Young people picking up the Anzac baton

Taradale RSA president Peter Grant is delighted to see the young stepping forward at services. Photo / Warren Buckland

In terms of the continuance of Anzac Day commemorations Taradale Returned Services Association president and Vietnam veteran Peter Grant summed it up when touching on the subject of young people becoming more aware, and involved, in the services of the day.

"They are picking up the baton," he said.

As has been evidenced over the past decade, the young faces have increased greatly at the services across Hawke's Bay, and the whole country.

They have indeed picked up the baton and are clearly running with it.

"Our young people seem to have a growing understanding and pride in our nationhood and what contributed to it — they have an understanding that freedom doesn't come for free."

He saw that again during the RSA's recent Spirit of Anzac speech competition and a special service, devised by young people for young people, at the Taradale Memorial Clock Tower.

What especially struck a chord was the way primary school children took it all aboard.

"A combination of the innocence of the young dealing with a very emotional and harsh topic — it is really quite special."

He said after a previous service he received an email from a high school student who had heard about the events of Passchendaele and when it came time to carry out the writing of a project he chose that subject.

"He had gained such an interest in the events of WWI and took on a whole new respect for veterans," Grant said.

"If it is doing that then it really is doing what we want these events to do."

Schools had embraced the Anzac story and the events across the landscape of WWI, and all times of war where New Zealanders gave their lives, and that had created additional spark with many parents.

That was now evidenced at the Anzac Day services, where young people are not only turning out in numbers to take it in, but are also part of the service.

The RSAs across the region, and the country, are now including young speakers at many services.

Grant said while the WWI veterans had all passed on, and the numbers of WWII veterans were thinning, there was still a large number of service personnel among the community, although many were reluctant to embrace the RSAs.

He said more New Zealanders have served in Afghanistan than did in Vietnam, and many had been mentally affected by the experience.

"It is the wounds that don't bleed thing — they are dealing with some horrific things in their minds."

Many chose not to go to RSAs, which was something the association was trying to address.

"We want them to come here — to give them welfare support but many they seem shy to do that."

He also spoke about the philosophy of his grandfather, who served in WWI and was severely affected by gas attacks.

Right up to the day he died in 1967 he struggled to breathe, but it did not prevent him from getting on with life.

"He'd get out in the shed and drink his home brew and chop some wood."

One day Grant asked him if he was going to the Anzac Day services and his grandfather replied he did not need to go to the Anzac Day service.

"Every day is Anzac Day for me," he said.

Napier RSA president and navy veteran John Purcell said it was heartening to see young people not only attending Anzac Day services but also taking part in them.

He was a youngster in the late 1940s when he first attended an Anzac Day service in Hastings — with two of his uncles who both served with the Maori Pioneers during WWI, and saw action at Gallipoli.

President of Napier RSA John Purcell. Photo / Warren Buckland

Purcell and his RSA crew have long been proponents and supporters of getting young people involved in Anzac Day services and he said he was "flattered" by the number of young people, and their families, who now turned out.

Young people now took part in the reading of the ode, the speeches and dedications at services.

He said he was approached by a young lad in his neighbourhood who after last year's Dawn Service told him he had seen him, and heard him speaking.

The youngster, who was around 9, added that he hadn't really wanted to go to the service but his dad got him up early and insisted he attend.

He told Purcell that it had been so special, and so meaningful, that he would be going again this year.

Young people had embraced the services and the country's military history, and that had been driven by schools bringing the Anzac story forward into their history curriculum as well as young people discovering that a relative, somewhere in the past, had served and wanted to find out more about them, and what they had been through.

Purcell said that was also illustrated by the "wonderful" rise in the number of young people, across the whole community, joining cadet units.

He agreed with Grant that many of the service personnel from outside the spheres of WWII and Vietnam, from the more recent engagements like Afghanistan, were often reluctant to steer a path into an RSA.

"We have some, but not many — but it can often take up to 10 years or so after they come up before they may decide to go to the RSA."

For Napier Royal New Zealand Navy veteran Guy Natusch the sight of so many people at the services today, especially the young people, is very heartening.

"I remember during the 50s and 60s — yes there were the numbers there then but we were always wondering how long it would keep going," he said.

"The numbers did start to go down but then they started to go up again."

Natusch served in the navy from 1942 to 1945 on destroyers and motor torpedo boats.

He saw action in the North Sea and in the English Channel during the D-Day operations and was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross in May 1944.

But he hardly spoke about his war years when he was back home.

"We didn't talk much to our offspring — we didn't really talk much to each other.

"A lot just didn't talk about it ... I didn't."

But, he said, as the years wore on he said veterans did begin talking ... to their grandchildren and their grandchildren listened and took it in.

And they accordingly started asking questions to understand more about what had happened.

Veterans, Natusch said, started to open up as the years slipped by them.

What was emerging also sparked schools to devote more history time to the events upon the Gallipoli Peninsular of April 25, 1915 which created what became known as Anzac Day ... the day the New Zealand and Australian forces effectively linked arms and went into battle.

He said the rise in young people taking part in Anzac events, spurred on by learning about those times, and the way it had become part of the history learning journey, was very satisfying to see, and he agreed with Grant's summation that "the baton was being passed on".