More Family History

 

The Anzac Day Centenary commemorations have stirred an interest in relatives who were involved in "the war to end wars".

 

Margaret's grandfather, Hughie (U. E.) Mitchell-Burnard, was on the Western Front for the last twelve months of the war, in the New Zealand Rifle Brigade. My great-uncle, Frederick Bigelow, was there for roughly the same period, and was wounded in his leg, which had to be amputated above the knee. He was fitted with a wooden leg, which fascinated me as a boy when we went for holidays on his farm in Northland.

 

So there was a great deal of interest in a programme last Wednesday night at Puke Ariki, as part of the current WWI exhibition. A group of about 20 of us, including two friends, Janette Theobold and Bev Mulqueen, were introduced to sources of information about details of the war.

 

There are plenty of websites on this subject, and in no time at all we found the detailed documents of the war service of these two relatives. This material is not accessible from home, but you can  see it on the museum's computers.

 

It appears Hughie may have been at Le Quesnoy, and I was thrilled to find that Fred had spent two months of his recuperation, over Christmas 1918, at Brockenhurst in the New Forest, where Margaret and I visited in 2008.

 

Here are photos of that village:

 

This is the memorial to soldiers who died while at the NZ Military Hospital in the village (demolished after the war) in the graveyard at the local church.

 

In the church is a chapel dedicated to those New Zealanders who were treated there or who worked at the hospital.

 

Our friends, Marilyn and Michael Messent, who live a few minutes' drive away, take a special interest in this chapel and the graveyard.

 

The chapel has a book containing the names of all who lived there while the hospital was working.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here are some of the graves that Marilyn watches over and tidies if necessary.

 

What a surprise to find that my revered Uncle Fred spent time there.

 

After that he was transferred to Walton-on-Thames Hospital to have his wooden leg fitted, and to learn, no doubt, to walk with it. Once that process was adequately successful, he left by troopship for home, where his first son was waiting for him with wife Katy.

 

 

This is the New Zealand Chapel in the local church at Brockenhurst.

 

Other materials we were shown last evening included books of history of the war.  

These cover detailed accounts of the action the various NZ units were involved in.

 

There will be a lot of work to do to identify exactly which of these our relatives took part in, by comparing the historical accounts with the dates in their war service records.

 

Fortunately, these books have all been digitised and are readily available from home computers and mobile devices so we will be able to do this research in our own time.

 

It is only the details of the war records that we will need to search at the museum.

 

So there is lots of interesting reading ahead!