100 years since Battle of Rafa

WE WILL REMEMBER THEM: Matawhero man and former Makauri School student Clarrie Cook was killed this day during the Battle of Rafa in 1917. The battle was near the Sultanate of Egypt and the Ottoman Empire frontier. In the 1967 Six-Day War, Israel invaded the Sinai Peninsula and took the Gaza Strip from Egypt. The Rafah Border Crossing is the sole crossing point on a 12-kilometre long border between Egypt and the Gaza Strip. Picture supplied

TODAY marks the 100th anniversary of the World War 1 Battle of Rafa in which Matawhero man Clarrie Cook was killed.

The 22-year-old was among Gisborne men who joined the Wellington Mounted Rifles and were shipped to Egypt to become part of the Egypt Expeditionary Force.

Fought on January 9, 1917, the Battle of Rafa was the third and final battle to complete the recapture of the Sinai Peninsula by British forces during the Sinai and Palestine campaign of the First World War.

The Battle of Rafa pushed the Ottoman Forces out of the Sinai Peninsula. Rafa is now on the border of Egypt and the Gaza Strip.

“I don’t know of other Gisborne men who died there but there were bound to be some,” says Clarrie Cook’s great-nephew Barrie Cook.

“Clarrie died in the assault from the north-east in what is now Gaza. He and others dismounted and advanced across open ground towards the Ottoman Forces who defended from a redoubt on a low hill.”

A redoubt is a temporary fortification, built to secure a strategic position or to consolidate a military line of advance.

Shot deadClarrie Cook was fatally shot during the advance on the Ottoman forces. The young soldier was buried nearby but later exhumed and moved to Kantara East on the Sinai side of the Suez Canal.

“I visited there in March 2014 to pay my respects and lay flowers,” says Barrie.

“I might have been the first relative to visit his grave.”

Seventy-one allies died and 415 were wounded in the Battle of Rafa.

More than 200 Turks were killed and 168 wounded, but Barrie can find no plans for commemorations.

“This contrasts with the planned celebrations in Israel this year for the subsequent Battle of Beersheba which had

greater casualties and was seen as a more significant turning point in the campaign.”

Clarrie Cook’s name features on an Italian marble memorial plaque for Makauri School students who served in the world wars.

In 2009, three students discovered what was thought to be a dirty piece of the school pool. It was the plaque.

They cleaned the relic of moss and lichen and used impression rubbing to transfer the 26 names from the plaque to paper.

At the bottom of the plaque the students found the words: We shall remember them.