St Cuthberts's College Year 11 students Tayla Curry, 15 (centre left), and Xanthe Copeland,15, place their poppies down on the white peace poppy. Photo / Nick Reed
The great-grandaughter of the only New Zealander to be awarded a Victoria Cross for the Gallipoli campaign was one of about 1000 St Cuthbert's College students to take part in a visual Anzac commemoration.
Tayla Curry, 15, yesterday laid a red poppy on a large white paper peace poppy in
the school's atrium to acknowledge soldiers like her great grandfather Lieutenant-Colonel Cyril Bassett who fought at Gallipoli.
The poppy was placed underneath a special Anzac Day quilt made by a year 10 art class last year.
Tayla said it was very special to acknowledge her grandfather, who among other tasks, had laid and maintained telephone lines between brigade headquarters and the front lines during Gallipoli - braving continuous gunfire in the process.
"I've learnt a lot about him at home like that that was a role you had to be short to do," she said. "It's been really good to learn and talk more about the war at school."
