SLEEPING IN TE AROHA (3)

(Published in the Aroha Advertiser)

The Dead Man’s Penny

After WW1 the next of kin of all service personnel who died as a result of the war were issued with a Memorial Plaque.  It is a sobering thought that 1,355,000 of these plaques were issued.  Because the plaque was made of brass and looked not unlike a penny it was soon nicknamed the Dead Man’s Penny.

One of these symbols of sacrifice can be found in the Te Aroha Cemetery on the memorial for Private William Lusby who died of disease in France on 1 March 1918 while on active service. To the right of the plaque is William’s name without his rank, as all sacrifices were regarded as equal. Around the picture are the words “HE DIED FOR FREEDOM AND HONOUR”.

William Lusby Snr immigrated to New Zealand from Lincolnshire with his parents and siblings in 1883 aboard the Crownthorpe.  The family settled at Shaftesbury near Te Aroha. Ellen Higdon, aged 13, arrived in New Zealand aboard the Rangitiki, with her older sister and her parents, from Somerset in 1879.  William snr and Ellen married in 1893 and farmed at Manawaru. William Lusby Jnr, the first child of the marriage, was born in 1894. Six other children followed.

At the outbreak of war, William Jnr (known as Bill) was a farmhand on his parents’ farm.  He wasn’t part of the initial response but left New Zealand for Liverpool on 13 October 1917 and arrived on 1 December. On 18 January 1918 Bill was admitted to Brimstone Bottom Isolation Hospital in Tidworth.  He had contracted Rubella. On 30 January Bill was discharged to Sling Camp and on 14 February he left for France. By 23 February Bill was very sick with pneumonia, a supervening infection from measles, and on 1 March 1918 he died in a field hospital.

Bill’s medals and his Memorial Plaque were sent to his mother in 1922.  His actual grave is in Westoutre British Cemetery in Belgium, along with two other Kiwis from the New Zealand Expeditionary Force, but the memorial to him, and the graves of his brother George Edward who died in 1920 and his parents William and Ellen, stands proudly in the Te Aroha Cemetery. The Dead Man’s Penny has been embedded into the headstone.

Deborah Watson

Genealogist and Family Historian

www.watsons.co.nz

© Deborah Watson 2017

SLEEPING IN TE AROHA (2)

(published in the Aroha Advertiser 2017)

John Kilian 

The headstone for John Kilian is broken off and lying flat on the ground at the far end of the Te Aroha Cemetery.  The young lad’s birth name was Johannes Bernardes Kilian but most people around Wairongomai knew him as John.

John was the only son of Emilia and Johannes Kilian who, along with their small daughter, arrived in Auckland from Capetown aboard the “Steinwarder” in 1864.  In 1881 the family, which had now grown to include two more children, moved to Wairongomai where Johannes was the publican of the Premier Hotel at the time of his son’s accidental death.

John was a cheerful young man, full of fun and with a renowned singing voice. At the age of 17 John worked as a “blanket washer” at the Wairongomai Battery.  Blanket Washing was a labour intensive and dirty job and was the “first job” for many young lads.

On the night of 16 May 1884, John was working nightshift at the Battery.  At about 8pm John and another lad named William Collins were sent to clear some obstructions from the water races.  To do that they had to go up a bridge consisting of two planks of wood with a handrail.  The boys took a lantern and went off to do the job.  On their way back down the bridge John decided it might be fun to slide down, however William wasn’t keen and held the lantern while John did this.  According to William’s evidence, it had been raining and the bridge was wet. The first time John slid down it was fine, but the second time John slid under the handrail headfirst into the gully about 20 feet below.  William couldn’t see him as it was so dark, so he ran for help.

Although a doctor was called from Thames, nothing could be done to save poor John.  He died the next day at 9pm, of concussion and a fractured skull.

John was a good natured, well liked and friendly boy and his funeral service drew great numbers of people from all over the district. The funeral was reported in the Te Aroha News on 24 May 1884 to have stopped en route to the Te Aroha Cemetery to “permit of an inquest being held at the Court House”.

© Deborah Watson 2017

SLEEPING IN TE AROHA (1)

(published in the Aroha Advertiser 2017)

Private Ernest John Timblick

Ernest was born in Oamaru in 1879 to John and Eliza Timblick.  The large Timblick family lived in Maheno, Otago but sometime between 1911 and 1914 Ernest moved to Manawaru.  By the time WW1 broke out Ernest was farming in Manawaru in partnership with his brother Charles. 

Although Ernest had already fought in the South African (Boer) War 1899-1902, he was prepared to fight again. Aged 37, he was older than many of the young men who were ready for a big adventure and was no doubt more prepared than the younger ones too, having already seen action.  On his attestation papers he wrote that he was prepared to leave in August 1916 but nevertheless he arrived at the Trentham Camp on 26 July 1916 to begin his training.

On 24 September 1916 Ernest was transferred to Featherston to the Army Hospital.  He was very ill as were five of his mates.  On 29 September Ernest died of CSM – Cerebral Spinal Meningitis.  The other five soldiers recovered.  Although Ernest had not long been a son of Te Aroha he was buried in our quiet cemetery rather than in his home district. 

In Maheno a memorial ceremony was held on 18 July 1918 to honour the men from that district who had paid the ultimate sacrifice. Ernest was one of the eleven fallen remembered with a memorial address “illuminated and surmounted with a portrait of the fallen hero, flanked by the Union Jack and Dominion of New Zealand flags.”1

Ernest left his share of the farm to his brother Charles and the remainder of his effects to Charles’ son William Douglas John Timblick. His parents and other siblings weren’t mentioned in his will.

Deborah Watson

Genealogist and Family Historian

www.watsons.co.nz

1.     North Otago Times, 19 July 1918

© Deborah Watson 2017