Lives of the First World War

New Zealand Maori Pioneer Badge, September 1917 - March 1919. Image from Auckland Museum

Brockenhurst in the New Forest in Hampshire was chosen in 1915 by the War Office to become a hospital centre. Initially, Lady Hardinge's Hospital, it was then replaced by No.1 New Zealand General Hospital in June 1916. It remained at Brockenhurst until it closed early in 1919. Approximately 21,000 New Zealand casualties were treated at the hospital, including 93 who died. The churchyard at Brockenhurst contains 106 graves of the First World War, of which one hundred are in the New Zealand plot. In addition to the 93 New Zealand graves, there are also three Indian and three unidentified Belgian civilians (employed at the Sopley Forestry camp). Every year at the annual Anzac Service in Brockenhurst cemetery the village remembers the ninety-three New Zealand soldiers buried there after dying of their wounds or sickness.