Rotary Information Weekly
Fifth Tuesday In May
Informative Seminar Followed by Dinner
Please see the invitation below
Following the seminar it is planned to have dinner at the nearby Gold Coast Tavern which has been suggested as an alternative meeting venue
For further information and to register please contact President Elect Andrew McTaggart
An ANZAC Story about Jenny O'Dwyer's Father - Harry Stratford
Harry was born in December 1894 and was sent to Egypt in mid 1915 for training and then on to Gallipoli on 7 September and was in the rear guard of the evacuation on 20 December.
One of his tasks was a stretcher bearer and he recalled memories of picking up the dead, wounded and body parts of soldiers blown to bits, of blotted corpses and rats the size of cats feeding off them.
From Gallipoli he was sent to the western front, serving a total of 3.5 years overseas. He suffered from a severe bout of dysentery while on the front in 1917 and was shipped to a medical hospital in England and somehow met a woman from Edinburgh, Maud, and they married prior to him being discharged and returning back to NZ in 1919.
So traumatised by his wartime experiences, he vowed and declared he would never leave the safe haven of NZ shores again. A vow I dare say he would have withheld had it not been for Jenny and I emigrating to Australia in 1981, when at the age of 89, he came for a visit in 1983.
Maud gave birth to a daughter, but unfortunately died circa 1930. He married Jenny’s mother, Nita, some 19 years his junior in 1936 and they had three sons (one dying of leukemia at 4 years of age), and Jenny born in 1950. (Nita didn’t enjoy good health and never really got over the loss of their son and she died in 1970.
He farmed his 1000 acre hill country property successfully and prospered with the wool boom in the 1950s when wool was fetching one pound for a pound in weight. He was an intelligent, quiet gentleman who loved reading poetry and listening to classical music and having long discussions about historical and current day events.
Jenny is extremely proud of him and her heritage and I would think there isn’t too many around of Jenny’s age whose father was in the first world war.
An article was printed in the local rag “Hawkes Bay Today” from Hastings, our previous hometown, regarding the Municipal Theatre (which was actually built in 1915) and one of our old friends over there guessed it was Jenny’s father and contacted her and she in turn contacted Eva Bradley, the reporter of the attached article, and hence this article.
Incidentally, no one ever found out who Lillie was.
Harry passed away in 1988, aged 93.
Hope you enjoyed this little bit of history.
David O’Dwyer
