Pirikahu and his father, Bill Moffitt, was a Vietnam veteran.
The finale will be a dinner for 120 at the Murray Wills Sports Centre.
The purpose of the day is not to glorify war, Matiaha said.
"We are here to remember the men and women who went away to preserve our freedom."
Jacq Dwyer's book covers 100 years of Pātea's military past. Photos / Bevan Conley
Pātea Historical Society president Jacq Dwyer has written a 150-page book about the RSA. It was designed by Caitlin Finnerty and includes the names of about 300 people who went to each World War, including those who returned.
Dwyer gathered war stories from the five towns that surround Pātea - Kakaramea, Alton, Whenuakura, Manutahi and Hurleyville. Talking to veterans was a great privilege, she said.
One of her stories is about Harold Hamerton, who survived 32 missions in a Spitfire in Bomber Command. The average survival rate was nine missions.
Another is about Whenuakura man Henry Coutts, a veteran of the Boer War and both World Wars. He was one of six men to receive a silk scarf made by Queen Victoria. The scarf is now in the National Army Museum at Waiouru.
Dwyer's self-published book will be on sale during the centennial event.
It's not surprising that Pātea is planning a big RSA centennial, she said. The town has a long military history. Its RSA started in 1919, had more than 100 members in the 1950s and had its own purpose-built centre until the 1980s.
Anzac Day celebrations there regularly draw 200 people, the Pātea Cemetery has a military section and the town has a rare Boer War memorial outside its Aotea Utanganui Museum.
The first European settlers made Pātea a garrison town, a base for their efforts to gain control of South Taranaki land. Most of its streets are named after the home towns of those soldiers.
