Anzac Day 2012
02 May 2012
April 25th is Anzac Day, when Australians and New Zealanders
mark the anniversary of the first landing on the Gallipoli peninsula in
1915.
Two divisions of the new Australian and New Zealand Army Corps
were joined by British, French and Indian troops in the first
assault, but the hostile terrain and ferocious Turkish defence
meant the invasion was doomed to fail.
By the time of the evacuation, at the end of the year, 36,000
Commonwealth, 10,000 French and 86,000 Turkish troops were
dead.
97 years later ANZAC Day is marked at ceremonies all over the
world, as Australians and New Zealanders remember their fallen from
the two world wars and other conflicts.
Photographs of 2012 commemorations are available on our Facebook page. There is also an album of photographs from the Gallipoli
commemorations.
One of the biggest ceremonies is at Villers Bretonneux on the
Somme in France, the site of the Australian National
Memorial.
The commemoration includes a service at dawn, recitations, the
sounding of the last post and a period of silence.
In Belgium the ceremonies include ones at Tyne Cot Cemetery and
the Messines Ridge
(NZ) Memorial.
In the United Kingdom, there are ceremonies at the Cenotaph in
London, and the Scottish War Memorial in Edinburgh, as well as a
number of other sites including Harefield (St Mary)
Churchyard
in Buckinghamshire and Codford St Mary
Churchyard in Wiltshire.