161 Battery civic parade in Auckland

John Miller's sequence of photos provides a graphic glimpse of one of the most dramatic foci of pro- and anti-war feeling. In May 1971, the war was far from over, and the New Zealand government's commitment to the war was ongoing. The civic reception and military parade for the returning 161 Battery seemed, to those opposed to the war, to be designed to rally support for an increasingly unpopular venture. John Miller's photos carry all the grainy integrity of the days before Photoshop. The accompanying article does provide valuable background to the photos, but some at least of the comments accompanying the photos are out of sync with what I remember, and with the evidence provided by John's photos. I will give my own memories of the event, and then comment on the article. John's photos show the two different parts of the protest that day in Queen St. The first was the more or less official protest, complete with banners, further up Queen St from the main crowd of onlookers lining the street. The second group of demonstrators was mixed in with that main crowd of onlookers. We were trying to be inconspicuous until the time came for the “guerrilla theatre” action we had prepared. This theatre action had been decided at a protest planning meeting up at the Auckland University Student Union the night before (or two nights before?). The idea was to show the terrible carnage that the war was inflicting on the ordinary people of Vietnam, and to contrast this with the pomp and ceremony of the civic parade. When the parade coming up Queen Street was still about a hundred yards away, the “actors”, dressed as “Vietnamese peasants” were to move into the street and make a pile of blood-smattered corpses, to provide echos of the horrifically familiar images from the press coverage of the war. Things didn't go according to plan. I was to give a signal. The police realised something was up and, at six foot five, I had little chance of making myself inconspicuous, once I had been spotted as a likely participant in that "something". One policeman stood right in front of me, staring straight at me, and moved wherever I moved. The parade was getting closer and closer, and I realised that I was going to be nabbed as soon as I did anything. I attempted to give the signal anyway. Before I could manage it though, the policeman grabbed me, pushed me the ground and held me immobile, using the time-honoured technique of grabbing my long hair and twisting it. The other “performers” (including Steve Robertshaw, Therese O'Connell and Anne Byrne), seeing that the parade was almost level with us, and realising that something had gone wrong with the signalling system, decided to go ahead anyway, and began to run out, virtually under the feet of the Army pipe band at the head of the parade. Instead of the planned “theatre” , our action appeared like an attempt to disrupt the parade. John Miller's photos (and TV footage which can be seen at the Auckland museum) do show clearly the theatrical aspirations of our action. You can see Thérèse O'Connell wearing a Vietnamese peasant hat and skirt in the TV footage and Anne Burns (Byrnes?) (RIP) can also be seen wearing a peasant hat in one of John's photos. Several of us were arrested, and charged with disorderly behaviour. The police had to prove that the behaviour was likely to cause a breach of the peace. We defended the charges vigorously, arguing that a parade of armed soldiers and artillery was much more likely to cause a breach of the peace, than a theatrical demonstration. To no avail. Roger Fowler brought a court action against Major Masters for the same charge but as the article states, the charges were dismissed. People in photos: Photo 3 of John Miller's slide show: Steve Robertshaw is on the left and Anne Burns (Byrnes?) RIP is on the right, partly obscured by the middle woman's arm, but wearing a peasant hat. Comment on the article: It is good to see this attempt to describe the anti-war demonstration to complement John's photos. However, the article assumes that the main intention of the theatre action was to disrupt the parade. In fact, as I have explained above, it was an only partially successful attempt at anti-war theatre. We intended to do our portrayal of peasant victims of the war, and then leave before the parade reached us. Article: “As the parade approached the reviewing platform red paint bombs and fire crackers were thrown on the road.” I have no memory of this and it certainly was not part our planned action. I wonder where the evidence for this comes from. Article: “The demonstrators used red paint to symbolise the bloodshed in Vietnam.” We intended it to be a literal portrayal of Vietnamese victims (see the peasant hats) rather than a symbolic one. Article: “In a postscript to this event the commander of 161 Battery, Major John Masters was the subject of a citizen’s arrest by members of a peace group and charged with “offensive and disorderly behaviour” for parading his unit up Queen Street. The case was thrown out by Magistrate H. Y. Gilliand who described the application as “misconstrued and abusive” and not representing the general public feeling.” The article does not mention that a number of the demonstrators were convicted of the same charges and the case against Major Masters was brought as a response to those charges. He was not subject to “a citizen's arrest” but simply responded to a court summons. I welcome this chance to add to the collective memory of this important event. Farrell Cleary. (December, 2008)