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| The Australian Pier Memorial following its unveiling. Photo Jim Claven 2018 |
Last month saw two major achievements by our Committee, working in concert with the authorities on Lemnos and in Australia.
These were the erection and unveiling Lemnos' new commemorative memorial to the Australian Pier and the announcement of the future creation of the Lemnos
Gallipoli Heritage Trail on Lemnos.
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| The Australian Pier Memorial Plaque, Lemnos. Photo Jim Claven 2018 |
The announcement took place following the unveiling on the 20th
April of the new memorial on Lemnos commemorating the Australian Pier near
Mudros. This Pier was built by Australian soldiers and engineers in March 1915
as part of the transformation of the Island into the advanced base for the
Gallipoli campaign.
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| Myself (left) and Mr Tarlamis (right) with Mr Giarmadouros, Sub-Prefect of the Northern Aegean. Photo Jim Claven 2018 |
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| The Lemnos Gallipoli Commemorative Committee delegation with Mr Marinakis, the Mayor of Lemnos. Photo Jim Claven 2018 |
In their joint announcement, Mr Evagelos Giarmadouros,
Sub-Prefect for the Northern Aegean, and Mr Lee Tarlamis, President of the
Lemnos Gallipoli Commemorative Committee, stated that the creation of this
heritage trail is a vital new step in not only commemorating Lemnos’ link to
the Gallipoli campaign but also in facilitating awareness of the link to a new
generation.
“Our Committee has
worked for many years to build awareness of the Lemnos’ link to Anzac in both
Australia and Greece. The creation of the Lemnos Gallipoli Heritage Trail will
be the culmination of this work and we look forward to working with the Lemnos
authorities to make this a reality,” Mr Tarlamis said from Lemnos.
Mr Giarmadouros said that the Trail would assist Australians
to walk in the footsteps of their forebears who came to Lemnos over 100 years
ago.
“The Lemnos Gallipoli
Heritage Trail will form a bridge between Australia and Greece – as well as
those from the other nations connected to the Gallipoli story – and build
greater understanding of our joint heritage. There are many bonds between
Lemnians and Australians and I know that this initiative will be welcomed both
on Lemnos and in Australia. I look forward to working together with the Lemnos
Gallipoli Commemorative Committee to bring this trail to a reality,” he
said.
The Committee will work with both the Prefecture of the Northern Aegean and the Municipality to make the new Lemnos Gallipoli Heritage Trail a reality.
This year’s Anzac commemorations on Lemnos took place on the
20th April. The commemorations were attended by over 200 people,
from both near and far. They were attended by the Australian Ambassador to
Greece, other consular and parliamentary dignitaries and senior representatives
of the Hellenic Armed forces. The latter included Vice Admiral Ioannis
Pavlopoulos, HN, Commander in Chief of the Hellenic Fleet, who travelled from
Athens for the event. Some of my photos of the commemorative service at East Mudros Military Cemetery and at Mudros Harbour are reproduced below.
A delegation of the Lemnos Gallipoli Commemorative Committee traveled from Australia to take part in the events. The delegation was led by
Mr Tarlamis and myself, and included Ms Deb Stewart, the grand-daughter of
Sister Evelyn Hutt who served on Lemnos in 1915, and Mr Malcolm MacDonald, who
has written about Second Lieutenant William Davis, a
former Victorian trade union official who served and died at Gallipoli.
The commemorations included a formal commemorative service at
East Mudros Military Cemetery, a short service at Mudros’ harbour-side Anzac
memorial, a historical presentation by Dr. Vassiliki Chryssanthopoulou and a
visit to the impressive Lemnos Gallipoli display at the Maritime Museum at
Mudros. Mr Tarlamis laid the wreath of the Lemnos Gallipoli Commemorative
Committee during the service at East Mudros.
However the main feature of this year’s event was the
unveiling of the Australian Pier Memorial, at Aghios Pavlos, north of Mudros.
The proposal to build this new Memorial grew out of my own research into the
story of the Australian Pier and its erection was jointly funded by the
Victorian Government, the Prefecture of the Northern Aegean, the Municipality
of Lemnos and the Lemnos Gallipoli Commemorative Committee.
I became aware of the story of Lemnos' Australian Pier as a result of my
researches through the archives into Lemnos' link to Anzac and the
Gallipoli campaign of 1915. The story of the pier is recounted in a
short article which I wrote and which was published in Australia's
national Greek community newspaper Neos Kosmos. I produced a special
brochure on the story of the pier for the unveiling ceremony. You can
view and download a copy of the brochure by clicking here.
At the invitation
of the local authorities, Mr Tarlamis gave the keynote address at the Memorial
immediately prior to its unveiling.To read Mr Tarlamis' address at the unveiling, please click here. The Australian Pier memorial was unveiled by Her Excellency
the Ambassador to Greece Ms Kate Logan, assisted by the consular
representatives of New Zealand, Canada and France as well as representatives of
the Prefecture of the Northern Aegean and the Municipality of Lemnos and Mr Tarlamis. Also
present were representatives of the Hellenic Parliament and Mr Khalil Eideh,
MP, representing the Victorian Parliament.
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| The Australian Pier memorial unveiled. Photo Jim Claven 2018 |
The commemorations concluded with an event at Mudros’ new
amphitheatre which looks out across Lemnos’ great Mudros Bay. Amongst other
presentations, it was my pleasure to address the assembly telling the story of
my discovery of the Australian Pier, from an obscure reference on a naval map
held in British Library in London to the archives of Australian military units
that served on Lemnos held in Canberra’s Australian War Memorial.
I
particularly thanked my colleagues in Greece – Mr Dimitris Boulotis and Ms Liza
Koutsaplis – in assisting my research into the Australian Pier.
To read the address by our President Lee Tarlamis please click here and to ready my own address please click here.
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| The Australian Ambassador addresses the crowd at the new ampitheatre at Mudros. Photo Jim Claven 2018 |
And how appropriate it was to give this address in a
re-created traditional classical Greek amphitheatre, looking out across Mudros
Bay, which was filled with over 200 Allied ships on the eve of the landings at
Gallipoli 103 years ago.
During their visit to Lemnos, I took members of the Lemnos
Gallipoli Commemorative Committee on a day tour of the Island’s key Anzac sites
and some of the villages visited by the Anzacs in 1915. Ms Stewart was
particularly moved to walk on the Turks Head Peninsula where her grandmother
was based during the Gallipoli campaign. I was assisted in the tour by Lemnos’
Petrides Travel.
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| Our party at the graves of the two Canadian nurses who died during their service on Lemnos in 1915. Photo Jim Claven 2018 |
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| Committee members Deb Stewart and Malcolm McDonald in Tsimandria, Lemnos. Photo Jim Claven 2018 |
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| On the Turks Head Peninsula - wear the Australian nurses and other medical staff served the sick and wounded in 1915. Photo Jim Claven 2018 |
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| Malcolm McDonald at the site of the Water Distillation Plant erected by Jewish volunteers from Palestine serving in the British Army on Lemnos in 1915. Photo Jim Claven 2018 |
Mr Tarlamis thanked the local authorities for their efforts
in putting together this year’s commemorations.
“We have been
participating in the annual commemorations on Lemnos for a number of years now
and I can say that this year’s events were truly one of the best. It was an
honour for me and our Committee representatives to take part in the
commemorations. I especially want to congratulate Mr Giarmadouros and the
Prefecture of the Northern Aegean as well as Mr Dimitrios Marinakis, the Mayor
of Lemnos, for their efforts and their welcome to their beautiful Island,”
he said.
As part of this year’s commemorations on Lemnos, the
Victorian Government has provided $5,000 in much needed assistance to Mudros Senior
Secondary College on Lemnos. This will provided two state of the art projectors
and other educational aids for the students at this school. This school has
actively participated in the recent visits to Lemnos by Victorian secondary
students as part of the Victorian Premier’s Anzac Student Prize program.
Mr Tarlamis and I visited the school to discuss the grant.
The Director of the School, Mr Stylianos Karagioannis said that this assistance
was most welcome.
“I look forward to
continuing the links between my students and those from Victoria. Such
interaction is an important part of our education program, opening our
student’s eyes to the world beyond our Island and to appreciate the Anzac
connection to Lemnos,” he said.
Mr Tarlamis added that the Committee was working to creating
a link between Mudros Senior Secondary College and Melbourne’s Albert Park
Secondary College, which is located next to the Lemnos Gallipoli Memorial in
Albert Park and who participate in the Committee’s annual commemorative service
there.
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| Christina Despoteris with the Principal of Albert Park Secondary College. Photo Christina Despoteris 2018 |
Ms Christina Despoteris, the Committee Vice-President, has
recently held discussions with both schools to make this a reality. Ms
Despoteris reported that the Principal of Albert Secondary College not only
supports the proposal to link both schools but is hoping to visit Lemnos with a
delegation of his students during the coming commemorations of the centenary of
the Armistice of Mudros to be held on Lemnos in early November later this year.
“Our Committee is so
pleased to have been able to facilitate this link between Victorian and Lemnian
secondary school students. These sorts of connections are vital to preserving
awareness of Lemnos’ link to Anzac in future generations,” Ms Despoteris
said.
The visit by Albert Park students will coincide with the
special Victorian Premiers Anzac Student Prize Alumni Tour to Lemnos during the
Armistice commemorations. This will be the first time that the Armistice –
which brought an end to the war between the Allies and the Ottoman Empire –
will be commemorated and the first of an annual service on Lemnos and in
Australia.
On behalf of the Committee I have successfully proposed the
establishment of an annual commemorative service at Melbourne’s iconic Shrine
of Remembrance – designed in the image of the Mausoleum of Halicarnassus – the
first service to take place on the centenary of the Armistice’s having come
into effect – at 12 noon on 31st October this year.
It is hoped that the progressive creation of the new Lemnos
Gallipoli Heritage Trail will form the beginning of a new Anzac trail
throughout Greece from Lemnos, through Thessaloniki, down through mainland
Greece to the Peloponnese, to Crete and across the Aegean – linking the key
Anzac and other Allied related site from both WW1 and WW2.
The Lemnos Gallipoli Commemorative Committee and the
Prefecture of the Northern Aegean have now commenced the planning for the
creation of the Lemnos Gallipoli Heritage Trail, including a number of
additional memorials commemorating significant locations in Lemnos’ link to
Anzac and other related initiatives. The Committee has also extended an
invitation to the regional and local Lemnian authorities to visit Melbourne and
our Lemnos Gallipoli Memorial.
Jim Claven
Secretary, Lemmos Gallipoli Commemorative Committee
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