Talking Medals

Listen to my story

James Crichton:

The Victoria Cross was awarded to James Crichton, Auckland Regiment in 1918, and in [2001] his daughters decided to entrust his medals to the collections of the Auckland War Memorial Museum, so that they would be here for the public of Auckland to see and to remember their Dad and his mates who fought in the Great War. They were really generous and gave his full set of medals and all the other documents and photographs that provided a record of their dad. And, you know what they say – everyone loves a winner (or hero in this case) – the collection is treasured in three different countries – here in New Zealand which is where James settled in 191, back in Scotland where he went to school and, finally (or firstly – depends which way you look at it), they also claim him back in Ireland where he was born.

If you look closely at the companion medals, you’ll find that James Crichton was awarded a Queen’s South Africa Medal from the time when he was serving with the Cameron Highlanders.

Medals in storage

a) Campaign medals – in polyethylene bags in archival envelopes, stored vertically in drawer units, in catalogue number order. This means that many of these are grouped by campaign, e.g. when they were eventually catalogued the personal groupings were broken up so that, for instance all the NZ Medals (in the collection at that time) were catalogued as a block
b) Brent Mackrell collection – still on green baize display case panels in drawer units (in recipient groupings). Some of these medals have been previously displayed in earlier exhibitions including the Bloody Gallipoli exhibition, the Vietnam War display, Nursing Centenary display and the Volunteers & Militia Display. Others still feature in the Red Cross Display on level 2 but are due for a well deserved rest from the spotlight.