199 Garden of Remembrance Upper Hutt, street scene 2018
Reason for the name
Upper Hutt’s Garden of Remembrance is centred on the Now Grandad statue at the Civic Centre and is now the focal point of all Remembrance Services for Upper Hutt.
Historically Upper Hutt has had a number of different sites where the ANZAC Day Dawn Service has been conducted. The St John’s Church Lych Gate was utilised from 1925 till about 1939. Between 1939 and 1957 they may have paraded on King Street in front of the UH RSA clubrooms. I recall the memorial walls and gates into the park that were opposite to Totara Street which were installed in about 1957 by the local Jaycees. The gates and accompanying walls were later dismantled in about 1985 and the gates were included in the new extended fences and gates that are currently at the Brentwood Street entrance to the park. From 1958 to 1973 they paraded at the flagpole in front of the Maidstone Memorial Baths that were located within Maidstone Park. In 1973 a brand new UHCC Civic Centre was opened, and a memorial area consisting of a black marble obelisk and the four bronze Battle plaques were installed and blessed in the outside entrance foyer area. Later a Battle plaque for Vietnam was added to the memorial. It has been here at the Civic Centre that the community has paraded for their ANZAC Day Dawn Service each year since.
Author: Wayne Myers UH RSA
It was ANZAC Day 2006 when the then President of the UH RSA Syd Giles, the Mayor of UH Wayne Guppy, his wife Sue, and UH RSA members Wayne Myers and Bernie Robson were enjoying a coffee (some with rum added) and chat in the UH Cossie Club garden bar area after the ANZAC Day Dawn Service when the Mayor asked Syd about the UH RSA merger with the Cossie Club. In replying Syd mentioned that they were still looking for a suitable walled area around Upper Hutt that they could mount their Battle plaques and Roll of Honour. Ground Hog Day twelve months later, the same place, the same five people and the same question, but no suitable wall yet identified. It was then that I quietly took up the challenge myself to solve the problem and find a suitable site.
My search for a suitable site took me all around and through the Upper Hutt area but all roads seem to guide me back to the civic centre area. I spent hours and hours in my car opposite to the civic centre pontificating and visualising in my head various concepts and designs before preparing a concept paper and tabling it to the UH RSA in July 2007. The President and I then presented it to the Mayor and his Parks Manager. They thought the concept of a Memorial Monument sited in the middle of the steps leading into the foyer of the civic centre was not appropriate but suggested utilising the vacant grassed area and wall just to the north of the foyer. This was duly accepted and agreed upon. I then retired to revamp the plan based around this new area.
More hours were spent sitting in my car opposite from the civic centre, where a concept and a revised plan was formulated. This included constructing a new stairway though the existing block wall and garden, thus creating two smaller walls. The left wall became the Citizen’s Wall of Remembrance, which would include a bronze Citizen’s Roll of Honour that recognised the eight citizens killed in the Benge and Pratt store fire, and individual bronze plaques recognising the various local service organisations. The right wall became the Military Wall of Remembrance, which would include a bronze Military Roll of Honour and the various bronze Battle plaques. The existing five plaques were increased to twelve that catered for all conflicts involving NZ, from the NZ Wars through to our current operational deployments. Centred in the grassed area would be a new Memorial Monument consisting of the following: A plain hollow concrete plinth with the sides of the existing black marble obelisk affixed to its four sides, thus allowing the spirituality (the wairua) of the old memorial to be carried over to the new one. On top of the plinth would be a life sized, bronze sculpture of an aged veteran in civilian clothes and his grand-daughter, entitled “Now Grand-Dad”. I took this statue concept to Hastings artist Chris Elliott who drew up the artwork and would later make the Marquette and moulds, and then to the Marton based bronze caster, Wayne Ross. This pair had worked together previously on a number of projects including the Gottfried Lindauer bust in Woodville and the Peter Snell statue in Cooks Garden, Whanganui. Before the statue was affixed to the plinth, we placed some pebbles in the void of the plinth. These pebbles had been brought back from ANZAC Cove, Gallipoli and the anonymous donor wanted them to have an appropriate home. The memorial monument was to be surrounded by a path, with pathways leading off to the foyer and to the steps that divide the Walls of Remembrance. Also included in the project were four new flagpoles which were to be located two on each side of the garden areas and the new stairway, up front where flagpoles should be. Another unique feature that I included in the project, was a brass chain maille veil consisting of 5,953 13mm brass key rings, which I wove together whilst watching TV. This veil would be attached to the front panel of the plinth on the week leading up to ANZAC Day and would allow citizens to affix their poppies to the memorial at the conclusion of the Dawn Service.
The genesis of the Now Grand-Dad statue is as follows: The statue is of a Veteran and his Grand-Daughter. He is identified as a Veteran by his RNZRSA lapel badge and by his medals, which are symbolic and of no specific campaign, thus enabling the statue to remain timeless. The Grand-Daughter has been asked to accompany her Grand-Dad to a remembrance service and when indicated by him, is to place a poppy with the others at their feet. In her left hand she holds the poppy and with her right she holds onto Grand-Dad’s hand. He removes his hat and reflects on those dark days when he and others answered the call to service, some never to return, having made the ultimate sacrifice. Others returned bearing scars (some visible and others not) but most who returned, just got on with life. Either from impetuousness or impatience or both she tugs at his hand, awakening him from his state of remembrance, and as he turns his head towards her, she asks, “Now Grand-Dad?” It is with this that he realises again, that it was for her and others like her, that they had gone off to do the dirty business of war. With a smile, he responds quietly as Grand-Dads do, “Aye little one, now will be fine”. She places the poppy amongst the others, then quickly stands, proudly grasping onto Grand-Dad’s hand.
In 2008 the revised concept plan titled: Project R3: Recognise, Remember, Reflect, with an indicative budget of $150,000, was formally tabled to the UHCC. It was accepted and a formal project team was established, consisting of:
a. Chairperson Syd Giles President UHRSA
b. Project Manager Wayne Myers UHRSA
c. UHCC Rep Wayne Guppy Mayor
d. NZDF Rep Various Commandants Trentham MC
After three years of fund raising and work, we were ready, and on the 14th April 2010 saw the unveiling ceremony. The then Minister of Defence Wayne Mapp and Mayor Wayne Guppy did the honours. In attendance also was the local MP, Chris Hipkins, the Chief of Defence Force, Lt Gen Jerry Mateparae and other military and civil dignitaries, along with approximately 4,000 military personnel and citizens. The Memorial Monument and Walls of Remembrance were then formally blessed by military and local religious representatives, as well as by the local kaumatua.
The Military Roll of Honour used was that from the UH RSA, which proved to include a number of anomalies and missing names which were brought to our attention by local citizens after the unveiling. I then took it upon myself the right these wrongs. After establishing agreed criteria for the inclusion onto the roll, I spent another 18 months researching local data bases, newspaper archives and military records to validate the new Upper Hutt Military Roll of Honour. The role now consists of 50 names: 29 from WW1, 20 from WW2 and one from the Korean War. It should be noted that this was agreed to with some dissent. A new bronze Roll of Honour was then produced, affixed to the wall and was duly unveiled and blessed.
In May 2011 saw the official handover of the Upper Hutt Area of Remembrance from the UH RSA Project R3 to the UHCC. Thereby the Area of Remembrance whilst resting under the governance of the UHCC is and will always remain the property of the community of Upper Hutt.
In 2014 the UH RSA and UHCC decided to take up the call from the Fields of Remembrance Trust to produce and display white crosses for those local citizens who had made the ultimate sacrifice during the preceding wars. Subsequently, fifty white crosses were acquired, individually named and branded with the Trust’s logo. They were to be displayed permanently in the Upper Hutt Area of Remembrance for the four year period of the WW1 commemorations. However, the UHCC decided after a couple of citizens complained, to only display them during the annual ANZAC Day and Remembrance (Armistice) Day commemorations.
The Area of Remembrance and the Now Grand-Dad statue at the Civic Centre remain the focal and gathering point for the Upper Hutt ANZAC Day Dawn Service and Remembrance Day Service ceremonies. Attendance at the ANZAC Day Dawn Service varies between 3,000 and 5,000 and the Remembrance Day attendance is growing each year.
