November 12, 2015
Remembrance Day in Yarraman shone a spotlight on the sacrifices made by one local family, who have four names engraved on the town’s War Memorial.
The Nash family, from Yarraman Creek, lost two brothers in World War I: Jim and Tom. Two more brothers, Alfred and Sid, served in World War II but fortunately lived to return home.
Marjorie Jurgensen, from the Gold Coast, led a mini-family reunion back to Yarraman on Wednesday to honour these four brothers, her uncles.
The family had also intended to donate a large, framed display of photographs of Alfred and Sid to the Yarraman RSL Sub-Branch to form a part of the RSL’s new permanent photographic exhibition.
But they were in for a surprise when Sub-Branch president Terry Reid took to the stage later in the day at the Yarraman Community Hall.
He called Marj and her son Arthur up and handed back the family photographs in a carefully restored almost 100-year-old frame.
“They belong back with the family,” Terry said.
Instead of keeping the photos, the RSL Sub-Branch decided to take copies and then send the historic original frame out for restoration as a special “thank you” to the family.
The photos of Jim and Tom Nash, and their service records, are now among the 40 lining the walls of the Yarraman Memorial Hall (see below).
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At Yarraman Memorial
A large crowd gathered at the Yarraman War Memorial for the traditional ceremony that marks the moment that the guns fell silent in Europe at 11:00am on November 11, 1918.
Lachlan Davies and Reba Collins, from Yarraman P-9 School, read a pray and poem at the start of the proceedings.
Compere Terry Reid then shared some sobering statistics in his address.
“More than 102,000 Australians have lost their lives defending the freedoms and values we so often take for granted,” Mr Reid said.
- Boer War – 16,000 men went to South Africa; 588 were killed.
- World War I – 324,000 men and women sent overseas; more than 61,500 died; 161,811 were battle casualties and 87,865 sick from other causes. Nearly 6000 Australians were killed or wounded in just one day at Fromelles.
- World War II – Almost a million men and women served; 39,761 did not return home and more than 8000 died as prisoners-of-war.
- Korea – 339 Australians died and more than 1500 wounded.
- Vietnam – Almost 60,000 Australians served, 521 died and more than 3000 wounded.
- Afghanistan – More than 20,000 men and women served; 40 killed and 260 wounded.
(These figures exclude all the other conflicts Australians have been involved in, including the Malayan Emergency, Indonesian Konfrontation and multiple peacekeeping missions.
“The sadness and the memories of war and its meaning can only really live inside those who served and in the homes that sacrificed,” Terry said
“But that is no excuse to forget.
“Every Australian should remember and thank those who left the security of Australia and gave up their jobs, family, friends and other loved ones to live with mud, heat, rain and disease; to eat bad food; to carry great weights and to live with the daily risk of maiming or death from bullet, grenade, shell, mine, gas or bayonet.
“They toughed it out when their mates and comrades were torn apart, and hung in there until it was over … over there, so it didn’t end up over here.”
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At Yarraman Community Hall
After the ceremony at the Memorial, the crowd moved up the hill for the official unveiling of the permanent display of portraits of Yarraman World War I soldiers which now line the walls of the Yarraman Memorial Hall.
Sub-Branch president Terry Reid said service records for 76 of the 94 soldiers listed on town’s 1919 Honour Board had been located. Photographs of 36 of these men were also tracked down.
He thanked the State Government for contributing $6500 from its Anzac Centenary Grant Program towards the project, while the Sub-Branch had raised another $2500.
“From 1914-18, men working and living in the Yarraman district volunteered to serve their new nation. Sixty per cent of those volunteers were either killed or wounded in action,” Mr Reid said.
In 1914, the total population of the Yarraman District was about 350; 94 men served in World War I. Of these, 20 died and 36 were wounded or injured. Fifteen pairs of brothers enlisted. Yarraman soldiers won five Military Medals and two were mentioned in despatches.
- Related article: Our Region Remembers
