Ahead of Sunday’s 100th anniversary of Remembrance Day, the Mount Isa RSL Sub-Branch hosted a special dinner event at the Buffs Club on Friday.
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Remembrance or Armistice Day is commemorated every year on November 11 to mark the armistice signed between the Allies and Germany to cease hostilities on the Western Front on “the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month” of 1918.
Over 100 guests attended the dinner and organiser and Mount Isa Sub-Branch RSL secretary Paul Robertson said Remembrance Day 2018 was the culmination of four years of important anniversaries for the RSL.
In his welcome speech on the night he made specific mention of Joe Rogers who was there on the night with wife Cheryl and writer Kim-Maree Burton’s whose article on Joe’s grandfather Peter Craigie, Mr Robertson mentioned in his speech.
Peter Craigie was an Indigenous First World War veteran from Boulia who aged 20 decided to ride his horse to Adelaide to enlist for the war on the other side of the world, but took the long way to get there, Mr Robertson said.
“He went from Roxburgh Station to Camooweal across to the Northern Territory then south to Alice Springs and onto Adelaide and enlisted in 1916,” Mr Robertson said.
“He was gassed on the front before being invalided out to England in 1918 and after the war he became a drover on the Murranji Track.”
The dinner was attended by Mayor Joyce McCulloch and deputy mayor Phil Barwick but it was Cr George Fortune who spoke on behalf of the Mount Isa City Council.
“Council is honoured to be invited to the dinner and this is a special night for all of us,” Cr Fortune said.
“We acknowledge the sacrifice that so many made in the war and thank the Mount Isa for continuing the tradition of Remembrance Day.
Cr Fortune said the day marked the day hostilities ceased on the western front.
“The day is about remembering the fallen and more important being thankful of their service and sacrifices and it is also about the memory of those left behind,” he said.
Commemorations now move on to the Cenotaph on Sunday with a choir performance from the Mount Isa Community Ensemble from 10am and the service starting at 10.30am.
READ ALSO: The original story of Peter Craigie
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