Shrine of Remembrance

Thursday 07 April 2016 Presenter: Shrine Trustee Colonel John Wertheimer AM RFD   1966 was the year that Australia sent a Task Force to Vietnam, the year the first National Servicemen served in the war, and the year of the battle of Long Tan. Australia felt the heart of the Cold War and the throes of a youth revolution, in the year the first baby boomers came of age. Fifty years on, this exhibitio...

Wednesday 20 April 2016 Presenter: Dr David Holloway The 4th Light Horse Regiment was Australia’s only unit to fight on all three fronts during the First World War. They served dismounted at Gallipoli before being divided between France and Palestine. Their legendary attack at Beersheba on 31 October 1917 saw the Regiment, armed only with bayonets, capture enemy trenches at the gallop. 

Tuesday 5 April Presenter: Ross McMullin Ross McMullin’s presentation illuminates the life, creativity and humour of the conspicuously talented, remarkably versatile and internationally acclaimed Ballarat-born artist-writer Will Dyson, who depicted Australian soldiers with profound empathy and sympathy as our first official war artist. Dyson drew endurance and resilience, grit and grief.

Sunday 10 April 2016 Presenters: Jack Caple, Ron Williamson, Bob Semple, and Heather MacFarlane Meet veterans Jack Caple, Ron Williamson and Bob Semple some of the few surviving Rats of Tobruk in conversation with Heather MacFarlane. Hear about their battle experiences, living conditions and the camaraderie which was shared by the Rats during the long siege of 1941. This mateship continues today i...

Wednesday 9 March 2016 - Peter FitzSimons AM   On 19 July 1916, 7,000 Australian soldiers – in the first major action of the AIF on the Western Front – attacked entrenched German positions at Fromelles in northern France. By the next day, there were over 5,500 casualties, including nearly 2,000 dead. Yet the sad truth is that, nearly a century on from those battles, Australians know only a fractio...

Wednesday 24 February 2016 Jeff Maynard A mystic explorer, George Hubert Wilkins, was appointed the official photographer under Charles Bean at the Western Front during WWI. Author Jeff Maynard discovered Wilkins’ lost records in the USA in 2014 and uses them to illustrate the remarkable story of the man who put a face to the Anzac legend. Peter Wolfenden also provides a demonstration of a 1912 Th...

Friday 19 February 2016 John Thompson-Gray Drawing on five years of research and interviews with centenarian airmen, Cambridge scholar and author John Thompson-Gray reveals untold stories of love, luck and grand larceny during the strafing at Broome in 1942. Discover the truth behind the disappearance of 30,000 Amsterdam diamonds from a plane shot down near Broome on 3 March 1942, a mystery which...

Thursday 21 January 2016 - Kerryn Taylor Wish You Were Here: Textile Artists Honour a Century of Service  is on loan to the Shrine courtesy of the Wangaratta Textile Association. Join contributing artist Kerryn Taylor as she shares the origins of the exhibition. Learn more about the themes behind the works and discover the family stories hidden within the threads.

A special presentation by Leslie Bunn Glover ('Bunny") as part of the Sandakan Mebourne Cup display at the Shrine of Remembrance during this year's Spring Racing Carnival. Commemorating the 2,500 Australian and British men who dies as prisoners of the Japanese on Borneo. The Sandakan Cup (1942) and the Emirates Melbourne Cup (2015) were featured on stage during the program. In May 1942, Bunny was...

Jim Claven MA, Secretary of the Lemnos Gallipoli Commemorative Committee, will recount the often forgotten role that the Greek Island of Lemnos played in the Gallipoli campaign. Lemnos was the forward base for the campaign and the location of soldiers’ rest camps and field hospitals. There were 148 diggers buried amongst the over 1,200 other Allied graves on the island. Lemnos is also the location...

Lambis Englezos AM discusses the search for the missing men of the Battle of Fromelles. A team’s tireless search and advocacy over many years led to the discovery of a mass burial site for 250 soldiers lost since First World War. This search has led to the creation of the first new Commonwealth War Cemetery since World War II and has connected hundreds of families with their military heritage. Thi...

Wednesday 3 Jun, 12.30pm Dr Michael Lawriwsky At Courtney’s Post on the Turkish Gallipoli Peninsula in May 1915 Albert Jacka was awarded the Victoria Cross for bravery. He was Australia’s first recipient of the award during the First World War and soon became one of Australia’s most well-known soldiers. Join Michael Lawriwsky, author of Hard Jacka and R eturn of the Gallipoli Legend , as he discus...

Tuesday 19 May, 12.30 Dr Michael Lawriwsky Gallipoli, most well-known for the landing on Anzac day, was also a place where our ANZACs distinguished themselves. 10 Victoria Crosses alone were awarded to the Australian and New Zealanders in the 8 months that the ANZACs were on the peninsula. Dr Lawriwsky, author of Hard Jacka and Return of the Gallipoli Legend: Jacka VC, joins us to discuss the Gall...

Friday 8 May 2015 - Christopher Wray To commemorate the 100th anniversary of the Second Battle of Krithia, Christopher Wray will speak on the events of the fateful afternoon of 8 May, 1915. The 2nd (Victorian) Brigade commanded by Sir James McCay took part in the final attempt to reach and break through the Turkish lines at the village of Krithia, 4 miles north of Capes Helles. Christopher, author...

Wednesday 6 May - Panel Discussion in partnership with the University of Melbourne The Anzac battlefield: landscape of war and memory , a major archaeological survey of the Gallipoli battlefields on display at the Shrine from 14 April 2015 - 31 August 2015, reveals the brutal realities of daily life in the trenches for both the allied and Turkish sides. This discussion explores what the survey rev...

Thursday 30 April 2015 Peter Rees Charles Bean was Australia's greatest and most famous war correspondent. He is the man who told Australia about the horrors of Gallipoli and the Western Front, created the Anzac legend and was central to the creation of the Australian War Memorial. Yet we know so little about the real man. Peter Rees gives us insight into a key figure who helped shape the emerging...

Thursday 16 April 2015 Peter FitzSimons Now approaching it’s centenary, the Gallipoli campaign, commemorated each year on Anzac Day, reverberates with importance as a symbol of what it truly means to be Australian. However, the facts of the battle – which was minor against the scale of the First World War and cost less than a sixth of the Australian deaths on the Western Front – are often forgotte...

Tuesday 3 March 2015 Dr Bart Ziino Join Dr Bart Ziino as he examines the private experience of the Great War in Victoria, drawing on personal letters and diaries to tell a story of the war as an individual, familial, and communal trial. Through an examination of anxieties over loved ones at the front, and tensions over who was bearing the greater burden. This talk offers new ways of understanding...

Wednesday 25 February 2015 - Dr Mark Johnston Australian soldiers praised stretcher-bearers on every battlefield of both world wars. From the landing at Gallipoli to the last campaigns of 1945, in desert, jungle, mountains and mud, Australian stretcher-bearers routinely risked their lives to save others. To win that praise, all bearers paid a high price. Their job was intensely dangerous and no ca...

Wednesday 11 February 2015 - Mr Barrie Cassidy   Barrie Cassidy shares his dad’s experience as a POW for four years in World War II. His father, Private Bill, participated in his first conflict on Crete in May 1941, during the largest parachute invasion in wartime history. Just four days later, he was wounded and taken prisoner. Join us as Barrie shares of his father’s escape attempts with horrifi...

Thursday 6 November 2014 - Bob Semple and Ron Williamson Meet our Rats of Tobruk, Ron Williamson and Bob Semple, as they share their recollections of the siege of Tobruk 73 years ago. Hear about their battle experiences, living conditions and the camaraderie which was shared by the Rats, as they were to be forevermore named. This mateship continues today in the Rats of Tobruk Association, supporte...

Wednesday 1 October 2014 Dr Mark Johnston To commemorate the 70 th anniversary of the D-Day Landings on 6 June 1944, Dr Mark Johnston discusses the largest seaborne invasion in history. Involving more than 150,000 Allied troops, including 3,000 Australians, the invasion of Normandy began the liberation of German-occupied Western Europe and contributed significantly to Allied victory in the Second...

Wednesday 24 September 2014 Professor Bruce Scates, Dr Michael McKernan and His Excellency Jean-Luc Bodson Two of Australia’s renowned military historians will be joined by the Ambassador to Belgium to discuss the outbreak of the First World War which, in its time, was considered to be the war to end all wars. Not only focusing on the Australian perspective and contribution, this talk will provide...

Tuesday 16 September 2014 - Mr Tim Smith One hundred years ago at the outbreak of the First World War, Australia had the most technologically potent submarine capability in the southern hemisphere: the E-class submarines. Tragically in September 1914 AE1 went down with all hands. AE2 rallied and led the charge to be the first submarine in history to penetrate the Dardanelles military defences in T...

Thursday 19 June 2014 - Mr Tim Whitford   Join Tim Whitford, Shrine of Remembrance Education Officer, as he discusses the search for the missing men of the Battle of Fromelles. Tim’s tireless search and advocacy over many years led to the discovery of a mass burial site for 250 soldiers lost since the First World War. This search has led to the creation of the first new Commonwealth War Cemetery s...