The Memorial is a 2.4 metre high stainless steel plaque inscribed as follows: IN MEMORY OF TWENTY TWO BRITISH SUBJECTS MURDERED BY THE JAPANESE AT BETIO ON THE 15TH OF OCTOBER 1942. STANDING UNARMED TO THEIR POSTS, THEY MATCHED BRUTALITY WITH GALLANTRY AND MET DEATH WITH FORTITUDE. In addition to the Coastwatchers, the Memorial commemorates the hundreds of Gilbert and Ellice Islanders who died during the Pacific War.

The 22 British subjects executed at Betio on or about 15 October 1942 comprised 17 New Zealanders, two Australians, and three British nationals. Each had been held captive on Tarawa Atoll during the preceding two months as Japanese forces moved to occupy the central and southern Gilbert Islands. Contemporary eyewitness accounts recorded that the prisoners were executed following an American air raid on Betio, and that a Japanese overseer in charge of Korean labourers was directly responsible for the beheadings. Although the bodies of the murdered men were then buried in pits, it was reported subsequently that a large calibre shell struck the supposed burial site during the Battle of Tarawa in November 1943. Later searches concluded that there was no chance of locating and identifying specific remains amidst the wartime devastation on Betio.

All the New Zealanders killed had been stationed in the then Gilbert and Ellice Islands Colony as official coast-watchers. Seven of their New Zealand coast-watching colleagues, who were captured in the northern Gilberts during December 1941, had been taken to Japan at that time as prisoners of war. They survived to return to New Zealand after the war. An Australian radio operator from Tarawa, who was commissioned into the Fiji Military Forces, a London Missionary Society Pastor from Beru, the Government Dispenser and two locally resident civilians were the other five men killed.

The first memorial commemorating the deaths of the 22 men was a large wooden cross, with an accompanying wooden scroll listing their names, erected by the United States Military Forces after the Battle of Tarawa in late 1943. Over the years, several changes were made to the memorial, culminating in the placement of a concrete cross with a stone commemorative plaque. This memorial became the focal point of Anzac Day observances in Tarawa following the establishment of the resident Australian and New Zealand High Commissions after Kiribati became an independent nation.

This current memorial was dedicated in 2002, the 60th anniversary year of the executions, and preserves the wording of the previous memorial, corrects some textual errors and adds a new commemorative statement in remembrance of the people of the Gilbert and Ellice Islands Colony who also suffered and died during the Japanese occupation in this area.

Designed and constructed by Office of Australian War Graves, in conjunction with the three Commonwealth High Commissions in Tarawa - Australia, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom and with the support from Australian corporate identities which do business in Kiribati - RHK Kiribati and John Swire and Sons. It replaces a monument on the same site which was showing its age.

Betio, Kiribati.

The Memorial is located at the Temakin Cemetery on Betio, an island at the extreme southwest of South Tarawa in Kiribati. The main port of Tarawa Atoll is located there.