Prime Minister opens Anzac memorial in Maryborough

2018-07-21

Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull was in Maryborough today for the official opening of Walk With the Anzacs – Gallipoli to Armistice, a memorial establishing an informative, inspiring and emotive tribute to the original Anzacs of World War I.

He joined Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk and Fraser Coast Mayor George Seymour in officially opening the complex built through a three-way federal-state-council funding package.

Dignitaries representing Britain, New Zealand, Belgium and Turkey; Australian War Museum director Brendan Nelson; and senior military officers were also at the launch of the unique $5 million complex.

Tracing the journey of Anzacs through the Great War, the modern memorial includes the whispered stories of soldiers, weathered steel columns rising as high as 8m to represent the cliffs of Gallipoli and ironbark representations of the three first boats to land at Anzac Cove.

At the heart of the amazing tribute is a statue of Maryborough-born Duncan Chapman, the first man to set foot on the beach at Gallipoli.

The Queens Park Military Trail Project Committee has been the driving force behind the memorial.

Committee president Nancy Bates said it was a fitting way to remember the sacrifice of Australians during the conflict and to help everyone understand our involvement in the war.

“People can get an overall perspective of events in World War I and also get personal views, often surprising, of men on the front line who wrote so many letters home,” she said.

“It’s an incredibly moving, sometimes confronting, memorial that’s not only meaningful to the people of the Fraser Coast and to Queenslanders but it’s also important to us as a nation and to our allies.”

Ms Bates said the memorial had been funded by local, State and Federal governments with strong backing from the local community.

“Hundreds of people in the city have contributed to giving the country a stunning new memorial that will bring us closer to understanding the journey of the original Anzacs,” she said.

The memorial is part of a wider military trail that stretches around the region from Tiaro in the south to Brooweena in the west, Howard in the north and Fraser Island in the east.

For more information, visit frasercoastmilitarytrail.com.

ENDS

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