Selwyn Times: June 09, 2021

Wednesday June 9 2021 Selwyn Times
Latest Canterbury news at starnews.co.nz
NEWS 9
Victoria Cross recipient’s earthquake
damaged family plot to be repaired
• By Chris Barclay
THE EARTHQUAKE-damaged
family plot of Lincoln-born
Sergeant Henry Nicholas,
Canterbury’s first Victoria Cross
recipient, will be repaired after
the New Zealand Remembrance
Army answered the call of a
distressed Korean War veteran.
Ken Wright’s campaign
to reinstall and clean the
toppled headstone in Bromley
Cemetery will reach fruition
after the charity devoted to the
restoration of New Zealand war
graves learned of the plot’s state.
NZ Remembrance Army chief
executive Simon Strombom
said the city council would be
approached to organise the
necessary consents and ideally
the rejuvenated plot would be
unveiled in about two months.
“We’ll hopefully get a
ceremony organised because it
is a nationally significant grave,”
he said.
The headstone had to be lifted
and pinned, with Strombom
estimating the work would cost
$1500 to $2000.
“We’ll underwrite it and get it
done. This is what we’re here for,”
he said.
“This is a classic case, there’s
war graves all over New Zealand
and no one looks after them. We
just funded six (repairs) in Te
Awamutu.”
Strombom said the
Christchurch branch of
the Returned and Services’
Association would contribute to
the project.
The New Zealand Army and
Veterans Affairs’ New Zealand
had also pledged support.
Wright first noticed the family
plot 20 years ago when visiting
from Dunedin. He moved to
Christchurch last November and
was appalled the plot has not
been repaired since the
2011 earthquakes.
PROGRESS:
The family
plot of Victoria
Cross recipient
Sergeant Henry
Nicholas is set to
be repaired by
the New Zealand
Remembrance
Army.
He was rapt to hear the NZ
Remembrance Army had
mobilised.
“That’s brilliant, bloody great,”
Wright said.
Nicholas was awarded the
VC for his heroic exploits in
December 1917 when storming
a German machine gun nest in
Belgium during World War 1.
Nicholas was killed, aged 27,
in France on October, 29 1918,
shortly before the armistice.
Robyn Thew, a great-niece of
Nicholas, was delighted the plot
would be restored and noted
Henry’s brothers Frederick
Charles and Ernest, who also
served in World War 1, were also
buried there with their mother
Hannah.
“The family lost quite a lot.
They lost one of their sons and
the other two came back pretty
shell-shocked. They never had
families,” she said.
Thew visited the plot several
years ago and felt guilty the plot
had lay so long in disrepair.
“My sister said to me: ‘I never
even thought about that grave.
When the earthquakes happened
the last thing you think of is
the gravestone of an old relative
don’t you’?
“I felt really sad that we hadn’t
thought about that.”
The NZ Remembrance Army,
formed on January 1, 2019,
relies on donations from the
public, which can be made at
https://givealittle.co.nz/cause/
the-nz-remembrance-armyappeal.
Message from Mayor Sam
Thank you to everyone who rolled up their sleeves and got stuck in to help each other get through
what was a dramatic storm with lasting effects. As the storm built rapidly I was heartened to see and
hear so many stories of selfless acts of kindness and generosity within our community.
Thank you for being brave and to those who reached out for support, by asking early our volunteer
teams were able to help before bad situations deteriorated.
Thank you to our Selwyn Gets Ready network of volunteers. Your ability to mobilise at the drop of a hat is
a testament to the amount of time you put into preparing for these situations. Your local connection and
swift action to open community welfare centres allows the response to be much more locally focused.
Thank you to our farmers for the early action you took, the neighbours you helped, the stock you
saved, and for the heavy equipment you used to save the day for so many of our community.
Thank you to our Emergency Operations Centre staff and volunteers, and those from our partner
agencies through this event. Being able to gather information centrally, and then coordinate activity,
led to timely decision making and a much more efficient response.
Thanks to the many business owners who opened their doors, provided services free of charge or
released staff to support their families or volunteer for our community.
We live in a district full of awesome people and organisations – and you have shown that you not only
care for your own needs but also for the community around you.
Thank you all for your work over the past week.
Sam
Sam Broughton
Koromatua ā-Rohe o Waikirikiri
Mayor of Selwyn