ANZAC Day, a public holiday held in Australia on the 25th of April
each year commemorates the sacrifices of the serving personnel of Australia
since 1914.
The term ANZAC came into being in 1915 and stands for Australia and
New Zealand Army Corps. It became famous during the Gallipoli Campaign
where British and Commonwealth forces attempt to wrest control of the Gallipoli
Peninsula from the Turks in order to gain control of the Dardanelles.
It was not merely that 7600 Australians and nearly 2500
New Zealanders had been killed or mortally wounded there, and 24,000 more
(19,000 Australians and 5,000 New Zealanders) had been wounded, while fewer
than 100 were prisoners. But the standards set by the first companies at
the first call - by the stretcher-bearers, the medical officers, the staff,
the company leaders, the privates, the defaulters on the water barges,
the Light Horse at The Nek - this was already part of the tradition not
only of ANZAC but of the Australian and New Zealand peoples. By dawn on
20 December, ANZAC had faded into a dim blue line lost amid other hills
on the horizon as the ships took their human freight to Imbros, Lemnos
and Egypt. But ANZAC stood, and still stands, for reckless valour in a
good cause, for enterprise, resourcefulness, fidelity, comradeship and
endurance that will never own defeat.
Dr Bean
The term ANZAC continued to be used, in Palestine, France and later
again in WW2 in Greece in 1941. In Vietnam an Australian Regiment absorbed
two companies of New Zealand infantry and again incorporated the name ANZAC
into their Battalion names.
Tommorrow surviving returned servicemen and women and their families
from all of Australia's participation in conflicts march and commemorate
the sacrifices they made and of their fallen mates.
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