Representing the Museum & Mercury Bay on the global stage
In October 2025, Becs from the Mercury Bay Museum and her daughter Amelia made the long trip to Oostende, Belgium after an amazing yearlong community crowd-funding campaign to represent the Museum and Mercury Bay on the global stage First stop and their base for the two weeks was Oostende, a sea-side city on the Atlantic coast of Belgium. What an amazing place to be based – the history and heritage of the town was awe inspiring. Right from the time they arrived at the train station to the walk through the city centre passing neogothic churches and to the sculptural artwork that is scattered throughout.
The key reason for the trip was for Becs to attend the International Kongress of Underwater Archaeology (IKUWA8) and present alongside her HMS Buffalo Re-examination project colleague Dr Kurt Bennett to associates from all around the world. The presentation was on the second day of the conference, so we had a chance to catch up with our colleagues and network with new friends from the underwater archaeology sector, museums and heritage sites.
The presentation titled ‘Building community-led maritime archaeology in New Zealand: Successes and future needs’ took the attendees on our journey with the HMS Buffalo Re- examination Project. We discussed the project, the outreach programmes, our collaborations with other organisations & even our children’s book. It is amazing to look back at all our mahi over the past five years and then have it acknowledged by our global colleagues as work that is on target and on the same course as other citizen science projects around the world.
The conference theme was ‘Telling our tales of the past’, which really run through on the other presentations and sessions that we attended. It was very different for them to be listening to work being done in maritime archaeology that is based on heritage from the 1400 – 1500s, our shipwreck is 1840!
Once the conference had finished, Amelia and Becs headed to Ypres. They were based here for two days to immerse themselves in the history of the Great War – World War 1.
They visited the Ypres Museum and the In Flanders Fields Museum which are both housed in the Cloth Hall in the Great Place, Ypres. These museums are full of immersive interaction and history of the region. The Ypres Museum follows the story of Ypres and where it fit within the history of Belgium. Children would love this museum with its interactive activities and following the cats through. We were not aware that Ypres was the City of Cats – just another story to add to their rich history. The In Flanders Field Museum takes visitors through the timeline of World War 1 and the battles in the Ypres salient ie Passchendaele and the Battle of Ypres. This was a sobering space as it tells of the heartache and tragedy of war. The Cloth Hall was built between 1200 and 1300 and was one of the largest commercial buildings of the Middle Ages. It was demolished during World War One (1915- 1919) and laid in ruins until 1933. It was completely rebuilt by 1967.
No visit to Ypres would be complete without being present at the Menin Gate at 8pm to hear the buglers of the Last Post Association. The Menin Gate is one of four memorials to the missing in Belgian Flanders which cover the area known as the Ypres Salient. The memorial has approximately 54,000 names of the missing engraved on it but does not include the names of New Zealand’s missing. Our government decided that they wanted New Zealand’s memorial to be closer to the battlefields where our men fought and lost their lives, so the memorial for New Zealand is at Tyne Cot Cemetery.
Becs & Amelia were honoured to be taken on a Battlefield Cemetery tour that was sponsored by the Mercury Bay RSA. Their tour guide was Kim from ‘Kim’s Battlefield Tours’.
Their first visit was into France and to Le Quesnoy. They visited Te Arawhata – The New Zealand Liberation Museum. What a beautiful museum and it tells the story of how the town was liberated and the connections to this day with New Zealand. A breathtaking exhibition within was a Weta workshop oversize soldier which is modelled following the liberation – these models are crafted with such precision that they are so life-like. They then walked the ramparts that border Le Quesnoy and stood in the spot where the New Zealanders put the ladder up to go over the wall and liberate the town from the German Army without a single loss of civilian life.
While in France, Becs and Amelia also visited their two great-great Uncles (brothers) who lost their lives in the battle just 10 days apart. These cemeteries are in the middle of farmers crop fields but so well looked after by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission and their partners. It was emotional to stand at their graves and know they are the first from the family to do so.
From France they moved back into Belgium and onto the several cemeteries where our men from Mercury Bay either lay at rest or are memorialised on the walls/plaques. They visited six cemeteries with a total of ten men. Tyne Cot being the largest cemetery where five of our men are missing, but their names live forever more on the walls of the New Zealand Memorial for Passchendaele.
This was a very emotional time for Becs as she has spent a lot of time researching the Mercury Bay fallen and felt honoured to be visiting them on behalf of the community and leaving a poppy as a reminder of home. It was also very sobering to be standing where battle ensued all those years ago and the feeling that is left when you stand among some 12,000 graves of which 520 are from New Zealand. The Memorial has just under 35,000 names of the missing of which 1,100 are from New Zealand.
Becs would like to thank the community for their support as without it we wouldn’t have been represented on the world stage. Becs is looking forward to putting her newfound knowledge into practice in her work at the Museum with our visitors, in new exhibitions and in our outreach programme.
If you want to know what else Becs got up to while in Belgium or more on the HMS Buffalo Re-examination Project, then pop into the Museum and have a chat.
The Museum is open Monday to Saturday 10am to 3pm and Sundays from the 21 st December 2025.
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