Anzac Memorial

About

The Anzac Memorial is a heritage-listed war memorial, museum and monument located in Hyde Park South near Liverpool Street in the CBD of Sydney, Australia. The Art Deco monument was designed by C. Bruce Dellit, with the exterior adorned with monumental figural reliefs and sculptures by Rayner Hoff, and built from 1932 to 1934 by Kell & Rigby. This state-owned property was added to the New South Wales State Heritage Register on 23 April 2010. The memorial is the focus of commemoration ceremonies on Anzac Day, Remembrance Day and other important occasions. It was built as a memorial to the Australian Imperial Force of World War I. Fund raising for a memorial began on 25 April 1916, the first anniversary of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC) landing at Anzac Cove for the Battle of Gallipoli. It was opened on 24 November 1934 by Prince Henry, Duke of Gloucester. In 2018, refurbishments and a major expansion were completed. The memorial was officially reopened by Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex.

Material in rock shelters reveals that Aboriginal people inhabited the Sydney Harbour area from at least 25,000 years ago. The Gadigal, who formed part of the Darug nation, were the Aboriginal traditional owners of the inner Sydney area, upon which the Anzac Memorial stands. It is believed that the southern end of Hyde Park, where the ANZAC Memorial is located, was used as a "contest ground" for staging combative trials between Aboriginal warriors, watched avidly by the British in the early days of the colony. It is remarkable that the State's most grand and monumental war memorial should be positioned on this historical site of indigenous combat.

The term "Anzac" began as an acronym for the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps in World War I, but it was soon accepted as a word in its own right. The Anzacs formed part of the expeditionary force organised by Britain and France to invade the Gallipoli Peninsula and clear the Dardanelles Straits for the British Royal Navy. The Australian Anzacs represented the national effort from a young nation taking its part in the Great War and reports of the courage they displayed at Gallipoli became the most enduring legend of Australian military history ( Government Architect's CMP, 2007).

After the withdrawal from Gallipoli, the Anzac infantry divisions went on to fight against Germany on the Western Front. The Light Horse fought to protect the Suez Canal against the Turks and joined the forces fighting in the Middle East. On the anniversary of Anzac Day in 1918, the Australian infantry reinforced the legend when it stopped the German advance at Villers-Bretonneux on the Somme. Australians were successfully used as shock troops at Ypres, Amiens, Mont St Quentin and Peronne, and took a leading part in breaking through the Hindenburg Line, in their last major offensive.

From an Australian population of around four and a half million, enlistments in the army and navy numbered 416,809, a total that represents one-half of the men of military age in Australia at that time. Altogether, 60,000 Australians were killed and 167,000 were injured, a higher toll proportionately than was suffered by any other British Empire country. Small wonder that those who returned wanted to see the sacrifice of their dead comrades remembered.

The first Anzac Day in NSW was organised by a committee within the Returned Soldiers Association (RSA) of NSW, an organisation formed by men who had been invalided home. Later the organisation was subsumed by the Returned Soldiers' Sailors' (and Airmen's) Imperial League of Australia (RSSILA), finally named the Returned and Services League (RSL). The original objectives of the day of commemoration were to remember dead comrades, induce young men to enlist and collect money for an ANZAC Memorial monument. NSW Premier WA Holman's Labor government promised a pound for pound subsidy to match the money raised on the first Anzac Day. In 1917 the RSSILA requested that 25 April be declared 'Australia's National Day' and gazetted as a public holiday. Both the Queensland and Australian governments made Anzac Day a public holiday in 1921. The official public holiday was first gazetted in NSW in 1925.

Developing the memorial concept in Australia

Historian Ken Inglis believes that the "war memorial" is a twentieth century concept which memorialised the human cost of war rather than the victorious outcome, as the former military monuments had done, and celebrated the sacrifice of ordinary soldiers rather than focusing on the men who led them. The names of those who made the ultimate sacrifice are differentiated from the names of those who returned. Whether returned or not, the memorials record the soldiers' service to the nation. This trend to list both the returned and the fallen was uniquely Australian, reflecting the all volunteer nature of the Australian forces.

Each capital city developed its own major memorial, with many smaller memorials in the suburbs, and regional areas. The major memorials and their dates of construction are as follows:

- State War Memorial Cenotaph, Perth – 1928–1929

- Shrine of Remembrance, Brisbane – 1930

- National War Memorial, Adelaide – 1931

- Shrine of Remembrance, Melbourne – 1928–1934

- Australian War Memorial, Canberra – 1941 The earlier memorials are generally in the form of obelisks, sometimes with applied sculpture, while most of the later examples are commemorative buildings with a range of rooms and uses. The social meanings of war memorials increased in complexity as time went on. The later examples such as the Shrine of Remembrance in Melbourne, 1934, the ANZAC Memorial in Sydney, 1934 and the Australian War Memorial in Canberra, 1941, represented the new trends in the symbolism of memorials more than the simple columns, obelisks and statues of citizen soldiers erected during the fighting and immediately after it. The Shrine of Remembrance in Melbourne is the most comparable monument to the ANZAC Memorial in Australia, both comprising one principal commemorative space, surrounded and above a series of administrative and exhibition spaces, contained within an imposing landmark building in differing architectural styles, set within a formal landscape.

In 1918 the RSSILA in 1918 published its aims for the monument:

- The building was to be a memorial for those who died;

- It was to be architecturally worthy of its high purpose;

- It was to provide headquarters for those working to assist widows and children of those who were killed and also, those AIF members who returned;

- It was to house the records of the AIF;

- It would be a meeting place and a source of assistance with repatriation; and