WWI lottery grants

5 July 2016

A photographic memorial to New Zealand tunnellers in the First World War to be built by the Arras Tourist Office in France is one of the 13 recipients of $1.4 million of WWI lottery grant funding announced recently.

Administered by the Department of Internal Affairs, the grant of $45,000 will allow the French town of Arras in northern France to commemorate the New Zealand Engineers Tunnelling Company at its ‘Wellington Quarry Museum’.

Little remembered in New Zealand until recently with the naming of the Arras Tunnel in Wellington beneath its new war memorial park, 500 New Zealand soldiers dug extensive tunnels from Arras to the German trenches in preparation for the Battle of Arras in 1917.

The tunnel system could accommodate 20,000 men and was outfitted with running water, electric lights, kitchens, latrines, a light rail system and a fully equipped hospital. It was dangerous work and 41 New Zealanders lost their lives.

Bridget Mosley of the Lottery Environment and Heritage Committee of the Lottery Grants Board said the Arras Tourist Office plans to use the grant to create a memorial wall of portraits of the New Zealand tunnellers at the museum.

“The project will strengthen the special relationship with the residents of Arras and the New Zealand tunnellers and their descendants,” she said.

Other recent grants awarded by the committee to commemorate WWI include a temporary exhibition of WWI naval art being assembled by the Hutt City Council.

Titled, ‘Ahoy! Lieutenants Esmond and Hal Atkinson RNVR – WW1 naval artists’ the exhibition will be held between 3-23 November 2016 at Alfred Memelink Artspace Gallery on the Petone foreshore in Hutt City, Wellington.

Also on a naval theme, the Otaki College Board of Trustees has been granted $73,860, part of which will be used to erect a monument to the sinking of the New Zealand Company’s food supply ship, the ‘SS Otaki’ by the German navy in the North Atlantic in 1917 with the loss of five lives.

The project has regional significance as the historical monument will become a focal point for the wider community to attend Anzac Day ceremonies and informal gatherings, and will be a fitting memorial to the ‘SS Otaki’, Bridget Mosley said.

ENDS

© Scoop Media