The Geraldine Military Museum's Nazi exhibit, depicting a 1st SS Panzer Division camp, has sparked controversy. Photo / Nathan Mackinnon, RNZ
By Tim Brown RNZ
The owner of a South Canterbury museum featuring a controversial Nazi exhibit is open to making changes to the display.
The Geraldine Military Museum exhibit depicts a 1st SS Panzer Division Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler military camp.
The division served as Adolf Hitler’s personal bodyguard and fought against New Zealand troops in Greece during World War II.
The display had been part of the museum since it opened two years ago.
A parent, who did not want to be identified, raised concerns the display glorified the division and the atrocities they committed during the war.
Museum owner Don Pelvin said he was comfortable with the display and thought it was appropriate and showed both sides of the conflict.
He had the backing of the Geraldine RSA and residents in the town.
However, he was open to making changes and adding additional information and context.
Holocaust Centre chair Deborah Hart was also concerned about the display.
“There’s no problem with having both sides on display. It’s the way in which both sides are displayed and the facts of World War II have to be have to be properly told,” Hart said.
“When you’re putting on a display of a unit that was ideologically driven to commit some of the worst atrocities of World War II, you do have an obligation to actually say that and put it in its proper historical perspective.”
Hart said the Holocaust Centre was willing to work with the museum.
“I’ve offered to help with education at the museum and we’ve also offered to assist with contextualising the display that they have,” she said.
“We’ve got every interest in helping them to rectify this display and make it appropriate.”
Pelvin was unapologetic about the display.
“I don’t actually own the display - I own bits and pieces of it - but a private guy owns it. It was in a shed and I knew it was there and I asked him if he would be interested in displaying it. He was a wee bit cagey at the start but I said to him ‘there’s two things you should know - one, there was two sides to this war that we’re trying to show and, two, I own the museum and I should be allowed to put whatever I want in it.’ And then he agreed to do it for us,” Pelvin said.
“I’d just like people, if they want to, if they’re concerned, to come and have a look and come and talk to us rather than hide behind a keyboard and punch out a whole lot of things with no face to them.”
But he was willing to accept mistakes might have been made.
“Yes, maybe we didn’t quite get it right and we’ll be the first one to submit it. That’s what we’re looking at the moment is trying to put this right so that people now will come in and see what the display is about,” Pelvin said.
“Maybe we haven’t put enough signage on it to portray what it actually is and we’ll be the first ones to admit that.”
A month ago those behind the museum had a meeting and updating the display was discussed.
Pelvin said that was before any concerns had been raised.
He was open to accepting the Holocaust Centre’s help and had already been in contact with the centre about creating a display to acknowledge the Holocaust.
“We haven’t got an agenda or anything like that. We’re trying to present a balanced opinion and put in displays that are balanced and if the Holocaust Centre can do that for us, well and good, we’re more than happy to listen,” Pelvin said.
Some of the material on display, including the SS uniforms, had come from a Canterbury re-enactment group who dress as members of the Waffen-SS LSSAH division. There was also contact information to join the group.
Pelvin said he had no concerns about that group or its members’ motivations.
Geraldine RSA president John Bray, himself a veteran, said he also did not see a problem with the display.
“The museum is a very good depiction of what has happened over the years with war and peace-keeping missions, and it’s good to see that there is a balanced view over there of both sides of the story.”
Geraldine residents also gave a similar view, saying history should not be sanitised.
Pelvin said he had only started the museum to keep himself busy in retirement, to find a place for his military machinery collection and because of his family history.
“My son was a soldier; I was a soldier; my father, my grandfather and great-grandfather were soldiers, so I guess that’s a good enough reason to be involved.”
While changes would be made to the controversial display – and they could include more context about the division and its role in World War II atrocities and war crimes – it was too early to say exactly what form the changes would take, Pelvin said.
- RNZ