Shellfire blighted everything it touched. H. Stewart, The New Zealand Division 1916–1919: a popular history based on official records, Whitcombe & Tombs, Auckland, 1921
Ormond Burton was a Methodist minister and prominent pacifist who developed anti-war views after serving in the First World War.
Ormond Burton was born and raised in Auckland. Central to his young life was his religious education, through which he became a strong public speaker and debater, as well as an unwavering Christian. After secondary school he attended Auckland Training College, and by 1913 he was sole-charge teaching at Waimana Sawmill School in the Bay of Plenty.
Andrew Russell was a New Zealand military leader in the First World War, known for his meticulous planning.
Born in Napier, Andrew Russell was educated in England, first at Harrow School and then at the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, as was family tradition. After serving for five years in India and Burma, Russell left the 1st Border Regiment to return to New Zealand and farm sheep with his uncle, William Russell.
From October 1918 New Zealanders progressively celebrated the surrenders of Bulgaria, the Ottoman Empire and Austria-Hungary before the armistice with Germany on 11 November
Ten New Zealand soldiers were killed when they were hit by a train at Bere Ferrers in the United Kingdom. The accident occurred as troops from the 28th Reinforcements, NZEF, were being transported from Plymouth to Sling Camp on Salisbury Plain.
After being found guilty of desertion, 28-year-old Private Frank Hughes was shot by firing squad in the French village of Hallencourt. He was the first New Zealand soldier executed during the First World War.
George Davies came from a low-income Wellington family of five children. In this Spectrum radio documentary from 1981 he remembers his childhood during the First World War.
