MEMBERS of the community gathered in Scone on Saturday to pay their repsects and remember those that had fallen in World War I.
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Around 100 people attended a ceremony at the Scone War Memorial Swimming Pool with president of the Scone RSL sub-branch Val Quinell adressing the crowd.
Member of the Scone RSL Pipes and Drums Harry Brown from Gundy played the Piper’s Lament and Mayor Wayne Bedggood made an address, recognising that Saturday marked the 99 year anniversay of the end of World War l.
“In those terrible four years, over 16 million soldiers and civilians from all over the world died, including sixty-two thousand Australians,” he said.
“The Scone Memorial Gateway holds over 100 names of those from the Scone district who fell in that conflict.
“I acknowledge Mr Harry Willey, whose 2005 book “Scone’s Fallen ANZACs” has recorded their stories, so future generations can know their sacrifices.”
Mayor Bedggood acknowledged that nine men from the Scone district had died in the battle of Passchendaele on the Western Front.
They included:
- Rupert Cross, a 19 year old farm labourer from Parkville.
- Samuel Mitchell, a 21 year old born and bred at Pages Creek.
- William George, a miner living at Stewarts Brook who enlisted a few days before his 30th birthday.
- Hercules Johnston a 30 year old barber who had a shop in Kelly Street.
- Ernest Collison, a 19 year old from Moonan Flat who was killed by a German mortar explosion in his trench before he had fired a shot at the enemy.
- Arthur Harvey a 21 year old Scone carpenter.
- and Walter Mitchell, a 15 year old labourer at Scone Saleyards when he enlisted, claiming to be 18 years old. He fought at the Western Front for 10 months and his parents were informed the following year he had died. He was 17 years old.
Remembrance Day marks the moment hostilities ended after four years of battle on the Western Front of the First World War in 1918.
