#anzac memorial

[redrcs]

We regret to inform you ...

WWI ANZAC memorial, Queens Park, Maryborough

[theartoffresco]

[intheshadowofwar]

The Boundless Sea

Sydney

11 June 2023

We headed into Sydney at about 9am this morning with a fairly full raft of activities.

The first of these, which we arrived to at 10, was the Hyde Park Convict Barracks. This barracks was built by order of Governor Lachlan Macquarie in 1817, and today a statue of him stands across the road from the building, gesturing towards it. I can’t help but wonder if Macquarie would appreciate the somewhat dodgy statue of himself showing off the prison he built, but maybe that’s just me. Hyde Park Barracks is a thoroughly modern museum, in that it uses audio guides instead of placards. I generally can’t stand audio guides, but I soon worked out that I could just read the subtitles on the ipod thing they gave us, so it wasn’t a dealbreaker. The museum now includes a major focus on the effects of colonisation and the convict system on the indigenous peoples of New South Wales, which I quite appreciated. The one thing I might have liked more about was a little more information on the guards; but I appreciate that this is specifically a museum about the convicts, not the soldiers.

After the barracks, we walked through Hyde Park to the Anzac Memorial. This is Sydney and New South Wales’ primary war memorial, opened in the 1930s to commemorate the First World War. It’s not quite as grand as Melbourne’s Shrine of Remembrance - few things are - but it is still a magnificent structure and well worth a visit. The statue of the prostrate man in the Hall of Silence - positioned under the Hall of Memory, and visible through a hole in the floor which they call the Well of Contemplation - is particularly striking. Most war-related sculptures, at least in the post-WWI period, tend to be horizontal. Here, the prostrated man is vertical - the language of mourning.

Behind the Hall of Memory and down the stairs is the Hall of Service. The walls here are lined with soil samples from every town in New South Wales that has sent soldiers to war. There’s a circle on the floor, under a skylight, with more soil - these from the battlefields on which soldiers from New South Wales have fought. This goes as far back as the New Zealand Wars of the 1860s, but frontier conflict isn’t represented.

After visiting the Anzac Memorial, we proceeded by train to Circular Quay, and after stopping for a quick drink, caught the Manly Ferry out to Manly. This took us past the Martello tower at Fort Denison, upon which a young Charles Lightoller raised the Boer flag as a prank in the early 1900s, and the naval base at Garden Island. Both Canberra-class helicopter carriers were in port - these are the largest warships Australia has operated since the decommissioning of the carrier HMAS Melbourne. On the port side of the ferry, as one approaches the heads, the foremast of the cruiser HMAS Sydney (the first one) can be seen on the shore. To starboard, one can gaze out through the heads to the Pacific - from here, the sea is almost unbroken until you reach South America.

It is somewhere northeast of here that HMAS Australia lies on the seabed, decommissioned and scuttled under the terms of the Washington Naval Treaty. Australia was a battlecruiser - the same class as the unfortunate Indefatigable. She missed Jutland due to damage from a collision with the third member of the class, HMS New Zealand, and thus never saw a major combat action. Her existence, however, deterred German raiders from sailing too close to Australia during the war (although I’d argue that it was actually the entry of the Japanese into the war that really coerced the Germans into fleeing the Pacific altogether.)

We lunched in Manly, and I took a look at the war memorial there - possibly Australia’s oldest, erected before the war had even ended in 1916. I had a look at the beach, too, but it was absolutely packed. We caught the ferry back at around 3pm, and then returned to Hurstville by train.

The real journey begins tomorrow - we leave early for Sydney airport, and then we have the long, long flight via Bangkok to Heathrow. This will be a long undertaking, but I’m not certain there will be much to write about - but I shall make a valiant effort regardless.

[seniouesbabes]

Lily Maymac 🌸💋🍒🌸 @louisvuitton FW22 ✨ This gold dress 🤩

[meghan-the-duchess]

Throwback: Meghan Markle and Prince Harry attending a Dawn Service Commemorating Anzac Day - 25th April 2018

[royalpain16]

Harry and Meghan arrive at Sydney's ANZAC Memorial in Hyde Park, which honors thousands of Aussie's in NSW who were killed in conflict throughout the last 200 years.

[hirocimacruiser]

Took my Q45 on a 1000km road trip to Albany and surrounds. The ANZAC memorials at Mt Clarence and Mt Adelaide are both worth while going to if only for the views. Albany was the staging area for the 2 convoys that headed to Gallipoli with all the troops from Australia and New Zealand in the First World War. I was surprised how many thousands of horses were sent there as well with the men but only one horse from Australia and one from New Zealand returned. 

[redrcs]

ANZAC memorial. Water tank on Yeerakine Rock

On my travels,