Richard Paul Mills might have died at home alone and unclaimed by family, but there was no way the Returned and Services Association (RSA) was going to let him go that way.
Mourners led by Cambridge RSA president Tony Hill and Te Awamutu RSA life member Lou Brown farewell Richard Mills at Te Awamutu Cemetery. Photo: Mary Anne Gill.
So, the call went out and on Monday members from the Cambridge and Te Awamutu RSAs stood and farewelled the 72-year-old who served in both the New Zealand Navy and Army.
But at least two people at Te Awamutu Cemetery’s services section knew Mills – “Grizzly” they called him, because he was, said Mike Preston.
Mills death notice glosses over the date of his death as it is not clear, but it was late last month sometime in his Hazelmere Cresc home in Te Awamutu.
Preston, who lives in Kihikihi, had left his car at Mills’ place and that is how police knew to contact him.
Angela Te Uira, a caregiver who visited him weekly, found out when she popped in. She had cared for Mills’ mother June Sklenars before her death and then Grizzly after he returned from Australia about 15 years ago where he had a stroke.
Mills never let the fact he was partially paralysed down the right side of his body stop him belting out songs when the mood took him, said Preston.
Mike Preston tearfully farewells his mate Richard Mills watched by Cambridge RSA president Tony Hill at Te Awamutu Cemetery’s services section. Photo: Mary Anne Gill.
“He had a good voice, he could sing anything.”
Mills had moved around the country and had an ex wife and son in Australia but had lost contact with them by the time he settled in Te Awamutu. Police were unable to track them down.
Rosetown Funerals director Jim Goddin called in the RSA to help with a farewell, as he did last year when John Patrick O’Brien’s body lay unclaimed in Waikato Hospital’s morgue for two months. The Vietnam veteran was buried at Hautapu Cemetery where Cambridge RSA president Tony Hill recited the Last Post.
He did the same for Mills, replacing the first sentences with the Naval version for the former Able Seaman who joined the Navy in May 1966 and served on the HMNZS Blackpool in 1969 from January to June during its deployment with the Far East Strategic Reserve in South East Asia.
Mills was also a private in the New Zealand Army Territorials from December 1969 to 1973. His two medals – the New Zealand Operational Service and the Defence Service with clasp – remain unclaimed at Defence Headquarters.
It was a moving burial made more so by Doug Rose of Cambridge whose playing on the bugle of the Last Post got to Preston who then farewelled his mate tearfully as the rain started.
And it was he who recalled that the ashes of Mills’ mother were still in the house and asked the police to retrieve the box so she could also be acknowledged during the ceremony.
The 14 mourners – which also included Waipā councillor and RSA stalwart Lou Brown – retired to the Te Awamutu RSA to toast Richard “Grizzly” Mills with a tot of rum.
Undertaker Michael Duxfield, left, watches as Cambridge RSA president Tony Hill adds a poppy to Richard Mills final resting place at Te Awamutu Cemetery’s services section. Photo: Mary Anne Gill.
