The Story of the M1 Garand: The Iconic and Influential World War 2 Weapon
Reading time: 7 minutes
Called the “greatest battle implement ever devised”, the M1 Garand semi-automatic rifle served the USA well during WW2 and beyond.
Twelve days at Anzac: the evacuation
Over one hundred years ago, one of the most remarkable operations in military history occurred at the Dardanelles with the evacuation in December 1915 of 83,000 Australian, New Zealand, British and Indian troops from the Gallipoli Peninsula without a single loss of life. It will, as, one contemporary German correspondent reporting from the Turkish lines exclaimed, ‘stand before the eyes of all strategists as a hitherto unattained masterpiece’.
In their own words: letters from ANZACs during the Gallipoli evacuation
Just five days before Christmas, in the early hours of Monday December 20, 1915, the last Anzac troops left Gallipoli in what Australian historian Joan Beaumont called an “elaborate game of deception”. […]
Who were we fighting at Gallipoli?
In the annual discussion of the Gallipoli campaign Australians are subjected to a variety of hyperbole and parable as commentators and reporters offer up the same old chestnuts for want […]
Lemnos and Gallipoli Revealed – Podcast
Over the course of 1915, most of the 50,000 Australian personnel who served at Gallipoli passed through the island of Lemnos. Centring his attention on the Australian experience of the island, historian Jim Claven shares unique and humanising insights into the Gallipoli campaign.
Frederick Lanchester and why quantity has a quality all of its own
Reading time: 5 minutes
Lanchester turned his mind to the subject of aerial warfare. In particular, he realised that the nature of war in the air—a novelty at the time—was fundamentally different to that of the slaughter underway on the ground below.
The War in the Skies: How The First World War Changed Aviation
Reading time: 6 minutes
When the first world war broke out in 1914, flying was still in its infancy. It had been eleven years since the Wright brothers had taken to the skies in the first motorised flight. Very little had been done in advancing aviation since then. In the four years of war, however, the world saw aviation take major leaps forward, so much so that these advancements are still at the core of flying today.
100 years later, why don’t we commemorate the victims and heroes of ‘Spanish flu’?
Reading time: 5 minutes
ous Rookwood Cemetery, a lichen-spotted headstone captures a family’s double burden of grief.
he grave contains the remains of 19-year-old Harriet Ann Ottaway, who died on 2 July 1919. Its monument also commemorates her brother Henry James Ottaway, who “died of wounds in Belgium, 23rd Sept 1917, aged 21 years”.
A History of the Great War, Volume One – Audiobook
A HISTORY OF THE GREAT WAR, VOLUME ONE – AUDIOBOOK By John Buchan (1875 – 1940) This is the first of a four-volume history of the First World War, covering the […]
Losing the war in an afternoon: Jutland 1916
1916 was the pivotal year in the First World War. In February German forces attacked the French at Verdun, while 1 July will mark the anniversary of the Anglo-French offensive on the Somme.
A History of the Great War, Volume One – Audiobook
A History of the Great War, Volume One – AUDIOBOOK By John Buchan (1875 – 1940) This is the first of a four-volume history of the First World War, covering […]
The A.E.F.: With General Pershing and the American Forces – Audiobook
THE A.E.F.: WITH GENERAL PERSHING AND THE AMERICAN FORCES – AUDIOBOOK By Heywood Broun (1888 – 1939) In 1917, the American Expeditionary Forces (AEF) arrived in Europe to fight alongside the […]
People dropped whisky into their noses to treat Spanish flu. Here’s what else they took that would raise eyebrows today
PEOPLE DROPPED WHISKY INTO THEIR NOSES TO TREAT SPANISH FLU. HERE’S WHAT ELSE THEY TOOK THAT WOULD RAISE EYEBROWS TODAY We’re researching COVID-19 in a fast-paced world with new data becoming available all the […]
First World War Centenary Prose Collection Vol. III – Audiobook
FIRST WORLD WAR CENTENARY PROSE COLLECTION VOL. III – AUDIOBOOK By Various. This collection of non-fiction and fiction pieces is the third volume commemorating the First World War. The majority […]
First World War Centenary Prose Collection Vol. I – Audiobook
FIRST WORLD WAR CENTENARY PROSE COLLECTION VOL. I – AUDIOBOOK By Various This collection of non-fiction and fiction, with its companion poetry collection, commemorates the outbreak of the First World War […]
The Australian Flying Corps, 1917–18
THE AUSTRALIAN FLYING CORPS, 1917–18 By 1917, the men of the Australian Flying Corps’ No. 1 Squadron had been fighting in the Middle East for almost two years. Now Australia’s airmen […]
Australia’s Great War in the air
AUSTRALIA’S GREAT WAR IN THE AIR In January 1911, the Australian government announced its intention to form a flying corps to support the Army. Over the next few years men […]
1917: our costliest year at war
1917: OUR COSTLIEST YEAR AT WAR A century ago, in early 1917, Australian troops had already seen heavy fighting, on Gallipoli in 1915 and even more on the Western Front […]
Walking with the Diggers
WALKING WITH THE DIGGERS The Centenary Commemoration of the Great War continues to unearth real treasures from our military history, none more mesmerising than this Exhibition of photographs taken by […]
The German naval threat in the Indo-Pacific 1914–15
Among the flood of centenary anniversaries and commemorations, one that slipped past without comment was the destruction of the German cruiser Konigsberg in East Africa on 11 July 1915. Although less well-known […]
After Jutland: the North Sea operations of 18–19 August 1916
One of the Great War’s abiding myths is that the German High Sea Fleet never emerged again after the Battle of Jutland to face the Grand Fleet until the ignominious […]
‘Cheese-eating surrender monkeys’? It’s time to give the French Army the credit it deserves
When marking the centenary of the terrible events of 1917, some of the most devastating of World War I, it is perhaps understandable that the British have focused their attention […]
‘I want to scream and scream’: Australian nurses on the Western Front were also victims of war
The revival of interest in Anzac since the 1980s has depended in part on the repositioning of soldiers as victims. We rarely celebrate their martial virtues, and instead note their […]
Peter Weir’s Gallipoli 40 years on: deftly directed and still devastating
With the release of the first-world-war film Gallipoli in 1981, director Peter Weir could finally shrug off the nickname he had laboured under since making his first films: “Peter Weird”. Idiosyncratic work like Homesdale […]