About Kaiapoi RSA

The Kaiapoi RSA is a local branch of the Royal New Zealand Returned and Services’ Association that has supported veterans, service personnel, and the local Canterbury community for over a century.

Early Beginnings and Milestones

Was founded in 1919
First Anzac Service: The Kaiapoi RSA hosted its very first Anzac Day service and parade in 1921.

Early Growth: Membership grew rapidly following World War I, with 85 members officially signed up by 1923. Dr. Maxwell Ramsay served as an influential early president, commemorated today by a sundial near the town cenotaph.

Women’s Section: A dedicated women’s section was established in 1941, led by its first president, Mrs. M. Richards, who served until 1954.

Meeting Places Through the Decades
Before securing a permanent home, the association gathered at multiple local venues, including the drill hall, the Orange Hall, the Borough Hall, the Kaiapoi Cycle Club, and the Volunteer Fire Brigade’s social rooms.

In September 1945, the Kaiapoi RSA purchased the old Forresters’ Hall, using it as their operational base for decades until it was sold in 1990.

Since the 1990s, the Kaiapoi RSA has shared a longstanding friendship with the Kaiapoi Workingmen’s Club, (now known as the Kaiapoi Club) making it their primary venue for meetings and community remembrance events.

Core Functions and Leadership
Led by President Allan West and supported by an active executive committee and archivist Jan Giles, the Kaiapoi RSA continues its core mission of veteran welfare, pension advice, emergency community support, and annual Poppy Day and ANZAC remembrance.

In 1919, following the end of the Great War, the Kaiapoi Patriotic Committee considered several options for the town war memorial. It initially decided on a Memorial Town Hall. However, escalating costs meant that the Kaiapoi Patriotic Committee was replaced by a new War Memorial Committee, who then selected local stonemason William Thomas Trethewey to sculpt a statue to stand at the east end of town by the Kaiapoi River.

The New Zealand soldier on top was sculpted by Christchurch stonemason W T Trethewey. Two large plaques near the memorial display names from the South African War and the Second World War. Trethewey sculpted the 10 foot statue from a five tonne block of marble imported from Carrara, Italy, a fine-grain but durable stone, and stood on a base prepared by Daniel Berry, an associate.

A former Kaiapoi serviceman was enlisted to model for Trethewey to base his design on and the final statue was unveiled on 26 April 1922. It portrayed a Digger, at rest after a desperate charge and captured in its stance the effects of war and a grim determination to carry on despite the odds. In his speech at the unveiling, Kaiapoi Mayor J H Blackwell described the statue as capturing the spirit of a typical Anzac.

With this memorial, Trethewey set a benchmark for others around New Zealand and it is still considered one of the finest.
In 2004 the Memorial Reserve underwent a revamp. The statue, together with memorials to other war veterans, stands on the bank of the Kaiapoi River as a quiet place of remembrance.

The Kaiapoi War Memorial has a Historic Places Trust Category II rating.  A brief history of the Kaiapoi war memorial Further Information NZ History Kaiapoi war memorial