New Zealand Division

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Māori at the Haka , 1918

The New Zealand Division was a division of the New Zealand Army , in the First World War was.

history

Soldiers with booty weapons

The division was after the Battle of Gallipoli placed from 1 March 1916 in Egypt and consisted of five regiments and numerous additional units such as artillery - and machine gun departments . General Andrew Hamilton Russell became the commander . Together with the Australian 1st and 2nd Divisions , the division was relocated to France in April 1916 as part of the I ANZAC Corps (Lieutenant General William Birdwood ) and prepared for the major battle.

From September 1916, the division was used in the Battle of the Somme and fought at Flers-Courcelette , Morval and Le Transloy. In these battles, the division lost 7,000 dead, wounded and missing between September 15 and October 4, before it was withdrawn from the combat area. Sergeant Donald Brown received the Victoria Cross for service in combat .

The New Zealand Division was then staffed up and then subordinated to the II ANZAC Corps before they took part in the Battle of Messines from June 1917 . In the Third Battle of Flanders the New Zealanders fought from October 1917 in the Polygon Forest, near Broodseinde and in the First Battle of Passchendaele . Lance Corporal Samuel Frickleton and Lance Corporal Leslie Andrew received the Victoria Cross for their service.

At the end of March 1918, the division was transferred to the British 3rd Army when it was defending itself against the German spring offensive and was used as part of the IV Corps (General Harper ) at Arras , on the Avre and at Bapaume . During the Hundred Days Offensive in September, the division advanced via Havrincourt and the Canal du Nord into the Cambrai area, in October 1918 it was involved in the Battle of the Selle and in the last days of the war in the fighting at Le Quesnoy .

After the war ended in November 1918, the division marched from Eastern France to Germany, where it arrived in Cologne on December 20 , before being demobilized in March 1919.

structure

  • 1st Infantry Regiment
  • 2nd Infantry Regiment
  • Rifle Brigade
  • 1st Entrenching Battalion
  • 2nd Entrenching Battalion
  • 3rd Entrenching Battalion
  • Divisional Machine Gun Battalion
  • Divisional Artillery
  • Divisional Train
  • New Zealand ( Māori ) Pioneer Battalion
  • Divisional Engineers
  • 1st New Zealand Field Ambulance
  • 2nd New Zealand Field Ambulance
  • 3rd New Zealand Field Ambulance
  • New Zealand Sanitary Section
  • New Zealand Mobile Veterinary Section

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ No. 6/2133 L / Cpl. Samuel Frickleton, NZ Infy. . In: London Gazette . 7906 , August 2, 1917 (English, online [PDF; 133  kB ; accessed on June 6, 2017]).