THEBIGGERISSUE.ORG: ANZAC DAY Dawn Service. By Uncle Monty.

ANZAC DAY Dawn Service.
By Uncle Monty.

Photos By Alex Albion.

Only very cold and pretty indifferent people would

not be moved by the touching and patriotic ANZAC

DAY Dawn Service that was held April 25th, 2oo9, at

5.00am sharp, at London’s significant Australian War

Memorial that is tastefully located at the evergreen

pasture of Hyde Park Corner. Over 3.500 Aussies

and Kiwis gathered at the annual London Dawn

Service to pay proper homage and respect to their

own country’s dead war heroes from Gallipoli to

Flanders of the 1st and 2nd World Wars. Soldiers

and officers of the Australian and New Zealand

Army Corps (ANZAC) gave many of their precious

lives in fighting such dreadful and bloody wars

for the freedom of us all no matter our country

of birth or creed or where we are from today.

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ANZAC Military Friends.

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The haunting Lament by David Williams opened the

one-hour long Dawn Service to the now hushed and

almost reverential gathering of people of every age,

although with a surpriseingly large representation of

those guyz and galz of twenty to thirty something

age. From start to finish, the friendly gathering

stood silently on their two feet in proud and open

unison. And, in full memory of their brave and

fallen country man and women of military pride.
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Australian Father and Son Military Family

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Sunrise was cloudy, but the minds of all present was as bright as the early morning daylight. Tears made no room for them for those had been rightly shed at the horrendous moment of their war death of many sad years ago. Rather, the avowedly expatriate crowd from Down Under and New Zealand at the British capital affirmed their cherished respect and honour for those war dead by being simply present at 5.00am. Such required no display of personal tears to openly prove their sincerity to others or among their compatriot selves. Just by being present in person at the annual ANZAC DAY Dawn Service spoke eloquently of their individual and collective determination not to forget those who had sacrificed their own lives for them and for all of us. BRAVO to them that stood surrounded by the battlefield of victory and for some of ultimate sheer death.

^ Canberra's Canterbury Grammar School Choir.
They brought honour to their country and to their Anglican faith.
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ANZAC Military Chaplains Were All Present & Correct.

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Director-General of Chaplaincy Services the Rev'd Murry D. Earl spoke welcoming prayers and reflection followed by the reading of Group Captain Mike Yardley, Acting Head of the New Zealand Defense Staff. While His Excellency Mr. Derek Leask, NZ High Commissioner to London, also read at the Dawn Service. The ANZAC ADDRESS itself was given beautifully by His Excellency Mr. John Dauth, High Commissioner for Australia at the Court of St. James.

^ ANZAC Military Personnel at London Dawn Service, 2oo9.
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But it was the London Irish Regiment's Bagpiper Rachael Walkin Shaw, 26, (shown below with Uncle Monty) who made the Dawn Service even more memorable for me personally. She stood atop a small hillock at Hyde Park Corner after the close of the official service to play her bagpipe with delightful supremacy, despite her being unfairly denied the opportunity to play at the official ceremony. She had been told bluntly by officials that she could not participate because she was either too late to be included or was of unwanted presence. Rachael is a New Zealander from her hometown of Whangarei, she told me. It also marred abit the beauty of the earlier service for me when Rachael spoke of how she'd be officiously and coldly treated at the ANZAC DAY Dawn Service. Her informal bagpipe presentation to the thousands leaving at the end of the service was, however, a fitting and worthy touch that was so befitting for the remembrance of those war heroes and to those who had participated and/or had attended the ANZAC DAY Dawn Service, 2oo9. The really sad bit was for Rachael Walkin Shaw not to have been officially included at the last minute for such a memorable day and for such a solemn event at London's Australian War Memorial, I would truly say!!! Rachael is also seen almost in silhouette-form at the opening black and white caption photo of this story of mine with her on the hillock at where I first heard her fine bagpipes and then I saw her in all her lovely glory ...