March 2017

Anzac Day commemorations will begin on the evening of Sunday 23 April with the projection onto the Memorial building of images of Australian servicemen and servicewomen drawn from the Memorial’s rich photographic collection. These projections will run again on 24 April until the start of the Dawn Service.

In close cooperation with the Returned and Services League of Australia ACT, will host the following:
•Dawn Service
•National Ceremony
•Last Post Ceremony

The daily Last Post Ceremony will start at 4.45 pm in the Commemorative Area. All members of the public are welcome to attend this special ceremony concluding the Memorial’s Anzac Day commemorations of the landings on Gallipoli.  It is anticipated that there will be a greater than normal number of people attending the Last Post Ceremony, so additional viewing screens will be placed outside the Memorial entrance for members of the public to view the proceedings. The ceremony will also be broadcast live online.

The Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commemorative Ceremony will be held after the Dawn Service at the Aboriginal Memorial plaque, a short walk from the base of Mount Ainslie.

The Mephisto is the rarest tank in the world. To commemorate the centenary of the First World War, the Australian War Memorial collaborated with the Queensland Museum to display Mephisto outside Brisbane for the first time since it was transported from Europe after the end of the First World War.

This First World War German tank is currently on display until the end of May, when it will be returned to the Queensland Museum.  Be sure to visit us in Canberra to see Mephisto for yourself. Free talks are held at 1.30pm on the following Thursdays:16 March, 30 March, 13 April, 27 April, 11 May and 25 May.

Visit the Memorial with family and friends for a moving and unforgettable experience. See our events page for the many public programs scheduled throughout the month, including;

Pigeons at war

“Mephisto” in the archives

From HMVS Victoria to HMAS Parramatta

Military family history information sessions: where do I start?

Art of the First World War

The Spirit of Anzac Centenary Experience is the flagship event of the national Centenary of Anzac program. Over 200 artefacts from the Memorial’s National Collection are included in the exhibition.

The exhibition has been out on tour for 18 months and has visited every state in Australia. With the close of the 20th location in Geelong, visitor numbers have reached nearly 300,000.

In the next two months the exhibition will travel to Orange, where it will be on display from 12 to 17 March, before moving on to Newcastle and ending the tour in Sydney in April.

For more details on exhibition dates, and to book tickets, visit www.spiritofanzac.gov.au/

Last month the Memorial unveiled a new collection item: a rare manuscript written by former prisoner of war Sir Alexander Russell Downer KBE. The book titled ‘Government in Two Worlds: An Introductory Survey of the Governments of Britain and Australia’ was written by Alexander ‘Alick’ Downer during his captivity as a prisoner of war in Changi, Singapore.

A lawyer before the war, Alick Downer, enlisted with the 2/14th Field Regiment and served as a gunner. Following the surrender of Singapore on 15 February 1942, Downer along with close to 15,000 other Australians, was marched into the old British Barracks at Changi where he was to be a prisoner of war until war’s end.

Issue 77 of Wartime, “Axis ascendant”, covers the critical early years of the Second World War. In this period the German Blitzkrieg seemed unstoppable as it swept into France and northern Europe. In the Pacific, the Japanese landed in Malaya a few hours before bombing Pearl Harbor. The subsequent desperate fighting by Allied forces failed to halt the Japanese drive to Singapore, where thousands were captured, raising fears of an invasion in Australia.
Meanwhile, Hitler’s invasion of the Soviet Union was bogged down. Japanese military planners were at odds with each other, and missed opportunities at Pearl Harbor. All these stories and more are covered through gripping narratives and skilled historical analysis.

Visit our website to purchase your copy.

Our special Friends-only activities offer an insider’s view of the Memorial’s exhibitions and galleries. These activities include behind-the-scenes tours and talks by the Memorial’s historians and curators.

See our website for more information on how to join our Friends of the Memorial program.