More than 60 years after WWII soldiers from the Maori Battalion were first welcomed home at Putiki Marae, Wanganui, the veterans were embraced again at the same marae.
Twenty-eight veterans and more than 500 whanau and supporters gathered for the 28 Maori Battalion annual reunion over the weekend of 20 February 2009.
As the Governor-General, Hon Anand Satyanand, told those in attendance, the Maori Battalion has a proud history of service: to New Zealand, to the Commonwealth and to the Crown.
“The Battalion’s gallantry includes almost one hundred honours. But its roll of honour includes more than 600 deaths in action, active service or as prisoners of war, and almost three times that number were wounded,” said Mr Satyanand.
“Those who served and those who died, fought not just to defeat an authoritarian regime that terrorised our world, but to defend the democratic freedoms that we all hold dear.”
It was also a weekend tinged with sadness, following the recent passing of two significant Battalion figures.
Jim Takarangi, a 28th Maori Battalion veteran, national president of the Battalion, and a driving force behind much of the organising of the reunion, had died just a few weeks earlier.
Veterans Affairs Minister Judith Collins expressed her condolences on behalf of the New Zealand veteran community: “As a loyal soldier, a tireless worker for the community, a talented sportsman and a loved kaumatua, Mr Takarangi epitomised the spirit of the Maori Battalion,” she said.
Then, only days before the reunion, the Battalion lost one of its oldest members, another former Battalion Association President, Tamati Maungarangi Paraone (Ngati Hine). He was part of the first wave of Maori soldiers to enlist in 1939.
More than three thousand soldiers have served in the Maori Battalion, but only four of the original ‘39ers’ are still alive.
Images courtesy the Wanganui Chronicle.