Editorial: Beach top place to remember

At the Dawn Service in Napier last year there were many children.
And at the end of the service, after the parade of service people marched off, some families wandered down on to the beach, despite the slight chill in the air.
It would have been the idea of the youngsters of course.
I mean, if you're going to be woken at 5am and dressed and readied to drive through the darkness to the Sound Shell then the least Mum and Dad can do is let you go and throw a few stones on the beach.
I tarried about, gathering some notes and speaking to people, and overheard one little boy say he thought it was a bit scary but pretty exciting when there was a volley of shots fired.
Then I heard a little girl with his group, but I think from another family, say the word "sad". So I edged a little closer and she said it was sad that lots of men died on a beach far away.
She was only about seven or eight so probably had little idea of the whole disastrous military episode we simply call Gallipoli, but she certainly had a sharp impression of war.
People die and people get hurt.
And some people return to the safety of their homes after time of war only to discover that a whole bunch of very graphic nightmares decided to stow away in their heads and went home with them.
I heard of one old chap who had seen a cobber burned to death after his aircraft crashed during the war in the Pacific.
The sight of any fire after that caused him to be physically sick. Forty, fifty years on and he could still not have a fire in the house during the worst days of winter.
My late father, a tankie, saw some atrocious sights during his service up through Italy. Young and old ... dead in ditches. His hard-case cobbers, shaken and fatigued by just too much horror. I don't think he ever really got over losing his good mate "Duff" Hewitt during a barrage of shelling near the Senio River. One shell took Hewitt's head off - Dad was right there with him.
Thankfully, that little girl at the Anzac service will hopefully never see such terrible things - but she clearly knew that those lost lives had not been forgotten.
As they have today, thousands have turned out to ensure those whose made the greatest sacrifice will never be forgotten.
They died for freedom ... to make a world where little kids could go and throw stones on a peaceful beach.