Kia Ora. Good evening. Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. Firstly, a big thank you to Scotty and Mel for allowing us to use this venue for tonight's event. And some of you I know. For those who don’t know, my name is Stu [Pearce]. I’m one of the Commanding Officers up at Ohakea, which is the Air Force Base just up-the-road in the Manawatu. I'm also a member of the OverWatch LGBT IQ support group that we've had in the Defence Force for a number of years right now. Today, the New Zealand Defence Force is arguably one of the most progressive militaries in the world. We're a world leader in LGBT inclusion, we are ‘Rainbow Tick’ accredited, and we've got a number of awards for the support that we provide all of our diverse people that we have serving for us. If you remember the LGBT community, you can serve in any branch of the Army, the Navy, Air Force, or civilian staff, and do so openly and with pride. But, it hasn't always been this way. And up in the years preceding the 1993 Human Rights Act, which essentially repealed the ban on open gay service in the military. And certainly, in the years leading up to the Homosexual Reform Act, being LGBT IQ in the New Zealand Defence Force was not easy. We know that the policies and the culture of the time destroyed careers. In some very sad cases, it destroyed lives. And we know the story of people like Squadron Leader Peter Rule who, very sadly, committed suicide after he was outed, and then ousted from the military, and couldn't reconcile the loss of his career and everything with what had happened to him. So, because of that culture, and because of the climate of the time, stories about our queer military history in New Zealand are extremely rare, which is why this book, I believe, aside from being just a beautifully written story and account of some gay soldiers during the Second World War, is actually, I believe, a groundbreaking historical document that I think should be in every library in the country. So, I'm not going to say any more about the book, because that's Brent's domain. So, without any further ado, I will pass out Brent, and you have control. [00:02:24] Thank you Stu for your introduction. So, I've written a book, ‘Crossing The Lines’, which was published by Otago University Press this year, and I’m really pleased that they have had the bravery to put themselves behind my writing and this book. Historians are always interested in historical relationships between past and present. There's always the danger in LGBTQ history of being seduced by this kind of teleological progression as things have gotten better in the trend of inclusion with the extension of civil rights. And we need to remember that it was never inevitable that the present is as it is today. Where we are near where we are now is contingent. It's dependent on a number of factors happening. However, we do have an enviable situation. And I want to acknowledge that at the beginning of my talk tonight. Since 1993, openly serving LGBT have been included in our military, supported by OverWatch, which is the organisation within our Defence Force who organised tonight. And by 2014, New Zealand was being recognised as having the most inclusive military force in the world. And I think that's something that needs to be acknowledged, and something that we should be proud of as citizens of New Zealand. So, I just wanted to start with acknowledging what's happened, and of course, since what I haven't got there [on the PowerPoint] is that yes, in 2019 they also received a ‘Rainbow Tick’ recognising inclusion within the military forces. So researching and writing ‘Crossing The Lines’ was, I must say [00:04:24] it was a 10 year endeavour, and I must pay respect to those in Wellington who encouraged me, and particularly the Ministry of Defence Historian John Crawford, staff at LAGANZ - The Lesbian and Gay Archive New Zealand, which is within the Alexander Turnbull [Library], the Alexander Turnbull in general, Archives New Zealand, and the Defence Force Archive at Trentham Military Camp. And much thanks to Stu from OverWatch for providing me with this photo which appears on the book. The wedding photo, the first same sex wedding on a military base in New Zealand, which I want to acknowledge. And also thanks for the Royal Society who are also based in Wellington. They gave me a fellowship that allowed me to have a whole year to read, and to think, and that was in 2009 and that was the time that I initiated the research into this this project. I hope that this book ‘Crossing the Lines’ has and will add to New Zealand to the histories of homosexuals in World War Two military history. We have a series the books that that exist. Allan Bérubé wrote [Coming Out under Fire] in 1991, about the situation for [USA] gay and lesbians and World War Two. Paul Jackson has produced ‘One of the Boys’ in 2004 [about Canadian soldiers]. Emma Vickers, a more academic book [‘Queen and Country’] about British soldiers. Yorick Smaal, his book [‘Sex, Soldiers and the South Pacific’] is about Australian soldiers, particularly from Brisbane and Queensland, and their time in Papua New Guinea. So, I'm hoping that what I've produced adds to that literature. And in a way my findings do confirm a number of findings that they also agree with; that war was a formative time and experience and a turning point in 20th century gay and lesbian history; that homosexual soldiers were able to carve out queer spaces and create a queer subculture despite the rigours and the rigidity of the military. While the past is often described as ‘a place of unremitting homophobia’, to quote [historian James] Belich, I suggest that many men are able to find ways to manoeuvre around this and live their lives fully, to live full lives as homosexual men. So, in doing so, I thought to provide evidence within our nation's history for gay men, particularly gay men within the Armed Forces today, of what one might term, a ‘common DNA’ for them. [00:07:19] The history I have written ended up with a focus on three men, Ralph Dyer, Douglas Morrison, and Harold Robinson. They termed themselves ‘homosexual men’ and I use that word, although it's a little bit outdated now. And the temptation is to use the word ‘queer’ I guess in modern literature. But when I interviewed Harold and Douglas, it was definitely that they were homosexual men. And in fact, Harold was very insistent, ‘I'm not gay, I'm homosexual’. And he saw a really distinct difference in those terms. And so words matter, and I decided to honour them by using the words that they use to self-describe. They provide the central story for this history. They were drafted into the war. They all performed in concert parties providing entertainment for the troops. The books narrative spans from the childhood in the early 1920s, to about 1959. In the last chapter, though, I do discuss the historical significance of this history and make references to those historical relationships between past and present, connecting to the post-war gay liberation movement in the 1970s where there was direct action protest at ANZAC Day ceremonies, and to the New Zealand Defence Force off-today regarding the significant changes that have taken place within the armed forces. So, the decision to start before and continue after the war I think is really important. So rather than showing the war years in isolation, which is what many historians do, I wanted to integrate them into a narrative of the whole of their lives. So, hearing about their formative lives, their youth, their family life, their training, and drama and dance, sort of lays the foundation for their experiences as homosexual men and performers as entertainers in the New Zealand military. All three already acknowledged and were comfortable with their homosexual identity before the war. And they were very happy in pre-war queer communities. There were three young queer men integrated into the communities in which they lived; integrated into the pre-war queer communities in Dunedin and Auckland. I particularly loved uncovering the life of Harold Robinson in Dunedin. He was a rather precocious boy I think, elocution lessons, singing, the Competition Society, ballet lessons, theatre. It was theatre in particular that opened up connections with other young homosexual men. He's a working-class boy from South Dunedin and he accessed culture in a really big way. His pre-war boyfriend is Roland Watson - here they are at Warrington, just north of Dunedin, and I must say those swimming togs [in the PowerPoint photo] are homemade by Harold [who was] very proud of them. And I think they would have been very special at that point. Not sure how many other men in Otago before World War Two were wearing a swimming costume like that. So, Howard Robinson ends up in the 36 Battalion, which is 8th Brigade in the Pacific; first serving in Fiji, then in Norfolk Island which the 36 Battalion garrisoned, New Caledonia and then Guadalcanal and the Treasuries in the Solomon Islands. It's the 36th Battalion who made the first opposed landing of New Zealand troops since Gallipoli at Falamai on Mono Island in the Solomons. And Harold and his boyfriend provide a queer presence in that really an important event in our nation's military history. World War Two is a time of total war. It meant conscription was introduced in New Zealand on the 22nd of July 1940, and with that a really diverse cross section of individuals is drawn into the army, for the sake of this greater [00:11:45] cause. They had to work together, and swept up in the war along with other men there age there is no hint that these men wanted to avoid service. They wanted to serve. They wanted to do their part. I think most homosexual men in the New Zealand military forces at this time, as far as I've seen from my research, escape any victimization. The conscripted army - the conscripted citizens army had, to an extent, to be inclusive. So in this respect, homosexual men found that there was a place for them within the military forces. Harold found himself in two roles in the war in the Pacific, he was the Batman to Major John Marshall, who later becomes their future Prime Minister john Marshall. [Audience member question: Did he know about him?] Well, I'm not sure. But a Batman is like a personal servant to an officer, shaves him, gets him dressed, organises his quarters, brings him drinks and food, takes messages to others. And this is an intriguing relationship, the conservative Marshall, and he was a very conservative Prime Minister if you know your political history, with a very flamboyant camp Batman. At the same time, there's a second role for Robinson and the Batman role gives them time to do this. He's a female impersonator in the Tui Concert Party, which is the 36 Battalions entertainment troupe. Harold attained what British historian Emma Vickers calls a ‘good fellow status’ within the unit. This not only signified acceptance, value and a sense of belonging, but it also led to the unit protecting the homosexual soldier. Harold had a very outgoing personality that led to the acceptance as ‘one of the lads’. Robinson would entertain his Brigade, his humour and quick wit would bring a bring a laugh onstage and offstage. And his physical appearance; he’s got a fit, healthy, strong, muscular body; he's got an enthusiasm to fit in. He worked hard to become a good shot when handling a gun. And that led to unit respecting him. In fact he became the fifth best shot using a Tommy Gun - that's a Thompson machine gun - in his unit. So, for Harold, mateship was seen as a really important value. And Harold Robinson was a loyal mate for everyone in his units. Some homosexual sexual soldiers could have been shunned by their peers, ostracised, and found the experience during this period of Total War a very negative one. But others like Harold would have worked very hard to fit in and become accepted by their unit. Robertson could give a really cutting retort back to anyone who challenged him on his sexuality. He was not someone to mess with. So, a key theme in the book that I illustrate is the ability of men to integrate into communities of servicemen; of homosexual men to integrate into these communities of servicemen, despite official hospitality towards same sex, love and desire. Harold was never a good looking woman though. This image, which is in an album of photos that Ralph Dyer gifted to the Alexander Turnbull Library, shows Harold at the Tui Concert Party. Harold is dressed as a woman on the left. Harold was always very proud of his legs from all that ballet dancing, and there they are on display. [00:15:47] The Batman role gave him enough time to design his own dresses and prepare for the to the concerts. On the left is dressed as Mae West during the battalions time on Norfolk Island. That's from Norfolk Island. And on the right, he's dressed as Carmen Miranda while in New Caledonia. In the unit there just happened to be a soldier who had worked making wax models at the Auckland Museum. And so was able to fashion some wax fruit for his head. Harold's ‘camp name’, given to him by other gay soldiers was Helena, after Helena Rubenstein, who they all considered to be the ugliest woman in the world at the time. She may have been the richest woman in the world, but she is pretty ugly! So it's a joke that Harold never presented himself as a beautiful woman. He had a rather large nose and he just doesn't really pull it off. The costumes are made out of just scraps of material. Some of them are parachute material, some of them are foil from planes. Whatever they could get their hands on, although they did get latter-on, costumes sent up from New Zealand as people heard what they were doing and people would send up spare dresses for them. Here is at the Coral Digger shows. They were performed on the Treasury Islands; that’s Stirling and Mono Island in the Solomon Islands. I love the fact that the stage is in the jungle with this giant rock beside it and a tree growing in the middle of the of the area they're performing in. During the war Harold’s lover at the time was Bob Murphy, another soldier in his battalion. Here they are pictured together in military uniform, and it's probably the only picture we have of a same-sex couple in World War Two in uniform. Bob was a beer drinking, rugby playing soldier from Ohakune. His nickname was ‘Spud’, from Ohakune, yes. Homosexual men found ways to manoeuvre their private lives during wartime military service and pursued their sexual interests. Being away from home and the scrutiny of family and community opened up a space that gave them freedom that they might never have had back in their community. And I think that's certainly the case for Bob Murphy. The context of homosociality within the military forces is a key theme throughout the book. The homosocial nature of relationships within the military during wartime means that the bonds between men were often very, very close, so that intense intimacy led to profound friendships - mateship bonds between men on an interpersonal and platonic level - but these bonds could also provide a cover for sexual intimacy between men. For some men this social environment led them to experiences that you might define as ‘situational homosexuality’; the experience for that particular moment, at that particular place. For others, though, it would have confirmed the nature of their sexual desire. David Wildey was a young 21-year-old homosexual soldier from Christchurch. He's left us a very large collection of diaries, letters and photographs that are in the Hocken Library in Dunedin. He's got about 58 folders of material. He's a hoarder of everything! He has copies of every letter he sent and every letter he received. And his diaries. His 1943 diary chronicles his sexual relationship in New Caledonia with Charles Darkie Boyd, who's a soldier from Dunedin. And it's interesting that Wildey describes Boyd - the only picture we have of Boyd is this rather blurry picture here - he describes him as straight. He acknowledges that, so I think Boyd is a very good example of ‘situational homosexuality’. Boyd marries within a year of returning back to New Zealand. What is clear is that homosexual men were reasonably successful in creating these kind of satisfying sexual relationships and close to fictional bonds. And I see that again and again [in the research]. [00:20:20] Here's the controversial one: it was Brigadier Dove who David Wildey went to when he wanted to be posted to the Forward Area to be reunited with Darkie Boyd. Boyd’s sent up to the Solomon Islands to fight the Japanese and David Wildey finds it very difficult to be separated from his first love. Brigadier Dove was Second-in-Command of the Pacific Campaign after Brigadier Barrowclough. He's the second most senior figure in the Pacific Campaign. He's a figure though that's well known in pre-war queer and post-war queer circles in Auckland, He's living a double life. Maybe he's a homosexual man who has been … who has felt that he has to have a wife. He e has a wife and two daughters, a house in Remuera on Victoria Avenue. Perhaps it's the marriage of convention, but he's well known by the soldiers and homosexual soldiers had a really complicated relationship with Dove. He's a potential ally. He helps out gay soldiers who get in trouble with the American authorities. Yet the power and authority he wielded was wearily regarded, especially when he used his position to gain sexual favours. Robinson who, while still in uniform, rebuffs Dove’s sexual advances, considered him a creep. When interviewing him when he's in his 90s, it's like, ‘Dove, oh that creep’. Dove was in a really difficult position I think. The mateship and camaraderie among homosexual men requires a certain amount of levelling that clashed with Dove’s position of authority. And reconciling the two would have been really quite difficult. It would also make them a figure of fun and the butt of many jokes. Morrison, who first met Dove when he was still a colonel, in January 1943, and it's one of the very few times he used shorthand in his diary, and as sort of a secret code I guess. I guess, he assumed not many people could read shorthand, and he secretly records his impression. He says, ‘Meeting the colonel, who was not as pleasant as I expected - in fact, a monster.’ Three days later, he remarks in his diary, ‘Our old friend Colonel Dove’ - a bit sarcastic there as he only met him three days before – ‘Our old friends Colonel Dove visited the camp, Ron making facetious remarks on his presence.’ Wildey wrote down a joke in his diary made by an Auckland gay man who knew Dove before the war - a man called John Waldie - in his diary in 1943. He writes, “Billy Dove, your name is in the book, but I've got the book.” And I think that indicates the men’s understanding that they too had something to hold over Dove. Wildey is a very lowly hospital orderly. He is in no way important. But he's successful in getting this transfer from Dove to the front line to be reunited with Darkie Boyd, which is extraordinary in itself. Dove appears in many gay men’s queer phone address-books in the archives, in the postwar years. He kept up contact with many of the soldiers he met. He later corresponds with and invites Wildey to his holiday home at Lake Taupo for a ‘men’s weekend’; an invitation that Wildey accepted and Dove pays for the trip for Wildey and a friend, another gay friend of his from Christchurch, to come on up for that weekend. Which is an intriguing relationship. I'll let you to make your own conclusions. During the war, Ralph Dyer and Douglas Morison, both from Auckland, were in the Pacific Kiwi Concert Party. They were touring New Caledonia, Vanuatu, and in the Solomon Islands. They were shows in Guadalcanal, Vella Lavella, the Treasuries, and then they actually got all the way up to Nissen Island in the Green Islands, which is north of Bougainville and part of Papua New Guinea today. They were the Pacific Kiwi Concert Party’s female impersonator. This [photo in PowerPoint] is Douglas in uniform; a very cis male figure. [00:25:04] I looked at their time growing up. This is Douglas. He attended Mount Albert Grammar. He's Louis XVI [in this image]. This other boy is called Ray Newdick, which I must say is the most unfortunate surname, seated beside him ass Marie Antoinette. In the right-hand image, Douglas is in the trench coat lining up for School Certificate. That’s the Year 11 exam for the younger members of the audience. Douglas played the very ‘plain-Jane’ female parts. He's the ‘girl-next-door’. He's the ‘mother figure’ in the skits. His camp name was Beulah. Beulah BBC. ‘BBC’ because he had a rather posh voice right to his last days. In fact, he briefly worked at on IZB radio in Auckland before being drafted. And I was very lucky because Harold was still in contact with Douglas. Douglas left New Zealand in 1944, as part of the reinforcements going to Cairo, Egypt. And he never returned. He really felt that he couldn't come back to New Zealand after the war and live as an openly gay man. And so, I was able to take a flight to London to interview him, and that was a real privilege. Then I later found a diary kept by Douglas during the war; kept by him in New Caledonia in 1942, and 1943. It is held in the Kippenberger Research Library at Waiouru Army Museum. So, there is a queer presence in the archives there. And they also hold many, many hundreds of letters sent by Douglas to two aunts that he liked who have kept all the letters and have given them to the Army Museum archives. I later contacted his sister in New Zealand, who was very little when he left and really had not much memory of him, and actually assumed he had died already. She still had a metal trunk. And we opened it up and inside were lots of programmes and ephemera from the concert parties. It was basically all his possessions that he had left in New Zealand in 1944. So as an historian you just kind of realise ‘I've struck gold’. ‘This is the treasure chest!’ Ralph Dyer was known to gay men in the army as Crystal or Chrysie. He played the sexy ‘Rita Hayworth type’ of glamorous woman for the Pacific Kiwi Concert Party. And in the Alexander Turnbull Library we've got this very large album of wartime photographs. He is probably the best known of the three men, because he joined the Middle East Kiwi Concert Party in the very last few months while they were in Italy at the time, and then coming back to New Zealand, in the post war period he toured with the postwar Kiwi Review. And it's the Kiwi Review Concert Party that a lot of people remember which toured Australia and New Zealand in the 1950s. There is a lot written about him in publicity merit material, but he's was ironically a very elusive to be able to research. But here he is [in the PowerPoint image], lacklustre sewing - I guess the materials in the humidity of the Pacific didn't last that long. The book is part biography, but it's also partly a detailed history of life in the wartime concert parties. In particular, it’s the first publication to talk about the Pacific Kiwi Concert Party and Tui Concert Party, and really the first book to discuss a queer perspective on those concert parties. One of my key historical narratives in the book is that even as they performed heterosexuality in the concert party shows, their homosexuality was there for those who were in the know or those who are in on the joke. Here's Douglas and Ralph in their military clothes. The makeshift stage - I love this picture because of the barrels underneath the stage holding it up. They often performed for American soldiers, so all dressed up in red, white and blue is the patriotic colours for performing in front of US soldiers. And they did a lot of comedy skits. Here we've got Ralph as Adolph Hitler. In a really interesting skit called ‘Nutziland’, as in New Zealand with [nutty] Nazis. During the war, the three men become really close friends. They keep meeting up, even though Harold is in the 36 Battalion they intersect constantly. It’s a story of wartime mateship between all three men. They also became friends with many other New Zealand homosexual men, as well as American soldiers. And here in the picture on the left, you can see a gay American soldier with the dog-tags on - I must say he has the best fingernails you've ever seen anyone go to war with. [00:30:38] I don’t know how he has his manicured so well. Homosexual men found each other during the war. Sometimes I think the groups were facilitated through the pre-war links that they had. But another way of course, I argue, is that they formed around the female impersonators in the concert party. The entertainment units offer a focal point for meeting other homosexual men. And that included those American queer soldiers. Douglas recorded soldiers passing notes to him through the window of the vehicle, asking to meet up the next day. So American soldiers would pass these notes and of course they do meet up. An American soldier named Hal Schaeffer came up to the camp when they were in Nouméa in 1943, sees the show, stays behind, goes backstage introduces himself to Morrison. Morison writes in his diary that he found Schaeffer ‘a very nice boy and exceedingly interesting’ on that day. The next day, after an afternoon show at the Red Cross Hut at Camp Barnes, Morison met up with Schaeffer again and they head into Nouméa. They go to Le Grand Theatre and go a film. They go to a coffee house. And Morrison writes in his diary, ‘We romanced until it was time for me to return to camp’. Morison is obviously smitten. In fact, at the very end of the diary that day he wrote, ‘The spell is broken - the day means little else to me’. And he spends the week meeting up constantly with Hal Schaeffer before they then of course are moved away on tour back up to the front line. When New Zealand soldiers are withdrawn from the Pacific, all three men come back to New Zealand. They do a series of wartime shows in Auckland, at the Town Hall. But they even come down to Wellington here and they help with the victory loan fundraising campaign. It was all about raising money for the war effort. And they performed at Victory Corner in Wellington and they sold kisses to men for 10 bob a time. I don’t know how that worked. That's Victory Corner there [in the PowerPoint photo] and here they are on stage. It’s the junction of Featherston and Hunter Street at Lambton Quay. Later all three men get sent to Egypt as part of the reinforcements. They find themselves placed in the Pay Corps. Ralph is posted up to the Middle East Kiwi Concert Party in Italy. Douglas remains in the Pay Corps, but actually gets himself posted to Italy and gets to be discharged in London. Harold and Ralph do return to New Zealand. But very quickly, they both decide they want to leave. After the war, Harold first, then Ralph, joined Douglas in London. Douglas is doing repertory in London. Harold gets one of the very first Returned Servicemen's Bursaries. With that bursary, he travels to London to study at the Sadler’s Wells Ballet School. Ralph follows to do a theatre design course. And they flat together in London. So, this is a continuing story of their friendship in the post-war years. Throughout the book, I've tried to widen the historical lens to take in the stories of other homosexual New Zealand soldiers. And I think that's a really important decision, as it allows us to see Robinson, Morrison and Dyer in a larger social and cultural context, to be able to compare and contrast the lives and experiences with other men. At end of the book writing process, the book actually contains fifty named-homosexual New Zealand men who were in military service in the war. It is the search for the needle in the haystack, but we found quite a few ‘needles’ there I think. There's thirty-six named and profiled in a little bit of detail at the back. Ten from the Judge Advocate General's court martial records remain unnamed as the provision for use of those records is that they remain anonymous. The Judge Advocate General's files are held on Wellington at Archives New Zealand. What's surprising is that, firstly, the records are very fragmentary. The military did not systematically bring all the records back here. But in the surviving records that we have, there's very few cases. [00:35:37] Homosexual indecency cases - there are fourteen charges in the surviving files that involve only ten New Zealand men; five men charged in New Zealand, one in Lebanon, two on the HMNZS Leander which was in the Mediterranean and two at Maadi Camp in Egypt. Four of these were from the Navy, three were from the army, and three were from the Air Force. One would expect, for a start, more cases from the army due to its size compared to the other forces. So, there's a few questions that poses about what does this mean. Have we got a very tolerant military force that doesn't prosecute anybody? I think, when I was thinking through this, the men might simply have been dealt with informally by their commanders who issued summary punishments. You know, so they admit their offence, and they accept detention, confinement to barracks, maybe extra guard duties or fines, without really any formal proceedings. And I think that was probably often a very pragmatic approach, because it allows the officer in charge to limit the effect, first on the individual, but also limit the effect on the unit. The lack of records may also indicate that many officers were prepared to overlook same-sex behaviour. I think there may have been a degree of unofficial tolerance among officers who were dealing with incidents and dealing with them in an informal way to avoid the removal of that man from the war effort. It is a huge loss to bring someone that has been trained in particular skills - to bring them all the way back to New Zealand. A court martial sentence was read out to the accused men’s unit. And that threat and its corresponding humiliation might have acted as a deterrent for men and meant that they were more discreet in their behaviour. I think that often though, what the court martial files show is that this often may have been dependent also on the personality of those involved, particularly dependent on how well the offending soldier had integrated into the unit and his value. The case of the X-ray technician in Lebanon who had skills that were probably too valuable to lose from the war effort. He is found guilty, serves time in prison in Cairo, but is released long before his the length of his sentence has expired - and is reposted very quickly to another hospital, where he can continue to thing without anyone knowing what he'd been up to. Two others. ‘Pat and Mike’ from the 5th Field Park Regiment. They're buried together on the El Alamein battlefield. They're mentioned but by the first names - they come from a memoir by soldier called Reginald De Graves who’s got a series of memoirs held at the Auckland War Memorial Museum archive. Mike's killed by German butterfly bombs and Pats grief leads him to suicide. That's one of the really affecting stories that I’ve uncovered. These images are of the homosexual men in the Middle East Kiwi Concert Party. We've got Walter Prictor, and Phil Jay. And the other soldiers that are not in the picture there is Tom Martin. And with Tom Martin there's a nice link because he later ends up flatting with Harold, Douglas and Ralph in London. Apart from ‘Pat and Mike’ who died at El Alamein, I did uncover Noel Hulme. He's really the only other homosexual New Zealand man I found who was killed in action. [00:39:53] Of course, there will be others who are not in the historical records - that we just we just don't know. [00:40:01] Hulme was killed at Minqar Qaim in the Western Desert. The pre-war photograph of him, taken in Christchurch with his pre-war boyfriend, Laurie McIlroy, who served in the Air Force -he was posted up to Canada. The photo on the right is off Hulme in uniform in Egypt in Cairo. Historians are interested in the historical relationships between change and continuity. One of the key themes I emphasise is that of continuity between the wartime experiences, and the pre-war lives of Robinson, Morrison and Dyer. And this continuity allows them to bring, I think, a sense of personal confidence, courage and creativity to their wartime experiences, and made the difference in how they reviewed and accepted by others. I hope that I've shown how they're able to bring their queerness home in the midst of the war, when they performed in New Zealand between deployments. And I think that continuity continues in the post-war lives. My aim was to honour these men in my writing, by constructing valid lives - valid lives that in themselves are full of joy and more than a little bit of sex -although some of its pushed into the footnotes, but it's there! In the end, it's a bittersweet story of these three men who self-empowered, construct themselves a good life in an indifferent world. And I think, all three of them had a good war. World War Two was a good war for them. So, thank you for coming along. Thanks to OverWatch and Stu [Pearce] for inviting me here tonight. And the bar for hosting. I hope I sparked your interest in military history. And I hope I sparked your interest in LGBT history. There are a lot more stories that need to be researched and a lot more stories that need to be written in our New Zealand history.