The Ghurkhas leave Italy: Ghurkha soldiers carry bedding into bush, load a truck. Drive away from camera. Travel over road to Trieste and through a tunnel near Miramare. Waved farewell by a [British] officer. Sign on roadside wall reads 'Duce'. Trucks arrive at wharf at Trieste. Whitewashing a naval vessel. An army band arrives followed by troops. Ghurkhas eating dinner. Load onto ship. Commanding officer and ships captain salute. Ship departs Italy.
Scenes from the advance after the Senio river crossing, April 1945: Group of German POWs relax in the sun, playing cards. Trucks drive by a dead body in a ditch. Another body lying prone. Ruins of town. Townspeople load body on to truck. Injured [Germans] loaded into an ambulance. A smouldering horse; two women, one pushing while the other pulls a cart laden with [bedding], move hurriedly by. Shermans of 19th Regt run along the road with troops on board, remains of German Panther tank in Medicina, with Engineers repairing road. KOd Sherman Firefly. Sign atop a gate states: 'Bologna'. Crowd waves to camera in a square. Partisans. Celebrations in the streets. American officers in town square. Italian Bersaglieri soldiers. Soldiers showering, cleaning clothes, playing cards. POWs in the rear of a truck. Shermans of 20th Regt. Column of trucks passing through countryside.
New Zealand troops marching through Barbiano. Locals wave. Soldiers drinking. An armoured car from 18th Regt. flies the USA flag as it rushes down a street. NZ Shermans drive past. POW marched along road. Road sign reads: 'Lugo - Bagnara'. Tiger tank KOd by infantry. Entering Lugo with white flags hung from windows. Erection of a tent. Soldiers washing. Engineers practise building a bridge to cross the Lamone river in order to allow for tanks to cross. New Zealand sappers lay explosives and the eradication of a stopbank. Tanks cross finished bridge.
In the Italian Alps men wax and prepare skis. Men climb mountain and ski down slope several times. Rock climbing. Traversing the mountain side. Further shots of the Alps and rock-climbing.
B Sqdn Shermans driving through pasture and along stopbank road followed by a convoy. Building a FBE ferry for tanks crossing the river Po. Transporting vehicles and equipment across Po. Wrecks of various German army vehicles south of stopbank. Troops marching across field and over a bridge.
Clips from Crete, post-war. Graves of soldiers at Suda cemetery: Officers talk with [local] priest. Aerial shot of an island and a headland on NW coast of Crete. Aircraft lands at Maleme airfield. Several aircraft on the field. Military graveyard. German memorial near Maleme. Caves at Sfakia. HMS Duke of York bottomed in Suda Bay. Ships at Suda or Canea dock. Graves. Sign reads: 'Nach Galata 5.5kms'. New Zealand soldiers meet with locals in Galata.
Clips from advance after Senio, April 1945: New Zealand soldiers erect a sign with a silver fern. Trucks crossing a newly erected bridge. Local women paste up posters on a wall in Massa Lombarda. Graffiti reads: 'Liberatore w Kiwis'. Another deviation and bridge. Test firing of an artillery piece. Ruins of a town. Partisans. Dead horse. Bodies wrapped in blankets. Soldiers inspect papers of a soldier, and show off loot - a Luger. POWs march past. More ruins in Medicina. Putting out a fire. Wounded local. Sherman from 18th Regt. pulling a German half-track from ditch. Inspecting abandoned artillery behind Senio. German 88mm AT, Panther in a barn and Tiger near Massa Lombarda. Freyberg inspects sign on tank in Medicina reading: 'Smashed by D.A.F.', alongside a silver fern.
Corrections and detail provided by Perry Rowe, history teacher, Otago Girls’ High School.