Why "Grandpa's Lonely Walk Home"?

The following is a personal report about the Key Date, 23 March 1917 when Grandpa's lonely walk home, began.  The content of this report is central to the purposes of this Blog, and was provided by Mare Clark, grandson of Richard and Te Maki Heperi:

I can remember one evening we were gathered around the kitchen table with grandpa, my sisters and I think both mum and dad. I don't know how we got to be discussing grandpa's war experiences, but that was the only time ever that he shared with us. I can remember grandpa mentioning a place called Somme, that it was at night, his mate had been injured and was stranded in No-man’s land. Grandpa said that he could hear his friend calling out to grandpa in Maori to come and get him.

When I heard grandpa that night in Orrs Road telling us, I had an image in my mind of a dark desolate landscape, void of any recognizable features and mud - just mud everywhere, and for me, at that particular time, our grandpa and somewhere out in the darkness and the mud, his friend lying wounded. Cousin, I still remember this image I conjured up in my mind so many years ago in our kitchen. Grandpa said when he heard his friend calling out for grandpa to come and get him, (and here I'll describe how I can best recall his words and I guess the feelings I had also). Grandpa said when he heard him calling, there was gladness because his friend was still alive but sadness also because of the predicament that he was in. His friend was in No-mans land, and the command given to grandpa and other soldiers, was, to leave the wounded, and anyone [not] doing so would be disciplined. Grandpa's aroha for his friend outweighed the fear of death or being disciplined, and he rescued his friend.

When grandpa finished, we were all quiet and I guess deep in thought - then he told me to go to the back bedroom - this was the room he used when he would come and stay with us - telling me to go into the wardrobe and get a small book (not to sure if the book was in a box or a coat). The book was dull grayish and dull green in colour, had some lettering or symbols in gold and some dull brownish smudges on the front cover. I think grandpa said it was an identification book, comparable to the dog tags of present day soldiers, and he kept this in his shirt pocket of his uniform. When grandpa was carrying his friend to safety (either piggy-back or over his shoulder), blood was dripping down, and grandpa said that the smudges on that little book was the blood of his friend.

That was some night we had with grandpa. I'm not sure if any of our cuzzies have heard this before. When grandpa told us, he didn't mention the name of his friend, and if the name Pona Te Whata matches, I now have a name of his friend he rescued from those dark and muddied battlefields.  (Email: Grandpa Talks about his Best Mate, Pona, Mare Clarke, Grandson of Richard and Te Maki Heperi, 13 Feb. 2013).

Unfortunately, Pona died of his wounds (DOW) the following day.  On 23 March 1917, close familial ties and friendships-- that began in Rahiri, Waihou Valley, Northland-- were permanently severed in Belgium.  Pona and Grandpa had played, eaten, swum, and played rugby together as young children.  Then, as young men, they worked together at the Rawene Box and Packing Company.  They enlisted in the military on the same date; trained at the same military camps; embarked from Auckland, New Zealand on the same date; sailed on the same vessel (HMNZT #61, Aparima) to England; and fought, side-by-side, on the Western Front.  How agonizing it must have been for Grandpa to carry his horribly wounded mate back from No-Man's land.  How dark the following day must have been, when word of Pona's death finally arrived.  Yet, how appropriate that the honor of carrying Pona to safety, fell upon Grandpa.  The walk they had made together to the Western Front, was now over.  With his best mate gone, Grandpa now began his, "Lonely Walk Home."

(continued at post titled, "Opposition to a Rescue.")