Hamilton East Cemetery part 1

I had an appointment in Hamilton East today so I decided to leave Orewa early and maybe get a bit of research done while I was down that way. (yes, I took my camera with me this time) hence the awesome pix of headstones.
I have some amazing luck when I visit cemeteries. I know you might laugh, but you can seriously waste a lot of time looking for burial plots in a cemetery ... especially an unfamiliar cemetery. I normally double check to make sure anyone I'm out looking for actually has a headstone.  If there is no headstone you need to go to a city council and get a map of the cemetery which shows the plots. Smart people normally ask if the plots either side have a headstone and if so, what are the names of the people buried there. Every bit of info helps.

I rocked up to the Hamilton East Cemetery, it's off Cobham Drive in Hamilton East. You follow a roadway called Hereford Crescent till you come to a white picket fence, the gates are normally open so you can drive right up. On the outside wall of the public conveniences there is a map of the cemetery, this was my first stop, (not to use the loo, to check the map) I double checked where I was going to and off I went in the direction of the lawn cemetery. I didn't realise at first that Stanley John Green was buried in the lawn cemetery.

The inscription on the plaque

I parked and walked between some headstones to a line of trees and then stepped down to the lawn cemetery part. There are about 5 rows between the line of trees and the curb where the road comes round.  I headed to the curb and when I got there I was looking left and right and thinking to myself there are at least 100 plaques per row. (slightly exaggerated but it felt like it) I was standing there and just decided to go right. I must have taken about four paces and I stopped and could not believe my eyes, there was Stanley John Green's memorial plaque. Under a beautiful old tree. as you can see, it was a bit covered over and some spots of nature had landed on it's surface so I cleaned it up so I could read it. The polished granite looks a bit motley, but it's actually the reflection of the tree branches over head.

I don't have much info on Stanley John Green as I haven't done much research on the middle collection of riders.  I did know he was from Australia as I couldn't find his birth on BDM in NZ. I sat for a little while and thought how had it would be to lose a child and have them buried in another country and not be able to bring them home. I was thinking to myself that it's possible that Stanley John Green served in WWII with the Australian forces, then came over here? but it's also possible that he was too slight to be accepted and just came over here because there were too many riders in Aussie?  Much to discover. Still I'm a little way off researching him because he died in 1948 and I'm still ambling through the late 1890's. I wonder what he looked like and hope I find an image of him.