Walcha and Tamworth will make history tomorrow with their Anzac Day commemorations by including for the first time a traditional indigenous ceremony but also through an overseas presence at a special Kokoda Digger ceremony in Papua New Guinea.
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This year’s ceremony and march will see an historic first as two Aboriginal women elders march out front of the main Tamworth Anzac Day parade and four women elders lay wreaths at Walcha and Tamworth.
The two northern centres are among just six across the state who will for the first time recognise Aboriginal soldiers who fought for Australia and are buried overseas.
And for the relatives of the Archibald families, who have links to Walcha, Armidale and Tamworth, the honours will be personally poignant because a number of them are in Papua New Guinea to bring the spirit of their slain Digger relative Frank Archibald home.
Private Frank Archibald was a 25-year-old soldier killed by a sniper’s bullet while fighting the Japanese in 1942 on the Kokoda Track near Sanananda.
About 12 members of the Archibald family, including his only surviving sibling Grace Gordon from Armidale, have flown to New Guinea to honor him and finally put his spirit to rest. They will also visit the graves of five other indigenous Diggers buried there.
A special ceremony in traditional song and dance in the Gumbaynggirr language will be held at Bomana War Cemetery on the outskirts of Port Moresby, near the start of the Kokoda Track.
Mrs Gordon’s niece Grace Munro from Tamworth is part of the contingent and says the Anzac Day ceremonies in Tamworth and in PNG are a part of history that makes them proud.
Before leaving Sydney on Friday, Mrs Gordon said the Anzac Day event, which apparently was six years in the making, marked a new chapter in Australia’s history.
“This is the first time that it’s ever been done for the Aboriginal boys who went overseas and fought for Australia and up in New Guinea,” she said.
“I’m very proud of them and I’m very proud now to think that this is going to be a big thing.”
The group, including Private Archibald’s cousin and only surviving male relative, Richard Archibald, 65, said a community-based Kokoda Aboriginal Servicemen’s campaign helped raise funds.
“Now it’s time to end the grieving, by bringing his spirit home Gumbaynggirr country, the country of our people,” he said.
A specially commissioned didgeridoo bearing Gumbaynggirr totems, as well as the uniformed images of Private Archibald and other family members who served, will mark the start of the official Anzac Day service at Bomana.
In Tamworth, elders Gloria Leigh and Edith Slater will march and lay wreaths. In the Walcha RSL Sub-branch, spokesman Eric O’Keefe said elders Syreene Kitchener and Shirley Davison would lay wreaths at their service.