ANZAC
stands for the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps which came together to fight in WWI. On 25 April 1915, British, ANZAC
and other allied forces, including the French and Indians, landed on the shores
of Gallipoli to open up a new front in the war
with Turkey and the Germans. It ended months later in bitter defeat, with a
hasty retreat and a terrible loss of life on both sides.
ANZAC Day
is one of the most important days for Australians and New Zealanders. It means
different things to different people but for me it is a time to remember so
many people who have suffered in times of war and who gave their life or made other
sacrifices. And not only those in uniform but their families who also suffered
and sacrificed with them.
KHS
will publish a book in 2015 to commemorate the people of the Ku-ring-gai area
(on the North Shore of Sydney) who served in WWI. Their names have been
compiled from the many monuments to the “Great War” in the district. Volunteers
from KHS (including me) are researching and writing 500-word stories of the
soldiers, sailors and nurses who served. However, because there are so many
names, the book will be limited to those who did not come back and those who
were decorated.
There are many free websites for researching the stories of these people, including:
- National Archives of Australia (NAA) for the official service records of people in the Army, Navy and Air Force, in many conflicts
- Australian War Memorial, for nominal rolls, honours and awards, the Red Cross wounded and missing files and much more
- Trove website (National Library of Australia), including the digitised Australian newspapers (1803-1954)
- Commonwealth War Graves Commission recording and maintaining the graves and memorials of servicemen buried overseas
- and many more
Ed,
ReplyDeleteThankyou so much for writing a post about our WW1 project and welcome to the world of geneablogging.
Hope to catch up with you at the workshop on Saturday.
Jill
Thanks Jill, It's a very interesting project. Great to be involved.
Delete