How Pukeahu National War Memorial is teaching us about our past
The upgrading of Wellington’s Pukeahu National War Memorial Park has uncovered tangible reminders of its military past
Australian Memorial (2015) of Pukeahu, National War Memorial Park, Wellington. The 15 red standstone columns represent the heart of Australia. Some columns are inscribed with the names of the main locations and military operations in which Australians and New Zealanders have served together. Others feature Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander artwork by Balarinji Design Studios (Sydney) and Māori artwork by Jacob Manu Scott. (Image by Jacqui Gibson).
On 25 April 2015, in the half-light of dawn, it's probable someone in Wellington's Anzac Day crowd inadvertently dropped something, leaving behind an all-important clue to the historic occasion.
Perhaps a button worked loose from a regimental uniform and fell unnoticed to the ground. Possibly a medal became unpinned and settled somewhere, hidden for a time under the soil of the capital’s newly upgraded Pukeahu National War Memorial Park.
It wouldn’t be surprising. For the past 150 years, the detritus of military life has accumulated on and around the park’s Mount Cook site, leaving valuable insights into how and why this low-lying hill overlooking the city has been used.
In late 2014, archaeologists working on the memorial park upgrade discovered a British soldier’s button dating back to the 1860s.
The 2.5 centimetre-wide tunic button was among the earliest evidence of military occupation at Mount Cook, Wellington’s first and the country’s longest-lived military base.
Lead archaeologist Richard Shakles, whose team discovered the artefact, says the button’s markings clearly date it to the period between 1890 and 1876 and show it belonged to an imperial soldier serving in the 14th (Buckinghamshire) Regiment of Foot.
“These were troops brought to New Zealand to fight Māori and protect colonists. On this particular button, you can just make out the figure of a tiger and the words India and Waterloo. These symbols are essentially battle honours, telling us of battles won in India at the time of the Napoleonic Wars. The original owner of this button probably lost it doing something as ordinary as digging a drain,” says Shakles.
Other military artefacts discovered include stoneware, bottle glass, a trophy, ammunition such as musket balls and Miniet bullets and even an ivory toothbrush and pearl cufflinks.
“We’re thinking the toothbrush and cufflinks weren’t the kinds of items most soldiers would’ve owned. More research is needed, but we’re pretty sure these belonged to officers,” says Shakles.
Shakles and a team of seven archaeologists worked on the Pukeahu National War Memorial Park project for three years from 2012.
The project, a joint initiative between Waka Kotahi, the New Zealand Transport Agency, and the Ministry for Culture and Heritage, involved putting Buckle Street underground, building a tunnel to take the traffic and commemorate the New Zealand Tunnelling Company of the First World War, and creating an overpass for the memorial park.
At a national ceremony on Anzac Day in 2015, Pukeahu National War Memorial Park opened to remember the more than 30,000 New Zealanders who died in conflict and served in war.
Shakles’ team carried out two excavations during the project’s lifetime: one in June 2012, followed by another in October 2013.
Shakles and David Rudd, Heritage New Zealand Pouhere Taonga archaeologist who oversaw the project, agree it was a complex, large-scale operation that revealed something from pretty much every key phase in the site’s military history.
The original wall foundations of the drill hall, built in the 1880s, and the hall’s underground rifle range were excavated. So too were a signal mast from the 1870s, brick drains and a gun pit. Several timber postholes, possibly from Mount Cook’s first military encampment in the 1840s, were identified, along with walls from the 1907 garrison hall and bricks made by prisoners from local jails.
For Shakles, the highlight was the range of subterranean findings.
“I don’t think anyone thought we’d find such a depth of archaeology here. Sure, we found some interesting things on the surface — the buttons and bottles and so on. But in the end, we found artefacts more than four metres under the surface, dating back to the 1840s and 1860s.
In 2012, archaeologists excavating Buckle Street found remnants (a gun carriage set into a circular brick pedestal) of a so-called Armstrong gun.
According to Shakles, a number of Armstrong guns were brought to New Zealand in the 1880s during a period known as the ‘Russian scare.’ At the time, the huge 13 tonne guns were the latest in military technology and could fire a 95-kilogram explosive shell more than six kilometres.
Another big find was what was thought to be Wellington’s earliest stone building, unearthed near the Taranaki Street end of Buckle Street.
“It was a double-cell stone building with half-metre-thick walls — probably a power room for housing military explosives that was added to and enlarged over time,” explains Shakles.
“Overall, this was an incredibly significant heritage project for Wellington. We saw literally layer upon layer of life revealed. This experience is common places like the United Kingdom, but it’s rare in a young country like New Zealand. It was very unusual to have a 19th-century ground surface surviving underground and uncommon to excavate a military site in New Zealand with such an extensive history.”
KEY DATES IN MOUNT COOK’S MILITARY HISTORY
Pre 1840 | Māori occupy the site and live nearby at Te Akatarawa pā (on the site of Wellington College).
Early 1840s | The New Zealand Company renames Mount Cook after British captain James Cook and decides to use it for government purposes. British imperial troops camp at the base of Mount Cook at what is now Buckle Street.
1850-1870 | British forces set up on Mount Cook before the site becomes a permanent one for New Zealand militia (the Armed Constabulary). Buckle Street becomes a military thoroughfare, with iron gates installed at both ends (Taranaki Street and Tory Street) and armed guards on 24-hour duty.
1880 | The Mount Cook depot is expanded for the New Zealand Constabulary (the former Armed Constabulary) and a permanent artillery branch is set up to train volunteer field and coastal defence gunners. A drill hall, artillery depot and instruction school are built.
1990s | A new brick garrison hall with a basement firing range is built on the corner of Taranaki and Buckle Streets, incorporating the old drill hall and featuring a brick street-front facade.
2015 | Pukeahu National War Memorial Park opens as the national place for New Zealanders to remember and reflect on the country’s experience of war, military conflict and peacekeeping.
This story was first published in Heritage New Zealand magazine in 2014.
Belgian Memorial (Memorial Wreath), 2017 by Niko Van Stichel and Lut Vandebos. The Corten steel sculpture symbolises shared bonds of friendship, reflected in the olive leaf design, an international symbol of peace (image by Jacqui Gibson).
Hinerangi (the universal mother) sculpture by Te Āti Awa artist Darcy Nicholas. Part of the memorial garden called Ngā Tapuwae o te Kāhui Maunga (image by Jacqui Gibson).
Ngā Tapuwae o te Kāhui Maunga memorial boulder within Ngā Tapuwae o te Kāhui Maunga (image by Jacqui Gibson).
The Man with the Donkey, by sculpture artist Paul Walshe, Pukeahu, National War Memorial Park. Sculpture pays tribute to all the medical personnel, stretcher bearers and ambulance drivers who’ve served in war (image by Jacqui Gibson).