Pambula and District Avenue of Honour

The Pambula and District Avenue of Honour was planted in the 1920’s to honour the servicemen from this district who served in the First World War (including in France and Gallipoli) and did not return.

The trees are Casuarina Cunninghamiana, commonly called River She-oak. Initially, 25 trees were planted representing the 25 young men from the Pambula area who made the supreme sacrifice. The choice to use a native species makes this Avenue of Honour exceptional and significant, as many other memorial avenues were created with exotic species such as Poplars.

Times were very tough during the depression years after the war and it’s likely these native trees were readily available and not too expensive. It was a wise decision on the organiser’s part as all bar one have survived for over 100 years.

Many locals have enduring memories of the Avenue:

Barbara Fulton nee Hart, now an Eden local was born in 1929 and lived at Lochiel. She remembers the trees being there and from the time her memory begins, recalls that they were always big trees.

She used to ride her horse to school at Pambula from Lochiel and she said during windy weather she found it really spooky and unsettling to ride past them, as the wind would howl through the branches. Even as a young girl, Barbara knew the avenue of trees had been planted in memory of local boys who had died overseas and hadn’t returned home from WW1.

Pambula was one of the last towns in what is now the Bega Valley Shire to actually build a ‘bricks and mortar’ war memorial. Discussions along these lines commenced in 1925 but it took 11 years before a stone memorial was finally unveiled in Pambula’s main street. To have had the living memorial Avenue of Honour was extremely important during the absence of a memorial in the village.

The 25 local men commemorated were from Pambula, Merimbula, Greig’s Flat, Lochiel, Millingandi, Nethercote, Pipeclay Creek and Rocky Hall, and thanks to the Avenue of Honour their supreme sacrifice will never be forgotten.

Pambula Wetlands and Heritage Project volunteers now care for the area around the trees by regularly mowing and clearing debris and weeds. In 2023 the Avenue of Honour was listed on the NSW War Memorial Register and in 2025 it was also listed with ‘Places of Pride’ – in the National Register of War Memorials.

In memory of:

ARMSTRONG, John Squire

ASHWORTH, Victor Wadsworth

BANKS-SMITH Sydney Harold

BECKETT John Raymond

BELLCHAMBERS William

BLACK Donald Mervyn

BLACK William Morton

BROWN Aubrey Edward Furnell

BURTON Arthur Herbert

CLARKE Henry John Thomas

CORNELL Samuel Thomas

DAY Albert James

DUNN Alfred William George

DUNN Helier Leslie Cecil

HAMILTON John Leslie

HOBDEN Noel Carlyle

JOHNSON Edgar Bootes

KAUTER, William

LONGHURST Vincent James Martin

MOORE Percy Albert

MUNN Ronald Thompson

PEISLEY Lindon George Albon

ROWELL Thomas

SEVERS Charles Bert

TARGETT Ernest Wilford