In the days before mass communication, news from the front often came from the soldiers themselves. Judging by the amount of letters uncovered, this role of "reporter" seemed to fit easily. The Great Search uncovered many first hand descriptions of events told by people who often suffered unbelievable hardships. What does it say about us, when Gallipoli our most defining moment as a nation was a failure? That we learn from history?

That we are not vengeful? That we are mostly unwitting participants in other people's battles?

TROOPS FIRST TO TRY ARMOUR IN WWI

NAME: Hugh Anderson

DATE: 1917

UNIT: 1st Brigade AIF

LOCATION: France, Belgium

Hugh Anderson was one of the first Australian soldiers to try out the new armour developed to help protect the troops.
 

THE BATTLE FOR LONE PINE

NAME: Hugh Anderson

DATE: 1915

UNIT: 1st Brigade AIF

LOCATION: Lone Pine, Gallipoli

The battle for Lone Pine, involving the Australian 1st Brigade plus two other battalions, was a crushing victory for the Australians but at a horrendous cost to both sides.
 

HUGH ANDERSON'S LETTERS BRING THE HORRORS OF WAR TO LIFE

NAME: Hugh Anderson

DATE: 1915 - 1917

UNIT: 1st Brigade AIF

LOCATION: Gallipoli, France

Hugh Anderson was a prolific letter writer. Throughout his time in Gallipoli and France, and when in hospital, first in Greece and later in England, he wrote regularly to his mother and father and to other relatives with vivid descriptions of places he had visited and the horrendous fighting in which he had been involved.
 

TROOPER MEETS UP WITH A HORSE FROM HOME

NAME: Geoffrey Armstrong

DATE: 1915 - 1918

UNIT: 4th Light Horse Brigade

LOCATION: Gallipoli, Middle East

Life is full of coincidences but when Trooper Geoffrey Huie Armstrong helped to unload Australian-bred horses in the Middle East after the Gallipoli campaign, he certainly did not expect to find one from his home town, let alone from the very station on which he was born.
 

THE BOY FROM THE BUSH HITS CAIRO

NAME: Geoffrey  Armstrong

DATE: 1915 - 1918

UNIT: 11th Light Horse Regment, 4th Light Horse Brigade

LOCATION: Gallipoli, Middle East

Trooper Geoffrey Armstrong was a boy from the bush, so wandering the streets of Cairo must have been a strange and fascinating experience for him.
 

FATHER NEVER RETURNED FOR PROMISED TEA PARTY

NAME: Joseph  Atkinson

DATE: 1916 - 1917

UNIT: 26th Battalion AIF

LOCATION: Europe

Joseph Atkinson was a religious man who loved to sing. When he left for war in November 1916, he was 47 years old and had a wife, two daughters and a young son.
 

LETTERS AN IMPORTANT PART OF A SOLDIER'S LIFE

NAME: Fred  Ball

DATE: 1916 - 1917

UNIT: 30th Battalion AIF

LOCATION: France, Belgium

For most soldiers in World War I letters were an important part of their life. Many wrote long accounts of battles and complained when mail from home didn't reach them.
 

MAJOR NAT BARTON MENTIONED IN DESPATCHES

NAME: Nat Barton

DATE: 1914 - 1918

UNIT: 7th Light Horse Regiment

LOCATION: Gallipoli, France, Belgium

Nat Barton was born at Wellington in 1894, the third son of Charles and Annie Barton. He spent most of his life growing up on their property, Nanima, close to Wellington, which his parents had bought in 1894.
 

A DOCTOR'S VIEW OF GALLIPOLI LANDINGS

NAME: Vivian Benjafield

DATE: 1915-1918

UNIT: Australian Army Medical Corps

LOCATION: Gallipoli, Middle East and England

Major Vivien Benjafield of the Australian Army Medical Corps became something of a legend in his own lifetime. He served throughout World War I as a surgeon and administrator in Gallipoli, on hospital ships, in Alexandria and later in England before being invalided back to Australia.
 

HAD FINGER AMPUTATED TO PASS THE MEDICAL

NAME: Isaac Henry Betteridge

DATE: 1917 - 1918

UNIT: 23rd Battalion AIF

LOCATION: France

Private Isaac Henry (Harry) Betteridge was pretty determined to go to war but when he volunteered in 1916, he was turned down on medical grounds because of a deformed small finger.