Hello fellow marchers.
All going well I will be marching in Sydney this year.
If not I will be celebrating O'seas somewhere.
Most moving Anzac day was one I attended many years ago at the Kranji war cemetary in Singapore.
This cemetary is where the majority of Australian POWs from Changi were buried.
Its a sereis of tiered hills with the graves on them. A memorial is on the top.
There was a mixed bunch of Aussie defence force units and kiwis there, various embassy officials from other countries plus aussie school kids from the expats school choir.They sung a very haunting version of I still call Australia home, I don't think there was a dry eye there after that.
End of the service when to the yank naval base to the Terra club and proceeded to run amok.
Had a great time with the Kiwis, our pussers got in the shit and the Army beat each other up! So ended another Anzac day !!!!!

This is our Shrine Of Remembrance. North Tce, Adelaide.

Four figures on the Christchurch war memorial; From left to right: youth, justice, peace and valour.


The 2 unseen in the above photo are, with arms outstretched, the maternal figure of sacrifice and above them all is the superb figure of an angel, nude to the waist, who is about to break the sword of war.

I don't quite get the Australian/New zealand obsession with Gallipoli.Firstly, it was a military defeat,and secondly, most of the fighting and dying was done by British and French troops.

The British had contributed 468,000 in the battle for Gallipoli with 33.512 killed. 7,636 missing and 78,000 wounded. The French were next most numerous in total numbers and in casualties. The Anzacs lost 8,000 men(inc New Zealanders) at Gallipoli and a further 18,000 were wounded.

Why don't the French and British feel the same way as Australia and New zealand?

Originally Posted by Bellerophon

I don't quite get the Australian/New zealand obsession with Gallipoli.Firstly, it was a military defeat,and secondly, most of the fighting and dying was done by British and French troops.

The British had contributed 468,000 in the battle for Gallipoli with 33.512 killed. 7,636 missing and 78,000 wounded. The French were next most numerous in total numbers and in casualties. The Anzacs lost 8,000 men(inc New Zealanders) at Gallipoli and a further 18,000 were wounded.

Why don't the French and British feel the same way as Australia and New zealand?

up to the time of gallipoli australia and NZ considered themselves a colony...with strong ties to "mother england". gallipoli was the start of our own individual national identity. the fact that the british bungled the entire operation, yet the ANZAC's accomplished (and exceeded) all objectives, including the taking of lone pine & Chunuk Bair only to be shelled off the hill top by british warships!
although some volunteers went to the boer war, gallipoli was the first major military action where colonial troops formed there own identity...this was transfered onto the "folks back home"


*****external site*****
In the South Pacific the campaign helped bolster a sense of national identity, albeit within a British framework, in both countries. At the time of the landing, New Zealanders at home had thrilled to learn that their men were taking part in the top league-a sense of exhilaration that was soon tempered by the arrival of long casualty lists. There was pride that 1NZEF had performed well in difficult conditions. The institution of Anzac Day, the day of the landing, ensured that the campaign would retain a special significance in both antipodean societies.

The joint defence of the Anzac perimeter provided a strong sentimental underpinning to the relationship between Australia and New Zealand in the remainder of the century. 'Anzac' became the lasting label for trans-Tasman cooperation.
http://www.nzhistory.net.nz/Gallery/...ths.htm#legacy

The Gallipoli operation cost Australia 26,111 casualties, 8,141 dead,
New Zealand 7,571 casualties, 2,431 dead,
Britain 120,000 casualties, 21,255 dead,
France 27,000 casualties, 10,000 dead,
India 1,350 dead,
Newfoundland (now part of Canada) 49 dead.
http://www.diggerhistory.info/pages-.../gallipoli.htm

but by far the most important point i would like to make is this:

"australians and New Zealanders, can take pride in heroic deeds at Gallipoli, as indeed can French, Indian, Pakistani and Bangladeshi people. We should not allow latter-day propagandists to sow seeds of unwarranted resentment between peoples whose ancestors fought with great courage in a common cause."

thinking on your question though...the british and french have much bigger battles they can remember...but for Australia & NZ, Gallipoli has a special significance that can never really be explained....i know that i would do anything to visit ANZAC cove and walk the gully's and trenches. the aim is for me to go for the 100 years anniversary.

Thanks for that,Chewie.I hope you make the 100th anniversary.

Originally Posted by Bellerophon

Thanks for that,Chewie.I hope you make the 100th anniversary.

cheers....i do hope that info was useful! i just got home from a gig where i was celebrating my first day at a new job...so ummmm yes. drunken typing is fun!


ANZAC day is probably the most personally important days for me...my family has a long history of war....two of my relatives died in the gallipoli campign alone.

one captured in crete during wwII. one other was a wellington bomber pilot. and my dad went to vietnam.

http://www.military-quotes.com/forum...=100569#100569

i think one reason gallipoli is so important to aussies and kiwis is becuase of some of the qualites that were shown by the soldiers there. especially the NZ's at chunuk bair or the aussies at lone pine for example.
they did an amazing job cosidering how up the planning of the campaighn was.

one of the best rembered english battles was the somme and it wasnt what you could call a great success considering how meny blokes died for the amount of land captured.

Yeah it was a significant battle, but a waste of good soldiers. Fighting an uphill battle was a turkeyshoot for turks. It showed that the brits did not care about dead colonials at all.