Royal New Zealand Navy Chief Petty Officer George Forrest, 31, was the keynote speaker at the Arrowtown Returned and Services’ Association’s Anzac Day commemorations, held at the Soldiers Hill cenotaph.
The former Wakatipu High student, who joined the navy in 2013, recalled growing up just down the road and, in his younger years, pulling on the Scouts uniform, joining the march, hearing the bugel and "doing my best to stand still through the speeches" on Anzac Days.
"I think, at that age, I didn’t fully understand why this day matters, only that it did," he said.
"As I got older I realised this place, this community, it holds its history close.
"Arrowtown has always been a town where people look after one another, where stories are passed down, and where the past is treated with respect."
George added to those stories on Saturday, when he shared excerpts from his great-grandfather Private Albert Forrest’s war-time diary.
Albert, an Australian, enlisted on March 16, 1915 — according to the AIF Project website, the boxmaker was 26 at the time, and embarked as a stretcher-bearer with the 5th Field Ambulance from Sydney on June 25 that year.
"He was one of those men who ran towards the shelling, not away from it," George said.
After receiving the diary four years ago, he kept coming back to what his great-grandfather wrote about Bullecourt in May, 1917.
It began at 4.30am, George said, when Allied and enemy bombardment had just started.
"They had been forward stationed in a sunken road in order to make preparations for an Australian advance.
"[Albert] wrote that ‘for an hour it seemed as all hell was let loose, the air just whistled over our heads’."
Soon after, the Australians went over the top — within minutes, hundreds of wounded and dead were everywhere.
Albert and his mates moved forward, up an exposed slope, to recover the wounded, while the Germans had a bird’s-eye view, and shelled them "unmercifully".
"Stretcher-bearers were being hit ... but the work didn’t stop," George said.
"He and his squad carried men heavier than themselves through mud, water and exploding shrapnel ... while German counter-attacks were coming in [and] while grenades were being thrown back and forth, just metres away.
"There was no sleep, no shelter, no pause.
"Just carrying the wounded again, and again, and again, for nearly two days straight."
For his actions at Bullecourt, Albert and his three mates were awarded the Military Medal — according to the AIF Project’s citation, they carried the wounded, continuously, for 36 hours, each trip one and three-quarter miles (2.8km) one way, frequently stopping to attend other wounded on the way, showing "utter disregard of danger".
Proudly wearing that medal on Saturday, George noted his great-grandfather, who died aged 84, "never bragged" about his actions.
"What he did talk about was the spirit of the men around him, the mateship, the humour, the grit.
"The way they kept going when no one would blame them for stopping and, to me, that is the point.
"Courage for the Anzacs wasn’t loud ... it was ordinary men doing extraordinary things because the person beside them needed them to.
"So ... as we stand here in Arrowtown, like generations before us, we remember them, we honour them, and we carry their values forward in how we live, how we serve, and how we look after one another."
