Every year the Kui Mina McKenzie Lecture discusses a topic near and dear to the museum community. The 2026 lecture will be presented by Charlotte Macdonald, Professor Emerita at Te Herenga Waka Victoria University of Wellington, and author of Garrison World: Redcoat Soldiers in New Zealand and across the British Empire. Within many museum collections in Aotearoa New Zealand are traces of the thousands of British soldiers present in the colony from the 1840s to 1870. What can these buttons, badges, plates, dominoes, pipes and other things tell us of the breadth of the military presence in these formative decades, and how do they speak to us in 2026?
Longlisted in the BookHub Award for Illustrated Non-Fiction category of the Ockham New Zealand Book Awards.
Everyone welcome. The lecture will be followed by afternoon tea.
Supported by the Te Manawa Museum Society.
Image supplied by author (frontpiece to book): Auckland Museum Tāmaki Paenga Hira. (2015). Contents of Albert Barracks (Albert Park) well, 1850s–1870s, [Photograph]. AR7644, Auckland War Memorial Museum - Tāmaki Paenga Hira
