The ANZAC spirit
is alive and well and exemplified in the attendance of Maurie Smith who
suffered a fall recently and sustained two broken ribs. Most of you will know
that is a very painful experience and the discomfort lingers for some time.
Maurie was determined to spend this important day with his mates, and soldiered
on well, although he did try to avoid too much laughter.
The RSL laid
down an edict for this year’s march that all WW2 veterans would have to travel
in cars. This was to avoid delays during the march over past years as veterans struggled
to keep up with the pace. Well, they needed a sub-clause “except for Frank Sims”
because Frank marched once again and displayed no ill effects from the
exercise. In fact he was able to give a TV interview immediately after the
march as you will see in a separate post.
A sobering
statistic from our Patron AVM Peter Scully (Rtd.) that Australian Airmen in
Europe represented over 30% of total Australian casualties in WW2. This
supports the view that the contribution of Australian Airmen in WW2 does not
receive sufficient consideration.
Member Bryan
Wilcockson sent us this message from the UK yesterday “ Good morning - I'm in
Melbourne (UK) and dressed ready for the ANZAC day march, but there's no sign
of the Friends bus?”
Unfortunately
our bus didn’t get to the UK but we will try again next year Bryan.
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