The Auckland Museum holds a lithograph of the sketch The Spirit of the Bayonet from Trevor Charles via the Tairawhiti Museum. Trevor Charles was a close friend of Hamon and a number of other Maori Battalion men. He is a veteran of a different unit. Mr Charles had written on the reverse of the print: The picture was drawn when the army was being driven back. The two people in the drawing (the soldier kneeling and the one with the taiaha) are self portraits of Dennis himself. He predicted that the tables would soon be turned against the Germans and thus the swastika in reverse was his way of portraying this. The mountain in the background is Mt Cook. The Auckland War Memorial Museum catalogue entry includes the following information: Award winning sketch (black and white section of Battalion competition) by Private Eruera Dennis Hamon (Reg.no. 39202) C company 28 Maori Battalion, 1940-41. Killed in action 30 November 1941 Hamon was awarded first prize posthumously. Original sketch said to be held by a Gisborne marae. Sketch was first published in the 2nd N.Z.E.F. Times. Chris Jones | Collection Team Leader | Auckland Museum Note from Te Awhi:  The mountain is Taranaki. 

The painting 'The Spirit of the Bayonet by Eruera Dennis Hamon accompanied the following Forward:A tribute to the men of Maori Battalion from one its former commanders Sir Charles Bennett, DSO, MA, LLD (Hon).Ko te umanga nui o nehera he whawhai - The chief preoccupation of olden times was fighting.The Maori's apparent predilection for organised warfare as revealed in the whole history of the Maori Battalion during World War II may be partly explained if considered against his ancestral background.War and the proccupation of the old-time Maori and amongst his foremost institutions were schools where the art of war was taught by experts.  Here were trained men who revelled in the feint and parry and thrust of their ancestral weapons - the taiaha and the mere.  The young warriors grew and developed into manhood with great physical strength, discipline and endurance, resilient to hardships of all kinds and possessing an intimate knowledge of nature and moods.They were unsurpassed in taking cover on exposed ground, making their way through uncharted forests with uncanny accuracy finally to reach whatever point happened to be their main objective.  Their training was such that their reaction to any situation of danger was tantamount to unconscious responses of instinct.  The cry and the leap of that martial exercise the haka were second nature to them.  It prepared them for that tense moment when they came to grips with the enemy and it was also aimed at striking terror into the hearts of their foes.In those olden days no medals were given for courage and bravery in war, but the brave deeds of men were perpetuated in song and dance, and the names of great warriors handed from one generation to another on the lips of men and devoted women. This is the background of the young men who made up the Maori Battalion and this is the material of which they were made; and it could well be that those martial qualities which were the prerogative of their forbears also form part of a modern inheritance.Bennett, C.  (c.1982). NZ 28 Maori Battalion Reunion Booklet.

TE KARERE, Aperira, 1942 pg120NEWS FROM THE FIELDThe late Eruera D. Hamon of Te Hapara, Gisborne, who died of wounds, won first prize in a black and white sketch held in the Middle East, entitled "The Spirit of the Bayonet." Quite a number of the returned boys spoke highly of the imagination and excellent work that Dennis could portray in black and white.

This article about Uncle Dennis was found in the Auckland Star, 5 May 1942, pg 4. http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nzA Maori ArtistThe successful Gisborne Maori artist Private Eruera Hamon, a member of the Maori Battalion, won first prize in the black and white Section of the N.Z.E.F. Christmas competitions in the Middle East, writes a Gisborne correspondent. This drawing, which he entitled "The spirit or the bayonet," was published In the N.Z.E.F. Times Christmas issue on December 22, 1941, and has now been reproduced in a New Zealand publication.Private Hamon died of wounds in Libya before "The spirit of the bayonet" was published. His parents, Mr. and Mrs. Henare Hamon, live at 10 Waverley Street, Gisborne.I wonder if Uncle Dennis knew that he had won the prize, as he had died on the November 30, 1941. - Te Awhi