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Published: February 18th 2014
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Friday 7th February, 2014. National War Memorial, Canberra, ACT, Australia
After breakfast we stuck our backpacks in a locker and strolled through suburban Canberra until we reached the
Australian War Memorial. The walk took about 30 minutes. It was very interesting walking alongl the wide tree-lined roads with their one storey houses. The one thing that was really irritating though, was that a lot of the steets either had no pavements (side walks) at all or just one on the one side. This really is a city for the car (not very green). Everything is really spread out and you can't walk from one thing to another easily (no pavements and long distances). Anyway, we made it to our destination.
The Australian War Memorial is Australia's national memorial to the members of all its armed forces and supporting organizations who have died or participated in the wars of the Commonwealth of Australia. The memorial includes an extensive national military museum so it is more like a cross between the Imperial War Museum and the Cenotaph. The Australian War Memorial was opened in 1941, and is widely regarded as one of the most significant memorials of its type in
the world.
The Memorial is located at the northern terminus of the city's ceremonial land axis, which stretches from Parliament House on Capital Hill along a line passing through the summit of the cone-shaped Mount Ainslie to the northeast. No continuous roadway links the two points, but there is a clear line of sight from the front balcony of Parliament House to the War Memorial, and from the front steps of the War Memorial back to Parliament House. We took some photographs from this end, having already photographed the War Memorial from the other end yesterday.
The Australian War Memorial consists of three parts: the Commemorative Area (shrine) including the Hall of Memory with the Tomb of the Unknown Australian Soldier, the Memorial's galleries (museum) and Research Centre (records). The Memorial also has an outdoor Sculpture Garden. We made our way through the sculpture garden taking some photographs on the way. M's favourite was the Simpson & his donkey Sculpture. John Simpson Kirkpatrick enlisted in the 3rd Australian Field Ambulance as Private Simpson on 25th August 1914. He took part in the landing on Gallipoli on 25th april 1915 and became famous among Australian troops for his bravery
and compassion. Under continual shell fire he used a donkey to carry water up Shrapnel Gully, and to bring wounded men down to the beach on Anzac Cove from the firing line on the ridges above. After less than 4 weeks in action he was fatally wounded on 19th May 1915. Although he was known on Gallipoli by a variety of nicknames, most of the soldiers who witnessed his bravery knew him as the man with the donkey, without ever learning his name. Simpson has come to embody for Ausralians the spirit of self sacrifice in war.
The other statue which particularly caught our eye was by Ray Ewers. In 1954 he was asked to create a sculpture to commemorate the sacfifice of Australians in all wars. 'Australian Serviceman' symbolises determination, courage and a spirit of achievement as well as hope for the future. It was unveilled in 1959 in the Hall of Memory and removed to the Sculpture garden in 1993 to make way for the construction of the Tomb of the Unknown Australian Soldier. Around the side, next to the administration building there was an interesting collection of Australian war memorabilia including the barrel from the Amiens
Railway Gun, the gun mount and bridge from HMAS Brisbane and a Centurion Tank. Outside the memorial there was also a naval gun from HMAS Australia.
We entered the main building passing by the Menin Gate Lions. These medieval stone lions once stood on either side of the Menin Gate in the walls of the town of Ypres in Belgium. Ypres was destroyed in the war, and these lions were recovered from the ruins of the Menin Gate. During the first world war, Allied soldiers passed through the gate to the battlefields around Ypres, where over 38,000 Australian troops were killed or wounded. The gate became the site of a memorial to the soldiers of the British Empire, including over 6,000 Australians who were killed around Ypres and have no known graves. in 1936 the Burgomaster of Ypres presented the lions to the Australian Government as a gesture of friendship between that town and the people of Australia. They commemorate the service of the Australian soldiers who helped to defend Ypres in 1917.
Once inside we found we were just in time for a free guided tour. First we went outside to the commemorative area which is situated
in the open centre of the memorial building. We entered a narrow courtyard with a memorial pool surrounding an eternal flame and flanked by sidewalks and shrubbery, including plantings of rosemary for remembrance. Our guide took us up to the the cloisters where we had a great view down to the two Parliament Buildings. In the cloisters is the Roll of honour, a series of bronze plaques naming the 102,000 Australian servicemen and women killed in conflict. The plaques include names dating back to the British Sudanese Expedition, the Second Boer War, and the Boxer Rebellion. The entire long wall of the western gallery is covered with the names of the thousands who died in World War I. The eastern gallery is covered with the names of those who died in World War II and more recent conflicts. The roll shows the names only, not rank or other awards, as "all men are equal in death". Visiting relatives and friends insert poppies in the cracks between the bronze plaques, beside the names of their loved ones that they wish to honour; many continue to be inserted by the names of those who died in World War I, and a few
even appear by the names of those who died in the 19th century campaigns. We walked past the names of those who perished in the First World War. Many of the names are marked with poppys which can be purchased from the shop. Members of staff carefully replace any poppys which have fallen to the ground. D spotted the name of Gleaves J on one of the plaques. We will have to see if he is related in anyway when we work on the family tree once we are back home.
We continued on to the heart of the commemorative area which is the Hall of Memory, a tall domed chapel with a small floor plan in the form of an octagon. The walls are lined with tiny mosaic tiles from the floor to the dome.b Inside lies the Tomb of the Unknown Australian Soldier. The remains that are interred here were brought back from one of the graves in a European Cemetry marked "Known Only to God". Three of the walls, facing east, west, and south, feature stained glass designs representing qualities of Australian servicemen and women. At the four walls facing northeast, northwest, southeast, and southwest are
mosaic images of a Sailor, a Servicewoman, a Soldier and an Airman, respectively. The mosaic and stained glass were the work of the one-armed Australian muralist Napier Waller, who had lost his right arm at Bullecourt during World War I and learned to write and create his works with his left arm. He completed his work in 1958.
We moved on inside the building which changed from an area of rememberence to a museum with exhibitions from various conflicts in which the Australian forces were involved. Unfortunately the World War 1 exhibit was being re-done so we couldn't see it and all the stuff associated with the disaster at Gallipoli. We were guided around all the second world war stuff, with aircraft and sound and light shows. When the guide had finished we had only 5 minutes to look around on our own before we needed to head for the bus back to Sydney.
We returned to the hostel, retrieved our backpacks, grabbed a sandwich and a drink from a local convenience store and arrived at the bus stop. We boarded the bus straight away as it was already waiting. It was full so we couldn't sit together
either. An uneventful return to Sydney via the airport.
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