The Bridge of Remembrance turns 100 on Monday 11 November 2024

It’s a pretty big deal turning 100. The Bridge of Remembrance will reach its century on Monday 11 November 2024.

The 100-year-old Bridge will play a key part in the Armistice Day commemoration on Monday 11 November. The Christchurch Memorial RSA is organising an event which will start at 9.30am on the Bridge. Representatives from the 2/1st and 2/4th infantry regiments of the army, New Zealand Royal Navy members and veterans will march over the bridge after 10am, led by the New Zealand Army Band. The Christchurch Highland Pipe Band will also play.

There will be an 105mm howitzer salute in Hagley Park. Three blank rounds will be fired as the parade marches across the bridge and along Durham Street South. The artillery will fire three rounds at 11am, symbolising the moment the guns fell silent on the battlefields in 1918.

In Remembrance Park (the Avon River Precinct near the bridge), a field of crosses has been laid out by Fire and Emergency New Zealand volunteers to recognise the 4,500 Christchurch service people who died in World War One. Veterans are encouraged to join the parade. (information from The Bridge of Remembrance turns 100 in The Star)

The foundation stone of the Bridge of Remembrance was laid on 25^th April 1923 and the memorial was dedicated on Armistice Day 11 November 1924.

Originally designed to commemorate soldiers from the First World War, the Bridge of Remembrance became a memorial where later conflicts have also been commemorated.

Territorials crossing the Bridge of Remembrance on the way to King Edward Barracks [25 Apr. 1926] File Reference CCL PhotoCD 3, IMG0052

This site was chosen because soldiers marched from the barracks and over the river on their way to the train station. It was on the bridge that relatives would wait to catch a glimpse of their loved ones as they trooped past.

The proposal for a major memorial to commemorate WW1 soldiers was first suggested by a letter writer to The Press newspaper in 1919. Mrs Irwin put forward the idea of a Bridge of Remembrance on Cashel Street. Soon after Dr Thacker, the Mayor of Christchurch, put forward a number of proposals (including the Bridge of Remembrance) for a memorial and the public were invited to vote for their preferred choice. Of particular interest was Samuel Hurst Seager’s idea – a government-built roadway from North Cape to Bluff with each town or city to “ornament it with avenues of trees and in other ways” as it passes through.

We can safely say that the Bridge of Remembrance came out on top. Our digital heritage platform Canterbury Stories has plans of the memorial.

These decorative arches have seen the city through a century of change. Welcoming soldiers; farewelling troops; overseeing parades, protestors, and casual passers-by — this is a place of movement, and of rest.

The Bridge of Remembrance has been a place marker in our city for 100 years.

Cashel Street Christchurch, looking west toward the Bridge of Remembrance. File Reference CCL-KPCD09-IMG0049

We have a wealth of resources about this iconic memorial:

Read our page on the Bridge of Remembrance
View historic images of the Bridge of Remembrance in our collection
See photos of the Bridge of Remembrance on the Discovery Wall
Public Art in Central Christchurch: Bridge of Remembrance - information on the Bridge and its history from this publication locating and documenting publicly owned works of art in central Christchurch.
Search the catalogue for the Bridge of Remembrance
Search our digital heritage platform Canterbury Stories for architectural plans of the Bridge of Remembrance
Read a 1924 booklet on the history and symbolic features of the Bridge of Remembrance.

Annie and Glenn
Local History librarians
Tuakiri | Identity, Level 2, Tūranga