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JonS

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9 April 1916

France (Western Front) – the New Zealand Pioneer (Maori) Battalion arrives in France. It is used to mill timber, dig trenches, erect barbed wire entanglements, build bunkers, and lay railway tracks.

as far as I can recall these guys were the original "Diggers" due to their job - the sobriquet subsequently being adopted by the whole of the New Zealand Division, and then.......as per usual.....by Australians.....

The Pioneers earned the nickname the 'Digging battalion' and the term 'Digger' was soon adopted by the rest of the New Zealand Division. By 1917 it had spread from the New Zealand Division to the Australian Divisions in the two Anzac Corps.
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29 April 1864

New Zealand - The initial assault made on Gate Pā by Lieutenant General Cameron’s force was repulsed with heavy losses.

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Plan of the attack on Gate Pā.

29 April 1915

Turkey (Gallipoli) – heavy Turkish attacks take place along the whole of the ANZAC line.

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Anafarta, Gallipoli Peninsula. c. 1915-08. The commander Mustafa Kemal Bey (Ataturk) (fourth from left) with officers and staff of the Anafarta Group, of which he was given command 1915-08. Far left is Major Izzettin Bey. (Australian War Museum)

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30 April 1845

An expedition sent to the Bay of Islands under the command of Lieutenant Colonel Hulme burns Otuihu Pā and arrests the local chief Pomare.

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HMS North Star destroying Pomare's Pā, 1845.

30 April 1941

Greece (Crete) – Major General Freyberg is appointed General Officer Commanding ‘Creforce’ which included a total of 28,600 Australian, New Zealand, and British troops.

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30 April 1946

New Zealand – the wartime Women’s Land Service is disbanded.

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01 May 1945

Italy – 2nd New Zealand Division advanced north across the Isonzo River heading for Trieste, taking somewhat less time than the Italians two decades earlier.

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01 May 1955

Five Vampire aircraft of No. 14 Squadron RNZAF take off from Tengah airfield, Singapore, to conduct a strike mission against ‘guerrilla targets in the Malayan jungle’. Led by Flight Lieutenant Stuart McIntyre, this is the RNZAF’s first combat strike since the conclusion of the Second World War. It's doubtful that they hit anything though.

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RNZAF's diesel powered Vampire's.

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02 May 1915

Turkey (Gallipoli) – the New Zealanders destroy a Turkish observation post at Lala Baba.

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02 May 1940

New Zealand - the Second Echelon (428 officers and 6,410 soldiers) sails bound for Egypt. En route, its destination is changed to the United Kingdom. While in England this Brigade forms a significant part of the south coast defences following the fall of France.

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02 May 1945

Italy – 2nd New Zealand Division enter Trieste, where the Germans are still holding out against the Yugoslavians. Act I of the Cold War is thus played out by a bunch of Antipodeans in a corner of the Balkans at the far end of the Adriatic. (incidentally, Col Hackworth’s first deployment was to Trietse, after just missing WWII)

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02 May 1945

Italy - German troops capitulate.

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05 May 1863

New Zealand - The Colonial Defence Act 1862 is enacted. It allows the Governor to “arm and array” a Colonial Defence Force of up to 500 mounted ‘natives’ or Europeans. This became the origin of the Army’s regular force element.

05 May 1915

Turkey (Gallipoli) - The New Zealand Infantry Brigade is deployed south to Cape Helles.

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07 May 1945

Germany formally surrenders, Zealand time. Having been burnt in 1939 by getting in to the war before Britiain, acting Prime Minister Walter Nash insists that celebrations should wait until Winston Churchill officially announces peace at 1 a.m. on 9 May, New Zealand time.

07 May 1971

South Vietnam – the main body of the sixth Victor Company arrive in South Vietnam.

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New Zealand servicemen and civilians relax inside the Kiwi Club in Saigon, circa 1971

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08 May 1845

New Zealand - The first British engagement of the Northern War of 1845-1846 takes place near Puketutu. About 400 Imperial troops led by Lieutenant Colonel Hulme assault Hone Heke’s Pā of Te Mawhe unsuccessfully. Hone Heke and Kawiti build a second Pā at Ohaeawai, where Lieutenant Colonel Despard received a second drubbing in July, despite subjecting the Pā to four days of cannon fire. The outer walls at Ohaeawai were built with a layered construction to absorb the impact of the cannon balls, with trenches behind and loopholes at ground level. The stockade itself was made using wood of the Puriri tree, a wood so hard and heavy that it will sink rather than floating on water.

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08 May 1915

Turkey (Gallipoli) - the New Zealand Infantry Brigade makes two charges across the ‘Daisy Patch’ to attack entrenched Turkish positions. It attacks on its own in daylight and suffers 835 casualties for no gain. After 14 days on the peninsula, the Brigade has already sustained more than 2000 casualties.

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08 May 1971

South Vietnam –161 Battery, RNZA is awarded the Vietnamese Cross of Gallantry at a parade held at Vung Tau.

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08 May 1998

Bougainville – the New Zealand-led Truce Monitoring Group is replaced by the Australian Peace Monitoring Group. In an interesting bit of maneauvre warfare, the commander of this mission decided that the best way to enforce peace between two heavily armed factions was to go in completely unarmed. It worked.

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09 May 1884

The first two of four Spar torpedo boats built for the New Zealand Government arrive at Port Chalmers. If you aren’t familiar with the operating concept of spar torpedo boats, you really should look it up. Utterly bonkers.

09 May 1945

Victory in Europe (VE Day) is celebrated.

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12 May 1915

Turkey (Gallipoli) – 1500 men of the New Zealand Mounted Rifles arrive at Anzac Cove to fight as infantry.

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November 1918 picture of officers, NCOs, and men of the Auckland Mounted Rifles, the survivors of those who enlisted in 1914

12 May 1916

Sinai - The New Zealand Mounted Rifles Brigade starts the first of its ‘long patrols’ into the Sinai desert. Reconnaissance patrols are to be a way of life for the next two and a half years, a role that would be reprised a quarter century later with the LRDG.

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A patrol from the Auckland Mounted Rifles Regiment at the railhead near Romani, 1916.

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13 May 1916

France - The New Zealand Division moves into front-line trenches for the first time, a six and a half kilometre long sector in the Armentières area.

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New Zealand Herald, 9 June 1916, p.7

13 May 1940

Egypt – the Egyptian government severs diplomatic relations with Italy. Units of the 2nd New Zealand Expeditionary Force are given security duties in Cairo.

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New Zealand Herald, 14 June 1940, p.7

13 May 1943

Tunisia – the last Axis forces surrender in North Africa. Lieutenant General Freyberg takes the surrender of the Italian 1st Army. In the six months since Since El Alamein, the 2nd New Zealand Division has lost 336 dead, 967 wounded, and 21 prisoners of war.

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German Chief of Staff surrendering to Lieutenant General Sir Bernard Freyberg VC, KCB, KBE, CMG, DSO** in Tunisia

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Freyberg talking with Marshal Giovanni Messe, commander of the 1st Italian Army, after the German-Italian forces surrender

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14 May 1941

New Zealand - 27 days after being commissioned HMS PURIRI, a minesweeper converted from a merchant ship, of the New Zealand Division of the Royal Navy, strikes a German mine 9 miles NE off the Whangarei heads and sinks. Of the 31 aboard, five (including the commanding officer) were killed, and another five were injured. Sounds like the old joke about Irish minesweepers.

14 May 1942

Fiji – B Force of the 2nd New Zealand Expeditionary Force is renamed the 3rd New Zealand Division.

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19 May 1938

Four Territorial Force colonels, R.F. Gambrill, N.L. Macky, A.S. Wilder, and C.S. Spragg, issue a public statement denouncing the deficiencies in the force. Known as the Four Colonels Revolt, this is the most open defiance of authority by officers in New Zealand’s military history.

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NZ Herald, 01 July 1938.

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Defence Minister Jones reports to the PM, Michael Savage. Mininnick, NZ Herald, 02 July 1938.

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20 May 1941

Greece (Crete) – the Germans launch their airborne invasion of Crete from bases in Greece. Within 10 days the Germans have taken Crete and General Freyberg has lost over 13,000 men dead or taken prisoner. The New Zealanders, on the north-western edge of the island, absorbed much of the initial brunt of the attack and are forced to withdraw over a mountain chain to ports in the south for evacuation.

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Peter McIntyre, Parachutists landing on Galatas, 20 May 1941

20 May 1941

Greece (Crete) – Sergeant Alfred Hulme (23 Battalion) earns the Victoria Cross for his actions on Crete from 20 to 28 May. He led parties of men to destroy enemy parties, whilst dealing with snipers. He ventured alone and threw grenades into a school in which a number of German troops were stationed. During fighting around Suda on 28 May while killing snipers he was severely wounded but carried on in and directed traffic under fire and organised various units into section groups. He was awarded the Victoria Cross for "outstanding and inspiring qualities of leadership, initiative, skill, endurance and most conspicuous gallantry and devotion to duty". Hulme was evacuated to New Zealand after the withdrawal of the Allied forces from Crete.

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John Cameron Duncan, Sergeant A C Hulme, VC, c.1940

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21 May 1941

Greece (Crete) – by nightfall the airfield at Maleme has been lost to German parachutists. The airfield was being defended by NZ 5 Brigade. The commander of 5 Bde, Brig Hargest, eventually and justly has been identified as the root cause of the debacle which snatched defeat out of the jaws of victory at Maleme. After the evacuation to Egypt he attempted to use his political connections to shove blame for the defeat away from himself and on to Freyberg, and got a DSO for his troubles.

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Hargest, who had served with some distinction in WWI, was captured (by Rommel personally) in Nov '41 during Op CRUSADER. From there he was sent to Italy, escaped, walked to Spain, made his way to England, and got himself attached as an official observer to 50th Inf Div for the Normandy invasion. The reports he wrote in Normandy have become quite influential in the historiography of the performance of the British Army in Normandy. Hargest was killed by mortar fire on 12 August 1944.

21 May 1949

New Zealand – the New Zealand Army Dental Corps is redesignated the Royal New Zealand Dental Corps. Left of the Line for those lads.

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22 May 1939

Berlin, Germany - Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini sign the "Pact of Steel" forming the Axis powers.

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The signing of the Pact of Steel in the Reichskanzlei in Berlin: from left, sitting, Italy's Foreign Minister Count Ciano, Reichskanzler Adolf Hitler, Third Reich's Foreign Minister Joachim Von Ribbentrop. Standing behind Hitler is Hermann Göring

22 May 1941

Crete - Charles Upham (20 Battalion) earns his first Victoria Cross for actions on Crete on 22 to 30 May. When informed of the award, his first response was: "It's meant for the men."

Upham discussing his VC

War Office, 14th October, 1941.

The KING has been graciously pleased to approve of awards of the Victoria Cross to the undermentioned: —

Second Lieutenant Charles Hazlitt Upham (8077), New Zealand Military Forces.

During the operations in Crete this officer performed a series of remarkable exploits, showing outstanding leadership, tactical skill and utter indifference to danger.

He commanded a forward platoon in the attack on Maleme on 22nd May and fought his way forward for over 3,000 yards unsupported by any other arms and against a defence strongly organised in depth. During this operation his platoon destroyed numerous enemy posts but on three occasions sections were temporarily held up.

In the first case, under a heavy fire from a machine gun nest he advanced to close quarters with pistol and grenades, so demoralizing the occupants that his section was able to "mop up" with ease.

Another of his sections was then held up by two machine guns in a house. He went in and placed a grenade through a window, destroying the crew of one machine gun and several others, the other machine gun being silenced by the fire of his sections.

In the third case he crawled to within 15 yards of an M.G. post and killed the gunners with a grenade.

When his Company withdrew from Maleme he helped to carry a wounded man out under fire, and together with another officer rallied more men together to carry other wounded men out.

He was then sent to bring in a company which had become isolated. With a Corporal he went through enemy territory over 600 yards, killing two Germans on the way, found the company, and brought it back to the Battalion's new position. But for this action it would have been completely cut off.

During the following two days his platoon occupied an exposed position on forward slopes and was continuously under fire. Second Lieutenant Upham was blown over by one mortar shell, and painfully wounded by a piece of shrapnel behind the left shoulder, by another. He disregarded this wound and remained on duty. He also received a bullet in the foot which he later removed in Egypt.

At Galatas on 25th May his platoon was heavily engaged and came under severe mortar and machine-gun fire. While his platoon stopped under cover of a ridge Second-Lieutenant Upham went forward, observed the enemy and brought the platoon forward when the Germans advanced. They killed over 40 with fire and grenades and forced the remainder to fall back.

When his platoon was ordered to retire he sent it back under the platoon Sergeant and he went back to warn other troops that they were being cut off. When he came out himself he was fired on by two Germans. He fell and shammed dead, then crawled into a position and having the use of only one arm rested his rifle in the fork of a tree and as the Germans came forward he killed them both. The second to fall actually hit the muzzle of the rifle as he fell.

On 30th May at Sphakia his platoon was ordered to deal with a party of the enemy which had advanced down a ravine to near Force Headquarters. Though in an exhausted condition he climbed the steep hill to the west of the ravine, placed his men in positions on the slope overlooking the ravine and himself went to the top with a Bren Gun and two riflemen. By clever tactics he induced the enemy party to expose itself and then at a range of 500 yards shot 22 and caused the remainder to disperse in panic.

During the whole of the operations he suffered from dysentery and was able to eat very little, in addition to being wounded and bruised.

He showed superb coolness, great skill and dash and complete disregard of danger. His conduct and leadership inspired his whole platoon to fight magnificently throughout, and in fact was an inspiration to the Battalion.

London Gazette, 14 October 1941

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26 May 1716

England - two regular companies of field artillery, each 100 men strong, were raised at Woolwich by royal warrant of George I.

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26 May 1940

France - The evacuation of Allied forces from Dunkirk begins. Operating from their own bases, and under a functional C3 system, the RAF's Fighter Command are finally able to intervene effectively agains the Luftwaffe's depredations.

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27 May 1965

New Zealand – in response to a South Vietnamese Government request of for combatant troop support, the New Zealand Government announces its decision to deploy the 161st Battery, Royal Regiment of New Zealand Artillery, in South Vietnam.

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