Remembrance Day For Anzac War Heroes
November 11th 2008 11:00
The ‘War to end all wars’ began in 1914 and raged for four bloody years, costing the lives of almost 10 million men, including sixty thousand Australian soldiers. The Australian and New Zealand Army Corps first saw combat on the 25th of April 1915 when they stormed the beaches of what became known as Anzac Cove.
My Great grandfather Bill (on the left) enlisted as a Corporal in the Australian Imperial Forces on 12 Dec 1914, having served in South Africa as a Private with the Australian Commonwealth Horse during the Boer War of 1899-1902. He was in the second wave of troops onto Anzac Cove. The man on the right, also named Bill, was killed on the first day.
AIF Burial Ground in France
The surviving Anzacs were then shipped to the Western Front where they distinguished themselves as crack troops at Bullecourt, Villers-Bretonneux, and ‘the bloodiest battle of the bloodiest war’, Passchendaele. These battles each cost more Australian lives than the eight thousand killed during the entire Gallipoli campaign.
Bill was discharged in February 1919, and was told he had just months to live due to the effects of mustard gas and being buried alive on the battlefield. He lived for another 46 years and had six children! It is profound to think of the people who might have been, had all those fallen diggers survived.
The eleventh of November was known as Armistice Day until the end of WWII when the name was changed to Remembrance Day, commemorating the fallen of all wars. During WWII the three sons of Great Grandpa Bill enlisted in the 2nd AIF and his daughters worked in munitions factories or helped him work the farm. My Grandfather Bert (left) and his brother Syd, were amongst 1,500 soldiers of the 2/22nd Battalion.
The 2/22nd were stationed at Rabaul, on the island of New Britain off New Guinea, but were unable to repel invasion by 20,000 Japanese Marines. At the fall of Rabaul and the order ‘every man for himself,’ the survivors of the 2/22nd Battalion split into two factions. One group wanted to stay and fight and the other wanted to escape to fight another day. They arranged to meet at a further beach the next day.
Bert was in the latter group, and disguising himself as a native he paddled a canoe along the coast. Hidden in the mangroves he saw the Aussies assembling on the beach, his brother amongst them, but still he held off joining them. Suddenly the Japanese burst out of the jungle and surrounded the men on the beach. They were taken into brutal captivity which few survived. Many of them perished when the prison ship transporting them to Japan was sunk by a submarine.
Bert and nine other diggers set out on an epic journey to Port Moresby across what would soon be known as the Kokoda Trail. Suffering with malaria, they were succoured by a German lady plantation owner. Bert was unconscious for twenty four hours and when he woke up he didn’t know where he was, and was shocked to see a framed photo of Adolf Hitler on the wall!
My Grandfather eventually made it back to Australia, one of three hundred survivors out of the fifteen hundred men in the 22nd Battalion. He never saw his brother again. It is for men like these, which never returned to raise a family that we will continue to mark Remembrance Day with a minute of silence.
They shall not grow old,
As we that are left grow old.
Age shall not weary them,
Nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun,
And in the morning,
We shall remember them.
Lest We Forget
As we that are left grow old.
Age shall not weary them,
Nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun,
And in the morning,
We shall remember them.
Lest We Forget
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Comment by James Rickard
unlucky_ fishermen.com
Angling Fish
Comment by GlenB
Raw Fish
Especially considering the Dominion troops numerical contribution was relatively small. Canada provided 5 Divisions. Australia 4 Divisions, India 2 Divisions, New Zealand 1 Divisions and South Africa provided 1 Brigade compared to 43 British Divisions.
There is little doubt that Dominion toops made better combatants though. They were often frontiersmen that could already ride and shoot and duck.
The Canadians pretty much saved the allies defensivey in WWI , and with the Aussies spearheaded the assault which defeated the Germans on the Western Front
The Americans arrived too late, The British were understrength and battle weary after four years of slaughter and the French Generals were more concerned with medals and honour and deference (to them) than achieving objectives.
In WWII our numerical contribution was also relatively small. We sent men to aid the British in the middle east but they abandoned Australia to the Japanese after the fall of Singapore.
The Americans were late again and we fought a losing rearguard against the Japanese until the US arrived to save our asses from Japanese occupation.
To broadly generalise, the British Empire Won The Great War and the United States Won WWII, but Aussies have always fought with skill and courage.
Incidentally some of the stories of my fighting forbears have just come to my attention. I didn't know that both my Grandfathers and Grandmothers Dads fought right through WWI and survived. I guess that's why I'm here.
Comment by James Rickard
unlucky_ fishermen.com
Angling Fish