"As morning dawned we stood and watched / That devastated scene / Where but a single yesterday / Had flourished Surafeen." In the final episode of a three-part series, RNZ's Black Sheep investigates the Surafend massacre of December 1918.

Read more about the story of Surafend on the RNZ website here.

T’was a never to be forgotten night
The village was soon in flames
The wallads knocked when sighted
But protected were the dames.

Although we are fighting Anzacs
Our honour we uphold
And treat the women fairly
As did our ancestors of old.

As morning dawned we stood and watched
That devastated scene
Where but a single yesterday
Had flourished Surafeen

We turned away in silence
But feeling justified
That for our murdered comrade
We would gladly have died.

- RSA Review, August 1938

These lines are extracted from a longer poem published in RSA Review, the official magazine for New Zealand War veterans. They were credited to an unnamed New Zealand soldier who participated in the 1918 Surafend massacre.

In the final episode of our three part series RNZ's Black Sheep we look at the unanswered questions surrounding these killings, and especially the question of what motivated them.

Host William Ray speaks to military historian Terry Kinloch, author of Devils on Horses, Paul Daley, author of Beersheba and New Zealand Defence Force Historian John Crawford

Further sources:

Go to this episode on rnz.co.nz for more details

Justin Marozzi, "Captives and Companions: A History of Slavery and the Slave Trade in the Islamic World" (Pegasus Books, 2025)

Asian Review of Books

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