World War II’s end 80 years ago marked in Napier

Clubs Napier president Brian Strong (left) and guest speaker and retired Navy commander David Anson at Tuesday's V-J Day 80th anniversary commemoration of the end of World War 2. Photo / Doug Laing

One of the last commemorations of the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II has been held in Napier.

The commemoration on Tuesday at Clubs Napier, formerly the Napier RSA, marked 80 years since the signing of Japanese surrender documents aboard the USS Missouri in Tokyo Bay, on September 2, 1945.

A small gathering included descendants of some of the 140,000 New Zealanders who served overseas in the six-year global conflict, of whom 11,928 died.

With the number of living veterans down to 100 or less nationwide at Anzac Day this year, various commemorations had also taken place around New Zealand on Anzac Day in April, May 8 (commemorating Germany’s surrender), and August 15, commemorating Japan’s announcement of surrender after the US dropped two atomic bombs, on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Following German’s surrender, Allied forces, including New Zealand, the UK, US and USSR, were still locked in conflict with Japan said to be refusing to fall in East Asia.

Afterwards, about 12,000 New Zealanders, including many who had served in Europe and the East, formed J-Force units in the British Commonwealth Occupation Force in Japan from 1946 to 1948, demilitarising the zone, providing security, supervising local administration, and assisting with social and political rebuilding, primarily around Yamaguchi, Honshu.

On Tuesday, guest speaker and retired Navy commander David Anson, whose grandfather served in five campaigns abroad, said that while New Zealanders served mainly overseas for all but three days of the war, those at home, in addition to the grief of losing family overseas, knew how close it was with the falling of Hong Kong and Singapore from December 1941 to February 1942.

The arrival of 80,000 personnel from the US protected New Zealand and offered security for those at home, he said.

The gathering was also addressed by Clubs Napier president Brian Strong, and Napier Mayor Kirsten Wise. A prayer of remembrance and the benediction were delivered by Rev Alan Burnett, and the ode was recited by Alan Lawton.

Doug Laing has been a reporter for 52 years, more than 40 of them in Hawke’s Bay, at the Central Hawke’s Bay Press, the Napier Daily Telegraph, and Hawke’s Bay Today. He has covered most aspects of general news and sport