Stories | Places of Pride

Australian soldiers wait in the trenches at Passchendaele in Belgium. The Battle of Passchendaele was also known as the Third Battle of Ypres. Septimus Power drew this image while as an official war artist attached to the 1st Division of the AIF during the Passchendaele offensive, 1917

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Corporal David Edward Etches, 3rd Battalion, AIF

Born in Sydney in 1889 to James and Annie Etches, David Etches had an older brother, William, and a younger sister, Anne.

Author: Australian War Memorial

Group portrait of members of 158 Squadron RAF

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Flight Sergeant Ronald Lanham, No. 14 Squadron, RAF

Ronald Lanham was born on 15 August 1922, the eldest of three sons born to Timothy and Olinda Lanham of “The Wattles”, a farm near Cowra in New South Wales.

Author: Australian War Memorial

Informal group portrait of RAAF officers stationed at RAF Station Beccles. Identified from left to right: A31907 Sergeant Patrick William ‘Pat’ O'Grady, No. 34 Squadron RAAF; 414792 Flying Officer Ernest Gatenby 'Ernie' Fletcher, No. 463 Squadron RAAF, who later was killed on operations over France on 4 July 1944; 79134 Leading Aircraftman Stanley Roper Somerville; 441009 Leading Aircraftman Vernon ‘Pom’ Hyam; 415299 Flying Officer Mervyn Charles 'Merv' Blee, No. 86 Squadron RAAF; 3926 Flight Sergean

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Flying Officer Ernest Gatenby Fletcher, No. 463 Squadron, RAAF

Ernest “Ernie” Fletcher was born on 12 July 1913 in Toowoomba, Queensland, the son of Edwin and Annie Fletcher. He had an older sister, Mary, and a younger brother, Linley.

Author: Australian War Memorial

A view of no man's land from our front line parapet, near Gueudecourt, in January 1917. The sunken road can be seen in the background.

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Private Harold Dean Anderson, 15th Battalion, AIF

Harold Anderson, known as “Halv” to his mates, was born on 2 February 1898 to John and Clara Anderson of Toowoomba, Queensland.

Author: Australian War Memorial

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Lance Corporal James Gavin, 31st Battalion

James Augustus Gavin was born on 20 March 1886, son of James and Mary Gavin, at Jondaryan on the Darling Downs in Queensland.

Author: Australian War Memorial

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Captain Domenic George Picone, Australian Army Medical Corps

Domenic Picone was born in Perth on 14 March 1909, the son of Anthony and Mary Picone.

Author: Australian War Memorial

Australian stretcher bearers with casualty on stretcher preparing to leave the battlefield, and another soldier attending to a second casualty, Belgium, WW1. In performing their work, stretcher-bearers were regularly exposed to great danger as depicted in this work. Shells are bursting close to where they are rescuing the wounded soldiers.

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Private Henry Gordon Loone, 4th Field Ambulance

Henry Loone, who went by his middle name “Gordon”, was born on 10 January 1885, the third son of Arthur and Keturah Loone of Scottsdale, Tasmania.

Author: Australian War Memorial

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Private Nathaniel Robert Abbott, 26th Infantry Battalion, AIF

Nathaniel Abbott was born in 1892 in Evandale, Tasmania to George and Jane Abbott. He was one of nine children and received his education at Tasmania State School.

Author: Australian War Memorial

The old no man's land of Fromelles battlefield viewed from the north-east corner of Sugar Loaf Salient looking towards the line from which the 15th Australian Infantry Brigade began their attack on 19 July 1916.

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Private Francis George Gilbee, 60th Battalion, AIF

Francis Gilbee was born in 1890, one of six children of Frederick and Annie Gilbee of Darlimurla in Victoria.

Author: Australian War Memorial

Bombay, India. c 1917. Three members of the Australian Army Nursing Service (AANS) sitting at a table in a ward at Victoria War Hospital. The hospital had two hundred beds on each of the first three floors and Sister's quarters on the fourth. It received the most serious cases as it was five minutes from the dock. Patients were received from Mesopotamia, including British POWs released by the Turks, Turkish prisoners and British troops. At one stage, British troops suffering from heatstroke were received at

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Sister Emily Clare, Australian Army Nursing Service

Born in Melbourne on 11 September 1890, Emily Clare was the youngest daughter of Peter and Mary Clare. She had four sisters and three brothers.

Author: Australian War Memorial

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Private Ralph Jones, 22nd Garrison Battalion, 2nd AIF

Born in Gorleston in Norfolk, England, on 26 September 1900, Ralph Jones was the son of Henry and Eliza Jones.

Author: Australian War Memorial

Australian guerrillas accepting fresh fruit from Timorese in November 1942

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"H" detachment Sparrow Force at Viqueque, 1942

Within days of the outbreak of the Pacific war in December 1941, the largely Australian “Sparrow Force” was sent to Timor.

Author: Australian War Memorial

Members of the 2/40th Battalion at Brighton Army Camp prior to embarkation for service overseas; the unit was the only battalion in the Australian Imperial Force recruited almost entirely from Tasmania.

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Private Leslie Albert Allen, 2/40th Australian Infantry Battalion

Leslie “Barney” Allen was born at Sisters Creek, Tasmania on 24 September 1918, the eldest son of Albert and Ruby Allen.

Author: Australian War Memorial

Saint-Pol-sur-Ternoise, France. c. 1917. A British Army stationary hospital in the snow. (Donor British Official Photograph D775)

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Private William Michael Walsh, 9th Battalion, AIF

William Michael Walsh was born in 1894 to Michael and Mary Walsh of Ramornie, near Grafton in northern New South Wales.

Author: Australian War Memorial

View of the ruins of Messines, in Belgium. The foreground is littered with debris, 1917.

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Private Vincent Henry Walsh, 41st Battalion, AIF

Vincent Walsh was born in 1887 to Michael and Mary Walsh of South Grafton in northern New South Wales.

Author: Australian War Memorial

The ruins of the church in a Somme village that was occupied by the troops in rest billets in 1916, and by Battalion Headquarters after the German spring offensive in 1918. The remains of steps leading to an observation post in the tower may still be seen.

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Private Charles Dunn, 42nd Battalion AIF

Charles Dunn was born on 10 March 1898 in Caterham Valley, Surrey, England, to William and Emily Dunn.

Author: Australian War Memorial

Tents of the Rutherford AIF training camp, NSW, 1916

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Private Ernie Coyle, 33rd Battalion & Corporal Joe Coyle, 19th Battalion

Ernie Coyle was born in 1891 to Dominick and Charlotte Coyle.

Author: Australian War Memorial

Port Moresby, New Guinea. 1942. The headquarters of the Anti-Aircraft defences New Guinea Force.

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Private Thomas Percy Laintoll, 113th Convalescent Depot, Second Australian Imperial Force

Thomas Laintoll was born on 22 January 1912 to James and Catherine Laintoll in Kapunda in South Australia’s Barossa Valley region.

Author: Australian War Memorial

Looking north to Hill 971 from a ridge 100 yards north of Hill 100. The head of Kaiajik Dere is in the foreground showing the extremely rough country the 4th Australian Infantry Brigade had to cross in the attack on Hill 971 on 7 August 1915. One of a series of photographs taken on the Gallipoli Peninsula under the direction of Captain C E W Bean of The Australian Historical Mission, during the months of February and March, 1919.

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Corporal Alfred James Davidge, 15th Battalion

Alfred Davidge was born in 1885 in Harrow, England, to James and Harriet Davidge. He attended school locally, and in 1905 came to Australia aboard the Afric.

Author: Australian War Memorial

Henry St Eloy D'Alton, 1914. Credit: Virtual War Memorial

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Private Henry St Eloy D'Alton, 8th Australian Infantry Battalion

Known to friends and family as “Harry”, Henry D'Alton was born on the 10th of April 1888 at Nhill, Victoria.

Author: Australian War Memorial

Hughes, NT. 25 April 1943. Lockheed Hudson aircraft from No. 2 Squadron RAAF in flight en route across the Timor Sea to attack Japanese installations.

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Corporal Roy Ernest Andrews, No. 2 Squadron, Royal Australian Air Force

Roy Andrews was born on 25 March 1916, to Ernest and Myrtle Andrews of Portland, Victoria.

Author: Australian War Memorial

Studio portrait of 1024 Private (Pte) Joseph Thomas Young, 25th Battalion from Chatsworth Island, NSW, 1915

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Private Joseph Thomas Young, 25th Battalion, AIF

Joseph Young, known as “Joe”, was born in 1897, the eldest child in the large family of Tom and Jessie Young.

Author: Australian War Memorial

Studio portrait of 402522 Sergeant (later Flight Sergeant (Flt Sgt)) John McAulay Morrison, 452 Squadron RAAF (later 75 Squadron RAAF), of Grafton, NSW

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Flight Sergeant John McAulay Morrison, No. 75 Squadron, RAAF

John “Jack” Morrison was born on the 1st of February 1918 in Lismore, New South Wales, the son of Daniel and Margaret Morrison.

Author: Australian War Memorial

Personnel of No. 467 (Lancaster) Squadron RAAF receiving instructions on the Type 'J' aerial switch, 1942

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Flight Sergeant Arthur Hedley Jenkins, No. 467 Squadron

Arthur Hedley Jenkins was born on 25 February 1924 in Ulmarra, near Grafton in New South Wales.

Author: Australian War Memorial