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They Served with Honour by Aleeyah Graves (Year 10)


Aleeyah Graves (Year 10) was selected to enter the Premier’s ANZAC Student Tour Competition with her short story They Served with Honour, reflecting on the commemoration of war. Although she was not selected among the final ten students from across the State, her work showcased the depth of talent within our student body. We congratulate Aleeyah on her outstanding effort and achievement.


 

There is a quiet hush in the exhibition. People stroll about, weaving between the artworks, choosing their favourites, observing and commenting.  


“The brushwork on this one is incredible.”


“Wow. He really managed to capture the atmosphere.”


They wear expressions of admiration, noticing the details, and recognising the time and thought and talent that went into each one. I wander through, admiring the intricate paintings, delicate sculptures and detailed drawings. Each piece tells a story. Sometimes, this isn’t easy to see. But the longer you look, the more things come together, make sense.


My eyes are drawn to a beautiful painting of oranges, blues and yellows, colours of the land, of nature. Red poppies, each with a dark black centre, are superimposed on the background. In the centre of the painting is a soldier. His proud, stoical face is partially shadowed by his hat. His weapon rests against his shoulders.


I take a step back. The soldier is immersed amongst the poppies.


I am suddenly brought back to history class, where the accounts of the ANZACs always absorb me. Stories of heroism, suffering and hardship faced by our soldiers. Sometimes, I find it hard to believe that these stories are true. Their endurance is the stuff of legends.


•  •  •

 

The poppies waited to unfurl; their buds closed against the pre-dawn cold and darkness, oblivious to the fear that flooded through the group of soldiers as they prepared for the command that they knew was coming. Fear squeezed the men’s lungs until they felt as though they were drowning. Dread and despair made them gasp for air.


This would be the end of the line. This wasn’t the adventure that they had hoped for. This wasn’t what they had signed up for. This was hell.


War was hell.   


They turned their faces to the sun that had just crept over the edge of their trench. It shone its rays of warmth and familiarity onto the soldiers’ skin, bringing them a little calm. As the world around them brightened, their terror subsided a little.


There was always hope. What did their commander always say? Where there is Life there is Hope.


Out in no man’s land, the sun’s rays reached the poppies, brick-red turning to bright, shining scarlet. They seemed to shimmer in the sunlight like the red tails of the black cockatoos that filled the skies of home, adorning the tall jarrah trees with their bursts of colour. In the desolate space of no man’s land, between the shattered trees and the cruel strands of broken barbed wire, in the shell craters and churned earth, oblivious to the dank smell of decay and death, the poppies danced, jewels in the sunshine.


To the ANZACs, heads above the parapet, tense with waiting, this was Mother Nature’s last gift. Vibrant life amidst hell. Beauty when you least expected it.


None of the soldiers moved. They wished they could remain here, suspended in this moment, filled with the sense of peace and possibility.


The men readied themselves. Over the crest of the enemy trenches, they saw the Germans’ steel helmets glinting in the sun.


Shrill, insistent, the whistle blew.


“Fix bayonets!”


Up, up, up and over the parapet. They stumbled through no man’s land, over discarded ammunition and broken shells, through sucking mud, through the terrible clutch of barbed wire, through red poppies. Thoughts of home drove them on. Thoughts of pounding surf and shrill cockatoos.


The ANZAC soldiers had grown close to one another, as close as brothers. Brothers look out for each other. Mateship drove them on. Soon every soldier was advancing through the mire, through the poppies, weapons clasped tightly in their arms.


It was as clear as the shining morning sun that the ANZACs didn’t stand a chance.


A hail of bullets and shells ripped into them, and yet they never slowed. They ran until bullets pierced into flesh, ripped into arms, into legs, into heads, into hearts.


Then you heard their screams as they begged to God for mercy; as they prayed for their families and wept for their mothers, as they cried for their wives and sweethearts and sobbed for their children.


The ground ran scarlet with blood. Blood from the ANZAC brothers.


The poppies danced on.


•  •  •


The poppies dance in the painting. All thirteen of them.


I look down at the artist’s statement.


Peter Farmer had written: “They served with honour. The 13 poppies are for those 13 Noongar men who fought alongside their white brothers in the 1st World War.  But on their return home, they were not recognised. They went back to being black.”


I stare at the painting, in awe of the artist’s ability to tell a story. I think of what the Noongar soldiers had faced. Hell in War. Hell when they came home.


These soldiers fought to the bitter end. Some never came home. The others came back to a society that didn’t recognise them.


From brothers to enemies. They were ignored while their white compatriots were applauded and celebrated as heroes.


The 1st World War – Australians’ “baptism of fire”.  Our coming of age on the world stage. But not for all. These soldiers were back to being black.


Shame overwhelms me.


It is said that poppies bloom, in even the most difficult conditions. Even in mud, in shelled earth and in bomb craters. Even in a hellscape.


I stand looking at the thirteen poppies in the painting. Thinking how Peter Farmer has used his talent as a commemoration for his people. Wondering if this artwork will become part of the Dreamtime that keeps alive a proud history. Considering the importance of passing on stories to young people like me. Seeing in the poppies the resilience of the Noongar men, who fought and died for their country, who were not recognised, but still continue to bloom.


I stand looking at the thirteen poppies in the painting, knowing that they served with honour.


                                                                  •  •  •

 


Artist Peter Farmer with his painting commissioned for:

They Served With Honour: An Exhibition. (Supplied: Edith Cowan University).

 

Bibliography list


Australian Army (2024). The Ode, by Robert Laurence Binyon (1869-1943). https://www.army.gov.au/about-us/history-and-research/traditions/ode 


Australians on the Western Front. (2006). Australian Government Department of Veterans’ Affairs.


Beaumont, J. (2020). The Anzac Legend. In Australia's War 1914-18 (pp. 149-180). Routledge.


Bull, S. (2014). The Old Front Line: The Centenary of the Western Front in Pictures. CaseMate.


Department of Aboriginal Affairs Community Development Directorate, (2019). They Served With Honour Book: Untold Stories of Western Australian Aboriginal Servicemen at Gallipoli. https://www.dlgsc.wa.gov.au/department/publications/publication/they-served-with-honour 


Eldridge, J. (2014). 50 Things You Should Know About the First World War. Books and Gifts Direct.


Monument Australia (2010). Conflict: World War One. https://monumentaustralia.org.au/

 

Saxby, C. (2014). Meet the ANZAC’s. Penguin Random House Australia.


Willmott, HP. (2012). World War I. Dorling Kindersley Limited.


Wynne, E., (2016). Unknown stories of WA’s Aboriginal Anzacs highlighted in Perth exhibition. ABC News. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-04-28/aboriginal-anzacs-from-gallipoli-recognised-in-book-and-exhibit/7367718

 

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