Collections of war memorabilia no longer just signify battles and bravery; they have evolved to tell us about ourselves.
Here it is. What remains of nearly 18 months of fighting hellish battles is an annotated map of the Indian sub-continent, an identity pass, a signed 1943 Christmas Day sergeants’ mess menu, a pay book, small piles of photos and letters, all spread across my dining table.
There’s a medal, too – the Burma Star – and a battered hat. This memorabilia marks the war of Ray Travers, posted to India and Burma with the RNZAF in 1943-44.
Ray was my father. In his ID photo, he looks so young, and he was. A sergeant at just 24, he commanded a ground crew who tested and loaded armaments onto the planes fighting in Burma. The map is massive. It’s taped together and split at the edges. His huge hands have folded it back into its creases so many times that it is worryingly fragile. On it, in capital letters, my father has written exotic placenames like Dum Dum, Alipore, Chittagong, Imphal, Akyab. He has marked air bases, train trips, dating many.
These are the physical mementoes of Ray’s service. I carry related childhood memories – his nightmares, the recurrences of malaria, the shrapnel mottling his leg and a few anecdotes about “tigers in tents”.
I consider what’s covering the table. What to do now with these delicate items holding special memories for our family? Who should they be passed to, and with fragile items like the map, should we be tapping expert attention to ensure it survives another 80 years?
These questions face many Kiwi families, and with the original owners now departed, the taonga can become contentious within whānau: what is kept, who keeps it, should “important” items be shared beyond the family and, as descendants fan out and grow in number, who keeps what?
Beyond storehouses
New Zealand has three specialist war history museums: the National Army Museum Te Mata Toa in Waiouru, the Air Force Museum of New Zealand in Wigram, Christchurch, and the Torpedo Bay Navy Museum, the national museum of the Royal New Zealand Navy, in Auckland. Metropolitan, regional and community museums scattered around the country offer another raft of options for would-be donors.
Museum curators emphasise that historically, their institutions were seen as storehouses of treasure. Objects were acquired and displayed in glass cases possibly without a direct connection to the community. That focus is rapidly changing. War history collections have evolved from a narrow view of charting conflicts into telling the broader social histories about their many communities of interest.
Museums like objects with provenance, which means the life of that object can be traced from the original owner to the current one. In the case of my father’s map, the provenance is clear. It is a “working object”, telling myriad stories about not only that period in New Zealand’s war history but also about the man.
Provenance isn’t so clear if museum staff are offered objects bought online or from a second-hand shop. Though the item may be interesting, there is no story surrounding it.
Curators also point out they are not experts or “the authority” on a particular matter – they are more custodians or kaitiaki of taonga gifted to the nation. They offer their expertise and training so that war items get the very best attention and professional care.
Gail Romano, associate curator of war history at the Auckland War Memorial Museum, says if an item doesn’t fit the museum’s broad criteria, it is respectfully declined. Specialist curators review whether the item is appropriate, taking into account collection needs and conservation and storage requirements.
“We understand how important memorabilia is to our prospective donors, and we empathise with that,” says Romano. “But unfortunately, the museum’s priorities for collecting don’t always align.
“When deciding what to add to a collection, there are many stories we need to consider. It’s not only about the actual theatres of war; there are also our peacekeeping deployments, civilian and children’s experiences, refugees from overseas conflicts and people who were interned.”
Paula Legel, associate curator of heritage publications, adds: “We often redirect donors to other relevant museums or suggest they add material digitally to the online cenotaph database.”
Stories, objects and community can be strongly connected, particularly in smaller localities. In Auckland’s southern reaches, the Papakura Museum has strong military ties via the Papakura Army camp, nearby Ardmore Airport (built in 1943 as a training base at the request of the US Air Force) and the recently excavated 1863 Rings Redoubt, packed with artefacts.
For Papakura’s curator, Alan Knowles, these objects are a magnifying glass into the past, connecting people to their history through moments in time. A small museum, Papakura prides itself on holding the same accession standards as larger ones. It aims to take donated items that engage the viewer, that are visceral, able to be seen and touched, and which invite the viewer to connect with their history.
“The past 10 to 15 years have seen a turning point in how museums interact with their communities,” says Knowles. “It must be a community place, first and foremost, so what is accessioned into the museum reflects the community we serve. A museum isn’t here to tell the public how to feel and interact with our collections; that’s up to them. People must feel welcome, comfortable and have the opportunity to connect with taonga – this is their past.”
Obligation to donors
Knowles looks for donations whose stories can be told in a “pithy, interesting and accessible manner”. This should be reassuring to people wanting to donate important family possessions – curators are trained to know and understand the obligation they take on when they accept items.
The curators of the three specialist military museums echo that mantra. There are common elements binding their approaches to donors. All medals pertaining to a specific New Zealand military service are collected. Typically, families can arrange to view their donations, which might not be on permanent display. All service museums have research libraries for academics and the public.
The Air Force Museum at Wigram spells out its obligation to families quite clearly. Collections manager Darren Hammond emphasises it is primarily a social history museum. “There is a misconception that military museums are focused mainly on technology,” he says. “The technology is nothing without the stories.”
The museum has 36,000 digitised images detailing the history of military aviation in Aotearoa for the public to view, and that number grows daily. As a specialist museum, it is proud that it can collect Air Force memorabilia quite broadly, digging more deeply into areas of interest. It is interested in not only the high-profile participants in our military aviation history, but also in people like my father and his experiences.
The museum plans to create a dedicated climate-controlled space so donated medal collections can be better preserved. With the RNZAF peaking at 40,000 personnel in 1944, this part of the collection has enormous potential for growth.
In Auckland’s Devonport, Caroline Ennen, collections manager for the Royal New Zealand Navy museum, has a wish list. She says there are gaps in the ability to tell an in-depth story of women’s service during the two world wars, the Women’s Royal New Zealand Naval Service from 1942 to 1977 (known as Wrens) and women in the navy since 1977.
Ennen would like to see more oral histories collected, while acknowledging that it is expensive and time consuming. “Collections are not just about objects; people telling their own stories are important.”
She says donors need to be aware that artefacts can degrade over time, especially at home. Museums have a cultural, moral and ethical obligation to care for collections, whether it’s a uniform, a VHS recording, art or furniture.
Technical expertise and the technology available to modern museums help. For Dolores Ho, archivist at the army museum in Waiouru, it’s important to reassure donors that their items will be treated with dignity and respect. “I had a woman come to the museum to show me a family diary, unsure whether she would donate it or not,” says Ho. “Once she saw how we would care for it – that it would be kept securely in an acid-free box in a temperature-controlled environment, she was reassured. She understood we had the resources to care for it much better than the family ever could, so she donated it to us.”
Ho can recite by heart the key components that will inform her about the provenance of any possible donation. Authenticity as an army item is critical, along with the need for memorabilia to have that all-important social connection.
Every medal donated to the museum is carefully cleaned, mounted, and placed in display drawers.
“Part of our role is to listen carefully to people when they want to offer their family war items,” says Ho. “Often, there is a deep spiritual relationship to that object and we need to be sensitive to that. Regardless of whether we will accept a donation or not, we always must be mindful that, to this person, the item is valuable and precious.”
Toitū Otago Settlers Museum curator Seán Brosnahan is unapologetic about the museum’s stance on war history donations. Its guiding principle is that donations must be of “‘significance to the history of Otago and its people” and create coherent Otago collections and stories.
“We seldom buy anything, as we’ve been collecting since 1898,” says Brosnahan. “We are mindful that we have limited storage, so we add only items with merit. Many donated artefacts have high costs associated with them: asbestos in helmets, the need for staff to hold gun licences because there are firearms in our collection, fragile textiles requiring conservation; the list goes on. Museums are costly to maintain.”
Brosnahan’s criteria for determining how well an object might fit any collection include rarity, representativeness, spiritual connections and whether it is from a key Otago person.
RSA clubs were once popular repositories of war memorabilia. But with many clubs closing or downsizing, their ability to accept and care for artefacts is waning. Collections have become dispersed and clubs are often unable to keep museum-standard records of donations. In Otago, Toitū has occasionally taken RSA collections, but establishing their provenance can be hit-and-miss.
Te Hikoi Museum in Riverton/Aparima relies heavily on volunteers for its operation of collecting objects and stories related to western Southland. Collections committee member Annette Horrell admits to being torn when having to decline a donation, always suggesting other institutions that may be interested.
To assist Te Hikoi’s staff and volunteers, Horrell relies on the expertise of Jo Massey, the Southland District Council’s roving museum officer, a unique position in this country. Massey has helped the province’s volunteer museums since 2006 to connect people to their history.
“Because we can’t afford to employ people to help with collection care or setting up of exhibitions, she is able to assist us,” says Horrell. “She can point us to the right person or organisation to help us and knows the right places to apply to for funds.”
Reinterpreting the wars
Proving ownership and the history of an artefact is more easily achieved when donations are made face to face and have supporting documentation. But what happens with items donated years ago with little known provenance? How can they be connected to families in the here and now?
A new Te Papa Press publication, Te Ata o Tū – The Shadow of Tūmatauenga, goes deep into the provenance of artefacts from the New Zealand Wars (1845-72) in the national museum’s collection. Four curators and other museum staff collaborated with iwi, hapū and descendants of the original donors to learn how the stories are understood and develop how they are now being told.
Many Māori taonga from the period donated to museums were deemed “war booty or trophies”, notes Te Ata o Tū. Investigating was always going to be confronting and emotional, especially for iwi reconnecting with taonga they thought were lost forever or didn’t know existed.
Likewise, it was challenging for descendants of those who donated items to know how they were obtained and the subsequent loss to Māori. The investigations and discussions that took place aimed to build balanced narratives, a different understanding of history and deeper recognition of the complexities and hurt surrounding those artefacts.
Matiu Baker (Ngāti Toa Rangatira, Te Āti Awa, Ngāti Raukawa, Ngāti Whakaue), Te Papa’s curator of historic Māori visual material, says the process meant the museum had to interrogate itself about its role in contributing to the prevailing New Zealand Wars narrative.
“This collection is about our social history during that period, the conflicts between Māori and the Crown, their different interpretation of Te Tiriti o Waitangi, competing agendas and misunderstandings,” says Baker.
For example, the flag collection, detailed in the book, demonstrates the flags’ historic and symbolic significance along with associated, often culturally complex, stories. The flags, some more than 150 years old, are fragile and need to be cared for appropriately, but can be viewed by visitors.
“People think their donated taonga will disappear into a basement here,” says Baker. “I can reassure them, we don’t have a basement. We have collections that we are dedicated to maintaining.”
Museums trigger curiosity about events and the memorabilia in their collections. The public can read, look, touch, reflect, be entertained and brought to tears just by looking at a medal, a photograph, a map. It’s our history, warts and all.
As for the treasure on my dining table – will we donate my father’s Burma collection to a museum? I now know that Dad’s 1943 map is rare. It’s a serious conversation our family will have on Anzac Day.
Letting go
If you are considering donating war history items, note the following advice from museum curators:
CHECKS
■ Museum websites list information about the donation process.
■ Research that your taonga is related to the museum’s mission and values statements.
■ It’s important that you have legal possession of the object, or agreement among all relevant parties to donate it: inter-family disputes over who has the legal right to donate war memorabilia need to be sorted before the items are offered.
■ Give as much information on the history of the objects (provenance) as you can.
BALANCES
■ Don’t arrive with donations without an appointment or leave items at the museum door.
■ Don’t assume the museum will automatically want to collect what you have to offer. It is not obliged to do so.
■ Don’t arrange in your will for a bequest, sending your war memorabilia to a museum. Museums collect with purpose.
■ Don’t assume that all museums can restore items. This is a costly process. Most museums can take preventive measures to ensure the item does not deteriorate further.
■ Note that not all donated items will be automatically digitised.
■ Museums are not obliged to provide a photocopy of items donated by extended family.
WORTH KNOWING
■ Museums are accountable for the proper care and preservation of their collections. They will accept and accession items only after thoughtful consideration.
■ Donating items to a museum involves a definitive transfer of ownership. The official receipt, signed by the donor, means the item cannot be returned to the donor or anyone else. The museum will control what happens with it from there on.
■ Museums exhibit only a small percentage of their permanent collections; most items are in storage. Don’t expect your taonga to be put on display immediately.
■ Items donated to some museums and in storage are available for viewing by appointment.
■ You need to check if a museum accepts items on loan or whether access restrictions will be placed on them.
■ Generally, the condition of donations is secondary to the provenance of the items.
To read more about wartime memorabilia, go here.