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  • Seeing the Sights in Paris

    Video

    A party of young women show a group of smartly dressed British, Australian, American and New Zealand soldiers the sights of Paris. Insignia on the women’s clothing suggests they are from the Red Cross. In this excerpt, the group walk along a concourse toward the Eiffel Tower. A pan around the party of sightseers shows a smiling, cheerful group. Later on, the group is in front of the Hôtel de Ville, before all climbing into a truck.

    When the Armistice was signed in November 1918, there were 56,000 New Zealanders overseas or at sea. Demobilisation was a carefully planned manoeuvre with most troops and nurses returning home during 1919 – though the last New Zealanders did not return home until 1921. Troops were anxious to leave and so, to counter rising tension as soldiers waited to hear when they could go home, activities such as the Inter-Allied Games and sightseeing parties were designed to keep the men occupied.

  • Hospital Blues

    Video

    This brief clip shows soldiers feeding hens and gathering eggs in an unidentified New Zealand hospital in 1918 in the United Kingdom. Their lemon squeezer hats identify them as New Zealanders and their uniforms further identify them as hospital patients. Known as the “hospital blues” (also as convalescent blues, or hospital undress) the single-breasted suit and trousers uniform was made out of flannel material of an Oxford-Blue colour, with a white shirt and red tie.

    The hospital blues served a number of functions and were important within the hospital environment. In the first instance, they were a replacement for dirty and often infested uniforms and therefore helped to improve hygiene and cleanliness. They were also a way to distinguish the patients from doctors, nurses and visitors and enabled the administration to maintain discipline and rank. The hospital blues also worked as a form of social control, as publicans were not allowed to sell liquor to men in the blues.

  • Goodbye to Blighty

    Video

    The evocative title for Pathé Gazette No. 535 says it all – Liverpool Good-bye to ‘Blighty’ – (New Zealand Soldiers Leave England with their Wives).

    This short, 23-second clip, shows a passenger ship lined with New Zealand soldiers and their wives, waving goodbye. Quay-side friends and family members wave farewell – among those on shore are several New Zealanders identifiable in their lemon squeezer hats.

    For New Zealand servicemen who had married ‘war brides’ – predominantly women from Britain and Europe – where possible the Defence Department arranged for the passage of both wives and children so that they could go to their new home on the demobilisation ships with their Kiwi husbands.

  • Memorial to the Gallant New Zealanders

    Video

    Crowds gather to watch the unveiling of the memorial to the “gallant New Zealanders” at Messines Ridge in Belgium on 1 August 1924.

    A panning shot reveals a World War One cemetery and rows of graves (presumably of New Zealand soldiers). Soldiers and war veterans walk up a path between the graves. The King of Belgium, Albert I accompanied by the New Zealand High Commissioner, Sir James Allen and General Sir Andrew Russell and other dignitaries gather on the dais for the unveiling of the memorial which is draped with a New Zealand flag.

  • Te Hokinga Mai Te Hokowhitu-a-Tū

    Video

    Look at the smiling soldiers, jam-packed along the ship’s rail, the Māori Pioneer Battalion is home at last.

    After a 36-day journey from Liverpool, the SS Westmoreland arrived in Auckland harbour on the evening of Saturday 5 April 1919. It berthed the following morning and 1,033 personnel disembarked to great fanfare – guns fired a salute, all the ships in the harbour sounded their sirens and horns, three bands played patriotic music and dignitaries greeted the men with brief speeches.

    Renowned Te Arawa leader Mita Taupopoki can be seen with his distinctive tāniko bonnet towards the end of the film clip. One of the haka being performed is the Ngāpuhi war cry “Ka eke te wīwī, ka eke te wāwā” – complete with the leaping in unison and brandishing of taiaha and tewhatewha fighting staffs.

    Following the reception at the wharf the Battalion marched to a pōwhiri at Auckland Domain. Tribes from all over the country gathered to welcome the men home, along with thousands of spectators.

    Of the 43,572 servicemen and nurses who returned home in 63 demobilisation sailings, only the Māori Pioneer Battalion returned together, as a complete unit.

  • Victoria Cross Corner

    Video

    Sunday 29 January 1956, when the Victoria Cross Memorial was unveiled, was a memorable day in Dunedin, New Zealand – everyone was there, dressed in their best.

    The unveiling of the memorial, outside the main entrance to the Dunedin RSA on the corner of Burlington Street and Moray Place, was a grand occasion attended by the Governor-General of New Zealand Sir Willoughby Norrie and Lady Norrie.

    A plaque lists the names of the 22 recipients of the Victoria Cross, nine of whom were in attendance that day, and one of them – the Reverend Keith Elliott – dedicated the memorial. Reflecting the language of the time, the plaque pays tribute to soldiers of “the Maori War 1864, South African War 1899 – 1902, The Great War 1914 – 1918 and The World War 1939 – 1945”.

  • The Australian Red Cross in action

    Video

    Nurses from the Australian Red Cross serve tea and refreshments to returned soldiers, including those injured and in convalescence.

  • Civilian clothing for returned soldiers

    Video

    Towards the end of the war the Australian Red Cross focused on helping integrate returned service personnel into work and society. This clip shows women at the Red Cross making and sorting clothes for returned soldiers.

  • Occupational Therapy

    Video

    Returned Australian soldiers in convalescence are shown to be in good spirits as they hand-craft objects from wooden materials.

  • Peace Loan Procession

    Video

    At the end of the First World War, Australia was in desperate need of funds. To combat this, federal Parliament announced the first Peace Loan campaign on 30 July 1919.

  • Invested at Buckingham Palace

    Video

    London – 3 May 1919 – crowds gather outside Buckingham Palace in London for an investiture by his Majesty King George V. Among the nurses and soldiers receiving awards and honours is a smartly dressed New Zealand officer in his lemon squeezer hat.

    On the dais are Queen Mary and members of the royal household. In front stand Field Marshall Sir Douglas Haig and his Generals – Plumer and Sir William Birdwood. Winston Churchill, then Secretary of State for War, stands proudly in morning suit and top hat.

    After the ceremony, the New Zealand Expeditionary Force (NZEF) Depot Band march past, followed by the New Zealand Parade Commander. Behind them are the New Zealand Field Artillery – note the infantry with their rifles and bayonets. Next, the Australian Imperial Force (AIF) march past. Mounted officers of the AIF and the Australian Light Horse trot by, and the crowd cheers and waves, then the AIF band march past – they are marching easy – and are followed by the Australian infantry.

  • The Ruins of Cambrai

    Video

    French Prime Minister Georges Clemenceau and Field Marshal Douglas Haig of the British Army inspect the ruins of the French city of Cambrai in this clip from the Australasian Gazette newsreel.

  • Clemenceau’s dark days

    Video

    Georges Clemenceau, Prime Minister of France, inspecting French troops during the ‘dark days’ of war in 1918, the year before the assassination attempt. It’s interesting to see among the troops, soldiers from France’s colonies in Africa.

  • An ANZAC visit to Versailles

    Video

    Produced in 1918 – 1919 the film The Land We Live In was a two-hour long extravaganza. Sadly only 21 minutes of the original film survive. Aimed at an education market, the film focused on the main centres and principal towns in Aoteroa New Zealand, promoting scenic views and industry in each province.

    Curiously, sandwiched between images of scenic wonder and industry is this sequence showing New Zealand soldiers sightseeing at the Palace of Versailles, near Paris, in 1919, during the negotiations for the Treaty of Versailles.

    The images were most likely taken by New Zealander Charlie Barton. At that time Barton was New Zealand’s only native-born official war cameraman – unfortunately this is one of the few of his films that survive.

  • A Carefully Arranged Propaganda Exercise

    Video

    Keeping his father’s promise that his eldest son and heir would visit “when peace comes”, Edward Prince of Wales (later King Edward VIII), undertook a tour of the Dominions to thank them for their effort and participation in World War One.

    The Prince spent a month in Aotearoa, arriving in Auckland onboard the Renown. He toured the country in a lavishly decorated train and by motor coach. In total he visited 50 towns and cities between Auckland and Invercargill. The “dashing playboy” was mobbed by enthusiastic crowds wherever he went and is said to have shaken more than 20,000 hands.

    In Auckland the Prince is presented with the 'Freedom of the City' by the Mayor and is given a guard of honour by returned soldiers. In Rotorua, guided by Māui Pōmare, the Prince shakes hands with members of Te Hokowhitu-a-Tū – the Māori Pioneer Battalion. Later he attended a huge reception at the Racecourse.

  • Supporting the men of Te Hokowhitu-a-Tū

    Audio

    Māori leader Sir Apirana Ngata fundraised for the men of the Māori Pioneer Battalion during the war, by establishing concert parties which toured the country performing and popularising waiata such as E pari rā and Pōkarekare āna which have remained enduring favourites today. 

    The money raised from these concerts was used to set up a trust for the men of Te Hokowhitu-a-Tū (the Māori name for the Pioneer Battalion.) In this radio interview, Remi Morrison of Te Arawa, a member of the committee which administered the Māori Soldier’s Trust, explains how they purchased Hereheretau sheep and cattle station, to generate an ongoing income for supporting the returned veterans and their families.

  • The Blue Boys

    Audio

    The impact of wounds, gas, disease and post-traumatic stress or shellshock, meant many returned war veterans would spend a long time in hospital for years after the war – sometimes well into the 1920s. 

    In the era before antibiotics, people could spend many months recovering from injuries and illness. Dedicated veterans’ hospitals were set up throughout Australia and New Zealand during the war.

    In a 1957 radio interview, two New Zealanders, Frank Broad and Alan Kernohan – who were in the King George V Hospital in Rotorua – remembered the restrictions placed on the recovering soldiers. 

    Throughout the British Empire, men who were able to get out of bed, were known as “Blue Boys” because of their “hospital blues” – a uniform worn by the convalescing soldiers. This marked them out and was supposed to prevent the invalids sneaking off to local hotels for a drink, as civilians were prohibited from supplying alcohol to the men in blue… but there were ways around this, as the men recall.

  • The Aussie and the Mademoiselle from Armentières

    Audio

    Pat Hanna's 1930 recording of the iconic World War One song Mademoiselle from Armentières continued the tradition of adapting the words of this famous song to reflect the different experiences of soldiers during the war. Hanna himself served with the Otago Regiment from New Zealand.

    Recorded in Australia on the Vocalion label, this version (with lyrics by Hanna), tells the story of an Australian “Digger” who falls for the French mademoiselle, only to leave her heartbroken when he is killed at Bullecourt (1917) in Northern France. It was a popular number performed as part of Hanna’s “Diggers” vaudeville concert party which toured Australia and New Zealand for many years after the war.

  • No Beer for Soldiers after 6pm

    Audio

    Returning New Zealand soldiers found changes had been made to their homeland while they were away fighting. As a war measure, the early closing of hotels had been introduced in 1917, with all pubs forced to close at 6pm. 

    In a radio documentary recorded in 1977, entitled A Land Fit for Heroes, several men recalled the effect of these measures on New Zealand society and the anger they inspired in returning soldiers.

  • The Diggers’ March in Sydney

    Audio

    In April 1938, several thousand New Zealand “diggers” sailed from Wellington for Sydney, where they reunited with their Australian “cobbers” of 1914 – 1918 in a grand Anzac Day procession through the city.

    The huge march from the Cenotaph to the Domain, where a commemoration service was held, was part of Australia’s 150th anniversary celebrations and some 50,000 returned servicemen took part – with an estimated half a million people lining the Sydney streets. 

    In this live radio broadcast from the Wellington waterfront, Station 2ZB announcers – who were veterans themselves – capture the cheering, bands and excitement on the docks. New Zealand Prime Minister Michael Joseph Savage farewells the old soldiers as they board former World War One troopships – ‘the Monowai’ and ‘the Maunganui’ – for the trip across the Tasman.

  • Marching in Dunedin

    Video

    Following an ANZAC Day ceremony at the Cenotaph in Queen's Garden, Dunedin, hundreds of veterans march down Princes Street. The sheer number of marchers reflects the fact that the Otago and Southland regions provided the largest number of soldiers for the New Zealand Expeditionary Force (NZEF) per head of population. On parade are the 4th Otago Hussars; the 5th Otago Mounted Rifles and marines from a Royal Navy ship. The Battalion Band is followed by officers on horseback and soldiers of the Territorial Regiment. Each company is led by the company commander on horseback, all of whom wear medal ribbons indicating they are World War One veterans.

  • Just enough speechifying

    Video

    In 1912, Sir Thomas Mackenzie, former Prime Minister, was appointed as the New Zealand High Commissioner to London; a post he held until 1920. Mackenzie was particularly concerned about the treatment of New Zealand soldiers and made several visits to see the troops during the war.

    In this clip, Mackenzie, with his back to the camera, talks to New Zealanders outside the 2nd New Zealand Field Ambulance station.

    During his visit, Mackenzie also joined the 2nd Otago church parade, inspected the New Zealand Engineers and made an address to the 3rd Otago Battalion. At the end of Mackenzie’s visit Major General Sir Andrew Russell noted in his diary: "The whole visit has been successful, fine weather – just enough speechifying but not too much”.

  • Images of war

    Video

    A sergeant from the 1st Battalion, New Zealand Rifle Brigade fires rifle grenades from a trench. The work is repetitious and dangerous, as rifle grenades were temperamental – sometimes landing in the trench or exploding in the barrel.

    The destructive power of heavy artillery fire is seen in a pan across the pulverised remains of a village – the scene is one of complete desolation. The pan ends on a trench scene, sandbags are piled high and soldiers with their gas mask satchels on their chest descend into a dugout.

    A line of soldiers stumbles through a large shell hole, knee-deep in water – it is some 20 meters in diameter and 4 to 5 metres deep. The soldiers are conscious of the camera, however the conditions are not staged – they are typical of those endured by the New Zealand Division in the low-lying trenches of Northern France during the winters of 1916 and 1917. It was not uncommon for men to spend up to eight days at a stretch in these tough conditions.

  • Back to Blighty

    Video

    An ambulance arrives at a New Zealand General Hospital and medical orderlies unload wounded soldiers. Around them are wounded men in various states of recovery – note the number of walking sticks and amputees. All of the patients are dressed in “hospital blues” – a uniform worn by all hospital soldiers in the United Kingdom. Under the Defence of the Realm Act it was forbidden for Public Houses to sell liquor to a soldier in hospital blues.

    Can you help us identify the hospital? We know it is a New Zealand General Hospital, so it is either Brockenhurst or Walton-on-Thames. Please contact us if can you help us.

  • Returning Home

    Video

    In this brief clip a group of New Zealand soldiers smile and wave to the camera. They have been invalided out of the war and are on their way home. The camera pans to show “trophies” of war – two soldiers wear gas masks, while a third displays an iron cross – all souvenired from the battlefields, from German soldiers.

  • Amusing sports events

    Video

    Scenes from the “Strawberry Fete” held at Torquay in Devon in the United Kingdom on Alexandra Day, Wednesday 27 June 1917. Promoted by the Four Allied Trades: Dairymen, Fruiterers, Grocers and Bakers, the fete was both a fundraiser and a morale booster.

    Pictured here are New Zealand Expeditionary Force (NZEF) personnel, nurses and locals participating in games and novelty races, including blindfolded races, crawling races, wheelbarrow races and apple-eating competitions. Soldiers, too injured to participate, look on.

  • Trench Fever

    Video

    Although unconfirmed until after the war, one of the biggest enemies that soldiers faced was lice! They thrived in squalid, unhygienic trench conditions and were carriers of bacteria – causing the mysterious disease known as trench fever, along with typhus and scabies. And they made men – already suffering under appalling conditions – unbearably itchy, irritable and depressed!

    To try and combat this, the work of the Medical Corps included sanitation “cleansing stations” where men were able to bathe and their uniforms and blankets were steam-cleaned. Watch as freshly bathed soldiers, wrapped in blankets, hand in their uniforms for cleansing in the Fodden Lorry Disinfector.

  • Entertaining the troops, “The Kiwis” concert party

    Audio

    The campaigns of the Western Front saw men serving in frontline combat positions in the trenches usually for a few days to a week at a time. In between, units were rotated back to ‘reserve’ positions several kilometres away from the Front, where boredom was yet another enemy to contend with.

    In an attempt to keep the troops entertained, concert parties were formed by the men, with names such as “The Pierrots”, “The Tuis” and “The Kiwis.”

    Bill McKeon, who served in the Wellington Infantry and had been in a concert party himself, had fond memories of “The Kiwis” and the high-quality shows they put on at Nieppe, near Armentieres in 1917, which he recalled in a radio interview with Neville Webber.

  • Blighty wounds and deserters

    Audio

    George Lee was among the later reinforcements to join the war, arriving in the trenches near Antwerp in April 1918. By this time, conditions at the front line were intolerable. There were only two ways out; death or injury. In this excerpt, Lee remembers the different methods men employed to be invalided out of the trenches.

  • Going ‘over the top’ at Messines by John A. Lee

    Audio

    On 7th June 1917, New Zealand Labour politician and author John A. Lee was a 25 year old, serving with the 9th (Hawke's Bay) Company of the 1st Battalion, Wellington Infantry Regiment on the Western Front.

    Some 50 years after the war, in 1968 he made this recording, still vividly recalling the experience of ‘going over the top’ behind the thundering Allied artillery barrage, which he calls “the greatest curtain of Hell in all history.”

  • Take Me Back to Dear Old Blighty

    Audio

    This song, in which a series of soldiers yearn to return to ‘Blighty’, or Britain, was hugely popular in 1917.

  • The Rose of No Man’s Land

    Audio

    A sentimental song composed as a tribute to Red Cross battlefield nurses.

  • What Did You Do in the Great War, Daddy?

    Audio

    The subject of a child innocently shaming their father for failing to carry out military service was a commonly used theme of war propaganda.

  • France’s South Pacific Soldiers in Sydney

    Video

    The First World War was truly a global war. What brought this home to Australians was seeing troops from other countries, including France’s Pacific colonies, passing through their country on their way to the Front.

  • The Patriot Spirit

    Video

    Troops from France’s Pacific colonies, on their way to the war in Europe, allowed Australians to display their loyalty and patriotism.

  • Carving Anzac Day

    Video

    An Anzac Day cinema advertisement encouraging Australians to not only mark Anzac Day as a day of significance but to 'carve’ its meaning into the nation’s psyche.

  • Royal Decorations

    Video

    A young Prince of Wales decorates Australian soldiers in France.

  • Ask Your Tailor for Anzac Tweed

    Video

    The factory weaving Anzac Tweed was on the brink of closure when it was taken over by the Returned Soldiers and Sailors Imperial League. It then employed only returned servicemen and their families.

  • The Choice is Yours

    Video

    A government film gives hope of rehabilitation to the returning war veteran.

  • With the Aid of the Red Cross

    Video

    Veterans returning in wheelchairs and with missing limbs gave Australians at home their first sight of the true cost of modern warfare.

  • Learning to farm

    Video

    After surviving the bloody battles on the Western Front and elsewhere, able-bodied returning soldiers were offered opportunities to become farmers.

  • Steeds and shellfire on the Western Front

    Audio

    The horses that were sent to the Western Front during the First World War faced many of the same difficulties as the soldiers that they served. Horses were used to transport officers, heavy artillery and other equipment to the front lines. The artillery conveyed by these horses was an essential element of the military strategies that developed on the battlefront. The Battle of the Somme in 1916 in particular saw the first widespread use of the ‘creeping barrage’, a strategy designed to provide cover for an advancing line of infantry.

    Leonard Leary was a law student in Wellington who first served in Samoa after joining up in 1914 and then joined the British Royal Artillery and fought at the Battle of the Somme. In this 'Spectrum' radio documentary from 1982 he recalls both the trials of controlling horses amid the confusion of a battlefield and the use of the creeping barrage at the Somme.

  • A dead teenager and life on the Somme

    Audio

    Like many young men, New Zealander Jim Warner lied about his age to enlist in World War I and found himself going into action on the Somme with the Auckland Infantry at the age of 18. 

    In this excerpt from a lengthy interview he recorded with Radio New Zealand reporter Andrew McRae in 1982, he recalls the conditions, the death of his 16-year-old friend and the shattered landscape of northern France which had been shelled heavily by the time the New Zealanders arrived in September 1916.

  • Early newsreels: A 1915 Pathé Animated Gazette

    Video

    People went to cinemas during the war to be entertained, but moving-pictures also played an important role in providing cinema-goers with news and information from abroad. Early newsreels, or topical films, were an important part of the typical cinema programme of the time.

    This film is an example of a full-length Pathé Animated Gazette newsreel that was shown during the war. It demonstrates the contents of these types of films and how they mixed serious topics with more light-hearted footage: scenes of the Algerian Native Cavalry in Flanders, a brief glimpse of King George V and Queen Mary making their way through packed London Streets to a service at St Paul’s Cathedral, the opening of a New Zealand military hospital, and Zouaves (Algerian French Infantry).

  • The Empire’s Troops

    Video

    Nearly three million troops from the colonies of the British Empire served during the First World War. This film made by Pathé Freres, released in 1917 but filmed over the period 1915 to 1917, shows how broadly based the Allied forces were. We see Canadians at Salisbury Plains, Indians at Marseilles, and Australians and New Zealanders in Egypt.

    Usually films of soldiers during the war are formal affairs. While the film starts off this way, with the usual scenes of training, marching and inspections, it also shows troops of all the different nationalities in a more informal mood, playing up to the camera-- including performing a Highland jig! It also shows a rare glimpse of ANZAC forces at camp relaxing in Egypt, with the spectacular backdrop of the Pyramids behind them.

  • First English hospital for wounded Kiwis

    Video

    The New Zealand Military Hospital at Walton-on-Thames was the first English hospital to be established for Kiwi soldiers during the First World War. It was officially opened on Saturday 31 July 1915, in a ceremony attended by “one of the largest gatherings of New Zealanders that has ever assembled" in the UK. (Evening Post, 24 September 1915, p.4)

    This film clip shows NZ High Commissioner Thomas Mackenzie and William Lord Plunket at the hospital’s official opening ceremony on 31 July 1915. Lord Plunket was a former Governor of New Zealand and the chair of the NZ War Contingent Association, formed on London at the outbreak of the war to support wounded NZ troops. The Association helped to select the hospital premises, and its members later visited convalescing patients.

  • The wounded return home to Australia

    Video

    More than 150 sick and wounded men return to Australia on the S.S Karoola which was fitted as a hospital ship in England. Soldiers suffering severe injuries are transported from the ship to waiting vehicles. They disembark on stretchers and, rather unconventionally, by piggy-back.

    When sick and wounded soldiers left the battlefield they were out of immediate danger, but were not entirely safe until they reached their final destination. It was not uncommon for hospital ships to be attacked, whether because of mistaken identity or intentionally. The Australian hospital ship HMAT Warilda was sunk on 3 August 1918 with the loss of 123 lives. The greatest disaster of this kind was in February 1916 when a German U-boat torpedoed the Canadian hospital ship HMHS Llandovery Castle, with the loss of 234 lives. After the war the U-boat’s captain and two of his lieutenants were charged with war crimes.

  • Caring for our Wounded

    Video

    Over 3,000 Australian nurses volunteered during the First World War, working in hospitals, including hospital ships and trains, and in field stations closer to the front line.  This film shows scenes of Allied forces medical staff and stations taken throughout the Western Front, 1916-1918: “No words can describe the awfulness of the wounds. Bullets are nothing. It is the shrapnel that tears through the flesh and cuts off limbs”

  • Boxing and recruiting

    Video

    In the early stages of the war sport was seen as a fertile site for recruitment, and this film shows 17,000 spectators crammed into the Sydney Stadium to witness Les Darcy defend his world middleweight title against American Eddie McGoorty in 1915. An intense affair, Police ended the fight in the 15th round after McGoorty was knocked down for the fourth time. Beforehand the Premier of NSW, William Holman, and the opposition leader, Charles Wade, were scheduled to give a recruitment speech.

    However, as it became obvious that the war would not be over quickly, and as casualties from Gallipoli mounted, sport was condemned as a distraction from fighting and the home front war effort.

  • Patriotic Football

    Video

    Football clubs displayed their patriotism by publishing lists of players (past and present) who had enlisted, and by organising carnivals and events to raise funds for the war effort.  This film shows a fundraising match between the 1915 VFL premiers Carlton and an Army Camp side at the Melbourne Cricket Ground. The Camp team, wearing the Collingwood strip, was made up of current and former AFL players who had enlisted in the Australian Imperial Force. The match, won by Carlton, raised 248 pounds for the Wounded Soldiers Fund and attracted 6000 spectators.

  • Billy Hughes visits the AIF’s home away from home

    Video

    The First World War led to a major influx of Australians into Britain. From summer 1916 to the end of the war there were never fewer than 50,000 Australian troops present. In 1915 Horseferry Road in Westminster, London, became a home away from home for the Anzacs. The AIF Administrative Headquarters, the Australian War Records Section and the War Chest Club were located there (the Club was established to promote the welfare of all soldiers). Horseferry Road became a historically significant Australian location: it was where the Anzacs could create a community for themselves, and was filled with men wearing slouch caps and speaking with familiar accents.

    In this film the Australian Prime Minister, William ‘Billy’ Hughes, doffs his top hat to the camera before inspecting soldiers at the AIF Headquarters. These visits were effective in raising troop morale, letting them know that, though far from their own country, they remained in the thoughts of those back home.

  • Australian soldiers in France

    Video

    Prime minister William (Billy) Hughes, Sir General Rawlinson and Major General Monash visited AIF soldiers in bombed out Péronne, Somme, France, July 1918. For almost the whole of the war, the town of Péronne was occupied by German troops; it was liberated by Australian troops on 2 September 1918.

  • "I gave my life willingly for my country”

    Image

    The Matyrdom of Nurse Cavell is a 1916 Australian feature-length film directed by Jack Gavin and Charles Post Mason about the execution of Edith Cavell during World War I. The Matyrdom of Nurse Cavell was viewed as a rival to Nurse Cavell, also produced in 1916, and there was legal action by Jack Gavin’s backers. It is considered a Lost Film.

  • Nurse Cavell imprisoned before her execution

    Image

    The Martyrdom of Nurse Cavell is a 1916 Australian silent film about the execution of Nurse Edith Cavell during World War I, directed by Jack Gavin and Charles Post Mason. Told in four parts, the film was one of the most popular Australian silent movies ever made. The film is lost with no copies known to have survived.

  • “Tell My Daddy to Come Home Again“

    Audio

    The songs sung by music hall artists during the First World War were often filled with war fever and patriotism. Propaganda messages promoted through song could appeal both emotionally as well as rationally and had the added benefit of being easily remembered and repeated by the average citizen. Tell My Daddy to Come Home Again: The Evening News Lonely Soldiers Song, recorded by Stanely Kirkby in 1915, is one such song, with lyrics written from the perspective of a child lamenting their father who has gone off to war.

  • Pacifism on the home front

    Audio

    In this excerpt, Millicent Baxter recalls her conversion to pacifism during World War I as a result of reading a letter written by her future husband, the pacifist objector Archibald Baxter. Millicent had not then met Archibald, but the letter to his parents, published in the newspaper Truth, moved her to investigate his pacifist viewpoint. In the face of popular patriotism, she adopted those views for herself.

  • Starting the New Zealand RSA

    Audio

    Many men who had been invalided back to New Zealand after the Gallipoli campaign found adjusting to civilian life difficult. Those without family support found themselves with little income and in some cases were virtually homeless once they were discharged from the Army. It was not long before a group formed to improve the lot of returned serviceman. In this recording from 1966, radio broadcaster Neville Webber interviews two World War I veterans, Gilbert Lawrence and Ernie Golding, who helped form the Returned Soldiers’ Association (RSA) in Wellington in early 1916.

  • In the Bull Ring at Sling Camp

    Audio

    Sling Camp on the Salisbury Plains of England was home to four or five thousand New Zealand soldiers at any one time, from 1916 until after the end of the war. It was staffed by New Zealand officers, with the exception of physical instructors whose job it was to get the ‘colonials’ into fighting shape. These men were veteran sergeant-majors of the regular British Army and their territory was the training ground known as ‘The Bull Ring.’  In a 1964 radio interview, Jack Archibald of Nelson recalled the grim conditions he faced there in the harsh winter of 1917.

  • Singing about Niuean soldiers who volunteered

    Audio

    The song ‘Lologo tau kautau Niue ne oatu he Felakutau Fakamua he Lalolagi’ was sung by the men from the Pacific island of Niue who volunteered to join New Zealand’s Māori Contingent in 1916. They served in France alongside Maori troops in the newly formed Pioneer Battalion, and suffered greatly from conditions colder than they had ever imagined.

  • ‘Great soldiers, good fellows’

    Audio

    The Victoria College Officers’ Training Corps was formed in Wellington in 1910. It was established partly by the need to train a new generation of officers to lead and fight in the New Zealand militia. Charles Treadwell was an original member of the Corps and in this talk he recalls its founding, the different forms that their training took, and the men he served with.

  • Marking the first Anzac Day in London

    Audio

    In April 1916, a year after the Anzac landings at Gallipoli, the first anniversary of the battle was observed in Australia, New Zealand and Britain. A grand memorial service was held at Westminster Abbey in London, attended by King George V and Queen Mary. Hundreds of New Zealand and Australian military personnel marched through the streets to the Abbey to attend the service. 

    Among them was Sydney-born Dr Agnes Bennett, who had been working in Egyptian hospitals treating the wounded from Gallipoli. Some 40 years later she recalled the experience in this excerpt from a radio ‘talk.’

  • ‘It's a Long Way to Tipperary’

    Video

    In this animated film, a British soldier dodges bullets and explosions. He grits his teeth as he thinks, ‘It’s a Long Way to Tipperary’. If you want to sing along, as cinema audiences did when it was presented, the lyrics are right there on the screen.

  • Seven Keys to Baldpate

    Video

    In Seven Keys to Baldpate, a silent film based on a stage farce, a struggling novelist undertakes to write a novel during 24 hours in the Baldpate Inn.  He thinks he has the only key but a succession of strangers arrives.

    Australian impresario J.C. Williamson had already produced several war-themed films when he turned to filming plays such as this ‘mystery farce’, his final film. The war films, with outdoor scenes and dramatic action, were apparently more successful than these filmed theatre productions with their quivering canvas sets. Ironically, being less popular may have protected them from being destroyed through repeated projection.

  • Leaving Gallipoli

    Audio

    From 18 to 20 December 1915, the Allies retreated from the Gallipoli peninsula. In the days beforehand, rumours of their impending departure produced mixed feelings in the men. After months of the hardships of war, they were reluctant to leave the resting place of their fallen pals. Had it all been in vain? In this compilation, three veterans remember the evacuation of Gallipoli.

  • "The toughest part of the war was lack of sleep"

    Audio

    Coupled with the lack of shelter or water and a very poor diet, Australian and New Zealand soldiers on Gallipoli found the lack of sleep almost impossible to get used to. The cramped conditions, noise, heat and flies made a good night’s rest a rare luxury. Men often fell asleep where they were sitting – or standing, as New Zealand veteran Jerry Duffel recalls in this radio interview recorded in the 1960s.

  • Battle in the Blizzard

    Audio

    In late 1915, towards the end of the Gallipoli campaign, a fierce snowstorm struck the peninsula. Allied soldiers fought the Turkish army while enduring rain, sleet and snow which caused severe frostbite and froze the trenches. In these radio interviews, three New Zealand veterans recall the living conditions and their experiences in the blizzard.

  • “We left a lot of booby traps behind…”

    Audio

    From 18 to 20 December 1915, the Allies retreated from the Gallipoli peninsula. The evacuations were carried out quietly, overnight, so the Turkish troops would not suspect that their foes were leaving. Here, two veterans recall stealthily sneaking away in the dead of night, leaving booby traps behind. The first speaker is Sergeant Walter Cobb, a machine gunner with the Wellington Mounted Rifles. The second is Captain Ray Curtis of the machine gun section of the Canterbury Infantry Battalion.

  • The walking wounded return home

    Video

    New Zealand soldiers board a ship. It may be a hospital ship returning them to New Zealand, as some of the men are visibly wounded, using crutches and walking sticks. A civilian woman can be seen in the opening frames, indicating that this scene may have been shot in England.

  • Trentham Military Training Camp

    Video

    This film shows a panoramic view of Trentham Military Training Camp, north of Wellington. In the foreground, groups of men can be seen practising drills. Behind them is the camp; a few permanent structures surrounded by rows of characteristic cone-shaped tents. Trentham was where many soldiers of the Main Body completed their brief training.

  • ‘Only One of the Toys’

    Audio

    The dismal lyrics of ‘Only One of the Toys’ suggest that the soldier in question is merely a toy with no authority. He eventually dies on the battlefield, fulfilling the destiny he predicted to his son before leaving for war. Despite its gloomy subject, this 1914 song was surprisingly popular in its day.

  • ‘Heroes of the Dardanelles’

    Audio

    The Gallipoli campaign inspired a number of patriotic songs like this one, that helped to build the Anzac legend back home and give Australia an independent identity from Britain.

  • New Zealand soldiers recover from battle wounds

    Video

    After being wounded in battle, many Anzac soldiers were shipped to England to recover. Once their injuries healed, they were sent to convalescent camps around the country to restore them to fighting fitness. This short film shows New Zealanders at a convalescent camp taking part in training exercises to improve their fitness. As the film shows, training was not all hard work, and they certainly had some fun at the camps.

  • Training at Trentham

    Video

    The New Zealand Expeditionary Force (NZEF) required fit, young, trained solders, both to prepare them for the realities of marching and fighting on the Western Front, but also to reinforce those who met their deaths there. Many men who were trained during the First World War had already received compulsory drilling during junior cadet training at school. The Trentham Military Camp in the Hutt Valley was opened in 1915 to accommodate and train newly recruited soldiers before they were sent to Europe, where their training would continue.

  • Ex-pat Kiwis march in the London Lord Mayor’s Show

    Video

    In November 1914 the annual London Lord Mayor’s Show took on a very military flavour, with thousands of troops from Britain and her allies marching through the streets. They included a group of 150 New Zealanders, part of a contingent of 200 who were living in Britain when war was declared.

    As this tiny fragment of film from 1914 shows, the New Zealanders were still wearing the ‘slouch’ hat with the upturned brim which New Zealanders had worn in the South African War.  Later in the war this would be replaced by the peaked ‘lemon squeezer’.

  • Soldiers swim at Gallipoli

    Image

    This hand-coloured glass slide shows men swimming in or lying beside the water at ANZAC Cove, beneath Plugge’s Hill (in background).

  • Nurses remember the sinking of the Marquette

    Audio

    Three New Zealand nurses - Elizabeth Young, Mary Gould and Jeanne Peek (née Sinclair) - recount their experiences of the sinking of the troopship S.S. Marquette on 23 October 1915. The nurses were part of the New Zealand No. 1 Stationary Hospital unit, which was sailing on the troop transport from Alexandria, Egypt, to Salonika (Thessaloniki) in Greece, when their ship was struck by a torpedo from a German U-boat.

  • Machine gunners at Chunuk Bair

    Audio

    Leonard Leary was an ammunition handler with a Wellington Infantry Battalion machine gun team, and was wounded at Chunk Bair. The outdated Maxim machine guns used by New Zealand troops on Gallipoli were operated by a team of six men. These teams had to carry their guns up to vantage points and assemble them there in the heat of battle.

    Listen to Leonard Leary reading from his memoir about the battle of Chunuk Bair.

  • Wounded at Chunuk Bair

    Audio

    The battle for Chunuk Bair was one of the bloodiest of the Gallipoli campaign for the New Zealand Expeditionary Force. Robert (“Bob”) Alexander Needs of the Otago Infantry Battalion, describes his experiences of the battle up Rhododendron Ridge, and the chaotic aftermath for the wounded.

  • “All my mates ever got were wooden crosses”

    Video

    Corporal Cyril Bassett was the only New Zealander to be awarded a Victoria Cross for the Gallipoli campaign. In this 1916 film clip he is congratulated by fellow Kiwi soldiers shortly after being presented with his medal. His modesty can be seen in his bearing – while smiling and shaking hands jovially, he still appears reserved. Throughout his life, Bassett had mixed feelings about his VC. “All my mates ever got,” he said, “were wooden crosses.”

  • “Every one of those lads was lying dead”

    Audio

    Dunedin-born Charles Duke was working in Australia as a journalist when World War I broke out. He signed up with the Australian Imperial Force, sailing with the 4th Battalion. By early August 1915 he had twice been wounded and evacuated from Gallipoli. Yet he returned to his unit and found himself caught up in the bloody offensive which came to be known the Battle of Lone Pine.

    Duke wrote a detailed account of his war, and in this 1969 radio programme he gives a vivid description of hand-to-hand fighting in the trenches at Lone Pine.

  • Schoolgirl life and love during the war

    Audio

    There was a sharp divide between rich and poor in New Zealand at the time of the First World War. Marjorie Lees, the daughter of an upper-class Wellington family, was attending boarding school in 1914. Young women of her social status faced a restricted life, with very few options apart from marriage once they left school. But like young people from all walks of life, she was soon to experience the heartbreak of war.

  • E pari ra / The tide surges

    Audio

    In this sound clip Tānga Tomoana describes how his father Paraire Hēnare Tomoana came to write lyrics for the well known and popular waiata E Pari Rā. He wrote the song in 1918 at the request of his friend Maku-i-te-Rangi Ellison whose son, Whakatomo Ellison, died in the war. Paraire wrote it as a memorial and lament for all fallen soldiers. Speculation is that Tomoana used the tune from a German Waltz, the Blue Eye’s Waltz to base his song on. Many other popular songs were written by Paraire including Pōkarekare ana, Hoea rā te waka nei, Tahi nei taru kino, Hoki hoki tonu mai. These are still performed by New Zealanders to this day. E Pari Rā was adopted by the New Zealand Navy as their official song.

  • Dust in our ears, eyes, mouth, nose and everywhere

    Video

    In late 1914 the New Zealand and Australian forces were diverted from their original destination of England to Egypt. There they combined to form the ANZAC Corps that would eventually fight in the Gallipoli campaign. This film shows an activity that became a routine part of soldiers’ life - the troop inspection.

    As well as the blazing Egyptian heat, the ANZAC troops had another menace to contend with – dust. Herbert Hart wrote in his diary “[t]he sand is worked into such fine dust near camp, that it now flies everywhere whenever the troops move over it. We had dust in our ears, eyes, mouth, nose and everywhere, it fell from our puggarees [cloth wrapped around the regulation sun helmets], pouches, pockets, putties [long cloth strips wrapped around the calves] or from all our clothes.”

  • The Anzac convoy departs from Albany

    Video

    The Main Body of the NZ Expeditionary Force steamed off from Wellington on 16 October 1914. The convoy consisted of 10 transport ships and four escorts, carrying 8000 soldiers and nearly 4000 horses. They arrived in Albany on 28 October to join up with 28 Australian Imperial Force troopships. The combined Anzac fleet of 38 troopships and escorts, carrying 30,000 soldiers and 7,500 horses, departed Albany on 1 November.

    This film shows soldiers of the Auckland Infantry Battalion ready to embark on Albany Wharf, and the line of grey-painted New Zealand troopships waiting to follow the Australian convoy ships (which retained their civilian colours). This vast fleet took soldiers from Australia and New Zealand halfway around the world to participate in the First World War.

  • Wrestling on deck

    Video

    This film was made during the New Zealand convoy’s 1915 journey from Wellington to Egypt, via Hobart and Colombo. On long voyages like this, an especially popular way for soldiers to spend their free time was watching wrestling bouts. Here the crowd watches intently as two soldiers, possibly former professional wrestlers, come to grips on the deck of the troopship. This appears to be a “worked”, or staged, bout, rather than a genuine contest. Gambling was prohibited on board troopships, but it seems highly likely that money changed hands on this occasion.

  • Readying the Samoan Expeditionary Force

    Video

    When war was declared in August 1914, New Zealand was asked by the British Government to capture German Samoa. A Samoan Expeditionary Force made up of just over 1300 soldiers, mostly from the Wellington region, departed for the Samoan capital, Apia, on 15 August. Little resistance was met when the troops landed a fortnight later, and a New Zealand military administration occupied Samoa over the course of the war.

    No footage of the New Zealand occupation of Samoa exists. However, this is footage of the two troopships, S.S. Monowai and S.S. Moeraki, which transported the Samoan Expeditionary Force. While the provenance of this film is unknown, the fact that the transport ships are still in civilian colours, a "2" is evident on the side of one of them (the troopship number), the dress of the sentry and the presence of a 12 pound gun suggests that it shows a glimpse of the preparation on Wellington’s waterfront for New Zealand’s first action during the war.

  • A sea of faces say goodbye in Dunedin

    Video

    Tahuna Park in Dunedin was the initial training camp for soldiers of the Otago and Southland Section of the Main Body of the NZEF. It was also the site for this civic reception farewelling the men on 16 September 1914. The Otago Daily Times reported that “seldom, if ever, has such a large Dunedin crowd been gathered together at one time." (17 September 1914, p. 2).

    The soldiers seem all smiles and expectant faces, and eager to be off to war. The film also gives rare glimpses of how Dunedin people felt as their fathers, husbands, brothers and sons headed off to the front. There is a sense of apprehension amongst this sea of faces, and it was well founded. Many of the troops shown in this film later became casualties of the 1915 Gallipoli Campaign.

  • Poor old soldiers, both two-legged and four-legged

    Audio

    Horses were among the unsung heroes of the NZEF during World War One. Ten thousand horses were sent overseas over the course of the war. They were used by mounted troops and officers, and for transporting equipment and artillery. The life of a horse in the army was a tough one. They endured brutal conditions travelling to the front and at the battlefield, and only a handful returned back to New Zealand, as Percy Lowndes recalled in 1969.

  • The last month I was there, I never wore trousers

    Audio

    The Anzac troops on Gallipoli faced many discomforts in addition to the Turkish soldiers shooting at them from over the hill. They lacked food and drinking water, suffered from sicknesses like dysentery and typhoid, and were surrounded by bodies decomposing in the heat. Life on the peninsula was all about survival, and it changed the men’s priorities. Here two New Zealand veterans talk about the highs and lows, including eating a dead sheep they found, squabbling over fresh bread and being evacuated due to dysentery.

  • "War is lunacy": The burial armistice

    Audio

    On 24 May 1915, both sides on Gallipoli agreed to a temporary armistice (ceasefire) to bury the dead, who were literally piling up between the trenches. This event was perhaps not as friendly as the famous Christmas Truce of 1914 in France, but nevertheless the men were thankful for a chance to bury the decomposing bodies. Here, three New Zealand veterans of Gallipoli, Walter Cobb, Mr Fraser and Mr Davidson, recall their experience of the armistice. Their accounts differ in their reporting of fraternisation (making friends) with the enemy Turks. This may be due to their different ranks (Cobb was a sergeant) or to the attitudes of their commanders.

  • “What about a drop of water, Digger?”

    Audio

    Water shortages were a constant problem for the thousands of men based at Gallipoli in 1915. Natural water was scarce on the peninsula and attempts to solve the problem by using water condenser units to convert sea water for drinking proved inadequate. Water supplies, often from as far away as Egypt, had to be brought in by boat and landed on the beach, sometimes under fire. Then the various containers had to be dragged over the rugged landscape to the thirsty men in their trenches. 

    The unidentified New Zealand veteran in this interview recalls how the mateship between Kiwis and Australians meant they sometimes gave each other preferential treatment with water rations.

  • Penny trails and white feathers

    Audio

    During WW1, those at home were encouraged to support the men at the front by donating money or goods to the war effort. Colin Franklin-Browne recalls watching fundraising parades and penny trails (lines of coins which the public were encouraged to add to) on Wellington’s streets in 1914-15. He also remembers the dark side of this patriotic fervor. Women’s patriotic groups sent white feathers, symbols of cowardice, to men who had not enlisted. The women targeted pacifists, men not yet in uniform and even those unable to enlist for medical reasons.

  • Teenage soldiers and a boat full of blood

    Audio

    Seventeen-year-old Daniel Patrick (Pat) Lloyd of Christchurch was among the New Zealanders who landed at Gallipoli on April 25 1915. He witnessed the carnage when the boatloads of men came under heavy machine-gun fire as they came ashore. Pat survived and went on to serve in France where he won a Distinguished Conduct Medal for ‘gallantry in the field’. Fifty years later he took part in an anniversary ‘pilgrimage’ by New Zealand veterans, who returned to Gallipoli to retrace their footsteps and visit graves and memorials to fallen comrades.

  • Mrs Barnard’s gingernuts

    Audio

    Six of Helena Barnard’s eight sons went away to fight, and she sent them care packages that included the gingernut biscuits she used to bake for them to take on tramping trips. The gingernuts were a welcome change from the notorious Gallipoli diet of tinned bully beef and ship’s biscuits. They lasted well and quickly became favourites with the boys at the front. Many wrote to Mrs Barnard asking her to provide their own mums with her recipe. Her gingernuts became famous and are quite possibly the original ANZAC biscuit. This interview was recorded around the time of Helena Barnard’s 100th birthday.

  • Verdun Buns – a Red Cross cookbook

    Audio

    Ena Ryan was born in the prosperous Wellington suburb of Kelburn in 1908. In this 1985 interview she leafs through a cookbook produced during the war as a fundraiser for the Red Cross.  The recipes and advertisements reveal the social upheaval the war brought to communities back home, from florists advertising speedy service for last-minute weddings (before men departed overseas) to recipes for cooking for invalids. Some recipes were contributed by the public, and Ena is appalled that one woman named her recipe ‘Verdun buns’, after the horrifingly destructive 1916 Battle of Verdun.

  • Flower power

    Video

    It was the most spectacular parade that the South Island town of Nelson had ever seen. Daffodil Week, a fundraising campaign to provide comforts to troops serving overseas, took place in September 1916, and the highlight was the grand parade and crowning of the Flower Queen. The streets were decorated with flags and from early morning children were selling buttonholes (small posies of flowers), while stallholders sold cut flowers, ferns, plants, seedlings, sweets and produce.

    In this short film the impact of World War One is evident. The floats and organizations are marshalled by uniformed soldiers, and the streets are lined with members of the local Territorial infantry battalion. The Rt. Rev. William Sadlier, the Bishop of Nelson, can be seen in a frock-coat in the crowd. The annual Flower Queen, elected by popular vote, was Miss Hazel Win. Altogether £780 (or NZ$100,000 today) was raised for Christmas presents for the boys at the front.

  • The landing of the Australian troops in Egypt

    Audio

    This commercial sound recording includes what might be the first recorded version of 'Advance Australia Fair', the song that became Australia's national anthem. In music and drama, this production recreates the 1914 arrival of the Australian troops in Egypt, before their departure for Gallipoli. It may have been aimed at giving those on the home front a sense of the soldiers’ lives. The recording is very celebratory and full of pride at the role Australia was playing in the Great War.

  • 'If England wants a hand, well, here it is'

    Audio

    Comes a message o’er the ocean
    A message to our sunny land
    England calls Australia’s soldiers
    We must answer her command
    If England wants a hand, well, here it is…

    The lyrics of this rousing, patriotic ballad were written by one of Australia’s most popular vaudeville (music hall) performers, with music by a noted Sydney songwriter. 'If England Wants a Hand, Well, Here It Is' was used on the soundtrack of the 1981 Australian feature film Gallipoli.

  • Fundraising for the war effort, Sydney

    Video

    Various wartime fundraising and recruitment activities are seen in this film from about 1916, shot from outside the General Post Office in Martin Place, Sydney, after rain. In pavilion-style tent stalls, Red Cross workers sell ribbons, flowers and other produce. The top-hatted Governor of NSW, Sir Gerald Strickland, walks among the crowds. Many AIF troops are shown in this clip, their humour in evidence in a shot of a young male civilian being ‘accosted’ and compelled to enlist, while others pretend to take his measurements for a uniform.

  • Sailing into war, 1914

    Video

    For many Anzac soldiers, their outward voyage on a troopship was their first overseas experience. The excitement of departure was soon replaced by seasickness on one of the world’s roughest seas. On the long voyage to Egypt they took part in leisure activities and routine training exercises like those shown here. Officers organised physical training programmes, inoculations, lectures and target practice sessions to keep the troops occupied.

  • Joining the Flotilla, 1914

    Video

    At the outbreak of war in August 1914, dozens of vessels were hastily converted into troopships to transport military units to their destinations overseas. This film shows newly recruited AIF troops boarding troopships at Woolloomooloo (Sydney, NSW) and Port Melbourne (Melbourne, Vic.)  Their ships then joined the flotilla at King George Sound (Albany, WA), the final Australian anchorage for the first convoy of almost 30,000 Australian and New Zealand soldiers heading to Egypt.

  • Comforts for the troops

    Video

    Throughout the war Federal Government House, the magnificent Melbourne residence of Australia’s Governor-General, was a central depot for Red Cross supplies for Australian troops serving overseas. Medical supplies and clothing, and small luxuries such as soap, tobacco and fruitcakes (known as ‘comforts’) were donated by the women of Victoria and delivered to Government House. Its ballroom became a warehouse and factory where goods were received, made, checked and despatched by volunteers, and the stables were converted into a workshop for making furniture and crutches. This silent film clip shows the first shipment of Red Cross supplies being loaded on to motorised and horse-drawn vehicles and leaving Government House for despatch to Australian soldiers in Egypt.

  • Departure of Reinforcements for the Front

    Video

    Troops (seen from dock) wave from ship prior to departure. Numerous civilians hold streamers connected with occupants of ship, while other civilians wave handkerchiefs as the ship leaves the wharf. The HMAT A20 Hororata weighed 9,400 tons with an average cruise speed of 14 knots or 25.92 kmph. It was owned by the New Zealand Shipping Co Ltd, London, and leased by the Commonwealth until 11 September 1917.

  • A troopship departs for Albany, 1914

    Video

    When Australia entered the First World War in support of Britain, ships were urgently needed to transport troops to the distant battlefields. The hastily refitted ships also had to carry the troops’ horses and military stores, plus wool, metals, meat, flour and other foodstuffs, mainly for the armies of Britain and France. This film shows the loading and departure of troops HMAT (His Majesty’s Australian Transport) A20 Hororata from Port Melbourne, Victoria on 18 October 1914. Troops move up the gangplanks of the transport ship. A tug then tows the Hororata out of port and it joins other ships in the convoy to head out to sea.

  • Turning boys into soldiers

    Video

    Compulsory military training was established in New Zealand in 1909, and by 1912 all boys aged 14 and over were required to undertake military drills as Senior Cadets. From the age of 18 to 21 they were required to serve in the Territorial Forces. In the process boys were turned into soldiers, since the Territorials formed the recruiting basis of the NZ Expeditionary Force.

    This film shows just how young this element of the Expeditionary Force was. Some very youthful-looking members of the Canterbury Territorials, and possibly Cadets as well, are seen marching into Christchurch around 1914.

  • Bright blades flickering into straw-filled sacks

    Video

    As part of their full 16-week training course, recruits were given four weeks of training in drill, artillery and bayonet use at Featherston Military Training Camp, in the countryside north of Wellington. This film shows Lewis gun instruction, and fixed bayonet training with straw-filled dummies. A history of the Trentham Camp recorded how: “The bright blades flickered into the straw-filled sacks, out again and in again. At each point the men made hoarse guttural noises, like football war-cries, and when the enemy was presumed to be dealt with they charged on for a line of trenches. The instructor had overtaken them... But he scarcely could be heard for the yelling of his men, mingled with the war-cries of other squads.”

  • A rickshaw ride in Durban

    Image

    Two Australian soldiers riding in a rickshaw pulled by a local man in Durban, South Africa, is taken from a B&W glass slide. Durban was an important port during WWI as troopships from Australia and New Zealand sailed around the Cape of Good Hope. From 1916 this was a safer route than the Suez Canal as there was a risk of a submarine attack in the Mediterranean. Soldiers disembarked in Durban and the troopships resupplied the journey took up to eight weeks to and from Australia.

  • Soldier’s souvenir view of Egypt

    Image

    This image (B&W glass slide) was probably taken by an Australian soldier during a break from a route (training) march. Australian troops relax under the shade of trees in Egypt. Many images taken by soldiers serving overseas in the war show more famous tourist scenes such as men seated on camels, the pyramids, the Sphinx, or in a building or busy city street. Yet this shot still gives a feel of the tourist abroad, in the relaxed lounging poses struck by many of the subjects.

  • Unloading barges, Anzac Cove

    Image

    This scene of soldiers unloading barges at what became known as Anzac Cove captures one moment in the landing and subsequent eight-month campaign at Gallipoli. The soldiers’ routine activity does little to indicate the heavy casualties incurred or the physical hardships endured. Turkish gunners had a good fix on Anzac Cove and many men were killed and badly wounded in the beach area or by the water.

  • At Anzac Cove

    Image

    This hand-coloured glass slide shows British soldiers near a dugout at ANZAC Cove. The scene appears calm, with the men in small, groups close to sandbagged dugouts and tents. The barges remind us that supplies were always a concern, as they had to be shipped in. Despite the superficial calmness of a blue and grey tinted sea and sky, the Allied forces had to struggle with a rough terrain, establishing shelter and supply lines on rugged cliffs and narrow unprotected beaches.

  • Washing the horses, Suvla Bay

    Image

    With the Gallipoli campaign at deadlock, a smaller Allied force, including Australians and New Zealanders, made an amphibious landing at Suvla Bay on the Aegean Sea to relieve pressure on the main force. Many horses accompanied the landing parties, providing vital transport for men and material. This photograph shows men washing their horses in advance of the Suvla attack, with mules, tents and other equipment in the background.

  • Household pets join the forces

    Audio

    Ena Ryan of Wellington was a young girl when war was declared in August 1914, but she vividly recalled the excitement of those days. In this 1985 interview she describes watching the Main Body marching through the streets of Wellington to the departing ships. She noticed that one of the men had a kitten buttoned into his tunic. Once they arrived at the battlefront the men adopted other pets, including dogs, donkeys and goats found in and around battlefields. These animals helped to keep up the mens’ spirits, and some became official mascots.

  • Farewelling troops in Wellington

    Video

    This rare film records a civic ceremony for New Zealand troops departing for the front. It shows the official farewell to the Wellington Section of the NZ Expeditionary Force on 24 September 1914. The troops are inspected by a group of dignitaries, including Prime Minister William Massey, Lord Liverpool the Governor-General and Major General Sir Alexander Godley. They then march four abreast down Adelaide Road and along Lambton Quay, Wellington’s main shopping street. The men of the NZEF are then seen crammed on board the deck and high up on the rigging of a troopship. Most have happy faces as they await what they expected would be a grand adventure. Contrast this with the more subdued figures of the 6th Reinforcement who appear at the end of the film. They are seen departing for the front in August 1915, when the horrors of the Gallipoli Campaign had become widely known.