In 2015 the Thames-Coromandel District Council embarked on a tree-planting project to commemorate New Zealand soldiers who had been killed in the First World War. The first trees were planted on Anzac Day 2015. The project was officially launched by the Minister of Conservation, Maggie Barry, at Cathedral Cove, near Hahei, on 5 June 2015.
Eight sites had been established by June 2018. In addition to the Cathedral Cove plantation, which commemorates Gallipoli, these were the new Mercury Bay cemetery, Stella Evered Memorial Park at Cook’s Beach, the Tairua RSA cemetery, Tangitarori Lane in Pauanui, Le Quesnoy Park in Whangamata, Rhodes Park in Thames, and the Hauraki Road wastewater treatment plant, near the Coromandel township. It is planned to plant a total of 18,166 trees, one for each of New Zealand’s First World War dead.
For more information, see: ‘Barry launches World War I Memorial Forest at Cathedral Cove’, Waikato Times, 5/6/2015; Thames-Coromandel Memorial Forest Project (accessed 20/7/2018).
Image: Karen Lawson, 2016
Text: Bruce Ringer, 2018