MMXV: Features of 2015

"Carnamah Historical Society and Museum's website and, in particular, it's Virtual Museum and Biographical Dictionary are one of Australia's biggest online success stories." - Museums & Galleries NSW


First World War

April marked the centenary of the Anzac landings on the Gallipoli Peninsula in Turkey. We marked the occasion with the launch of a new virtual exhibition on the First World War as well as a physical exhibition within our museum (the latter being in partnership with the WA Museum). A request to say a word or two at Carnamah's dawn service quickly escalated into us being handed the baton to give the official address, and for such an auspicious anniversary.

Links:  First World War virtual exhibition  |  Transcript of Anzac Day speech 

"I used your... virtual museum exhibition in my year 7-10 classes at Carnamah DHS today as a lead up to Anzac Day. The students were thoroughly engaged by the stories particularly as they featured local soldiers and names they could relate to. It provided a great springboard for some fantastic discussion. Thanks for such a fantastic and timely resource."

Major Jack Colpitts of Heppleholme Farm in Winchester, South Carnamah

Macpherson Homestead

It's been a year of highs and lows for the old and wonderful Macpherson Homestead.

We were delighted to welcome a special group of visitors during the year, which included Oriel Green (nee Bartlett), her sisters and a number of their relatives and friends. Oriel spent a portion of her childhood in Carnamah and Three Springs during the 1930s but what made the visit more momentous was that her family are believed to be Aboriginal descendants of the Macpherson family.

Another high was our first steps toward the homestead hosting primary school excursions. Our thanks to Ignite Your Audience for their work so far and to the Three Springs Primary School for being our enthusiastic test-subjects!

Sadly the conserved ruins of the bakehouse at the homestead began to rapidly and suddenly deteriorate in October. Huge cracks spread through the walls and a large section began to collapse. However, we're pleased to report that the collapsed section has been restored and the remainder has been solidified and conserved to ensure the ruin will continue to stand strong.

Western Australian Heritage Awards

For the second year in a row, we were a finalist in the community organisation category of the WA Heritage Awards and were stoked to be named this year's winner.

"Carnamah Historical Society & Museum uses cutting-edge technology to engage with and promote the heritage of, not only their own and neighbouring districts, but also the State. Impressively, the society has established a virtual volunteering platform that has engaged 7,000 people with online heritage projects, which, in turn has provided a valuable resource for historians and the State."

Australian Curriculum Resources

For a few years we had been working hard, in partnership with Ignite Your Audience, to create a suite of Australian Curriculum education resources. Our completed range of nine resources, which relate to primary years, were promoted at the History Teachers' conference in Mount Lawley and the third History TeachMeet in Peppermint Grove. The resources are a little different - as they can be used with school visits to our physical museum or from classrooms anywhere in Australia (with our virtual museum and other online content).

Link:  Carnamah Historical Society & Museum's Australian Curriculum resources

We've received a lot of favourable comments, including glowing feedback from the National Gallery of Australia in Canberra! We were especially delighted when our resources received a Highly Commended in the Interpretation, Audience and Learning Engagement category of the Museums and Galleries National Awards.

Museums and Galleries National Awards

The Museums and Galleries National Awards, or MAGNAs, are conducted annually by Museums Australia and are held during the national museums conference. This year's conference was in Sydney and we had a few reasons to go. Both our education resources and our virtual volunteering program were short-listed in different categories and we're pleased to say they each received a Highly Commended. Not a bad effort considering the competition was mostly state and national institutions!

 
In the Media and in Parliament!

Our achievements of recent years were featured in the Museums Australia magazine, on the blog of Museums & Galleries NSW and in the Heritage Council of WA's Heritage Matters magazine. We were also honoured in the lower house of the Western Australian Parliament on 21 May 2015 when Shane Love, the MLA for Moore, spoke about our endeavours and successes.

Thank you

Our thanks to you for being part of our 2015 - whether it was online to our blog, Virtual Museum or Biographical Dictionary, or as a physical visitor to see our history and heritage on the ground in Carnamah.

We'd also like to thank those who supported us during the year. Special thanks are due to all of our virtual volunteers, to project partners atWork Australia and the North Midlands Project, and to financial supporters the Department of Culture and the Arts (DCA) and the Anzac Centenary Local Grants Program.

If you're ever in Carnamah, we invite you to stop by:

• Carnamah Museum
• Macpherson Homestead 

The Anzac Centenary in Perenjori

In the lead up to Anzac Day we assisted the Shire of Perenjori in identifying their local men who had served during the First World War. Plaques containing the names and details of the district's servicemen were added to a wall at the Perenjori War Memorial and on Anzac Day a bronze sculpture of the rising sun badge was unveiled.

The 16 men from Caron, Latham and Perenjori were:

• Robert Thomas Arundell
• William George Lidstone Aspley
• Norman Walter Britt
• Harry Richmond Campbell
• "Cecil" George Charles Cecil Crompton Fowler
• Leslie Allan Hesford
• Ernest Hirschauer
• Newton Charles Livingstone
• "Eric" Alfred Robert Eric Russell
• Thomas Francis Sheridan
• Bert Smith
• John Morpeth Spencer
• Edmund Charles Spencer
• Edgar Sugden
• "Roy" Lewis Roy Timmings
• William Robert Williams

The names of seven of the above men had already been well remembered. Their surnames label Fowler, Russell, Livingstone, Timmings, Hesford and Smith streets plus Hirschauer Road in the Perenjori townsite.

Photographs kindly provided by the Shire of Perenjori.

The Anzac Centenary in Carnamah

Amid a fresh east wind and before a crowd of a few hundred, Carnamah continued its annual tradition of holding an Anzac Day dawn service at the Carnamah War Memorial. We were honoured to provide the address, of which a summery is below.

Each Anzac day large numbers of Australians gather at war memorials and other sacred sites to pay tribute and utter the words Lest We Forget. But... have we forgotten? Who are we remembering? Acknowledging sacrifice, although a worthy endeavour, isn't quite the same thing as remembering individuals. Those who died during the First World War were sons, fathers, husbands, brothers, nephews, cousins and/or friends. They had names, jobs, interests and aspirations. Despite changes in the world over the past 100 years, their lives weren't really that different to our own.

Let’s pause on that for a moment though, and jump back to 1914…

When the First World War broke out, Carnamah was a much smaller place than it is today. The Macpherson family had been here for over 45 years, a few others families for about a decade and the first settlers to take up Ready-Made Farms had just arrived.

Carnamah had a small one-teacher school which was under the management of 25 year old Alick McLean who, like many in Carnamah, was a Scottish immigrant. An Education Department inspector described him as "Inexperienced but eager to improve. A Good Teacher." He was granted leave from teaching towards the end of 1914 to allow him to enlist in the Australian Imperial Force, or A.I.F. He was 6 feet ¾ inches tall, weighed 164 pounds (which is 74 kilograms) and had blue-grey eyes, light brown hair and a fair complexion.

After less than a month of training at Blackboy Hill, on the outskirts of Perth, Alick departed from Fremantle on 2 November 1914. After further training in Egypt he was part of the infamous landing at the Gallipoli Peninsula in Turkey - on this day 100 years ago. His battalion landed while it was still dark. One of his comrades thought he had been shot, possibly in the arm and headed for the beach. Whatever did happen, he died and was never seen again.

Coorow farmhand George Bell also took part in the landing at Gallipoli and was shot in the thigh. He was bandaged by his comrades but had to be left behind when they were forced to retreat. He was listed as missing in action and it was hoped he'd been taken a prisoner of war. This was hoped as it meant he might still be alive. His aunt Mrs Janet McGill, who also lived in Coorow, appealed to his comrades for any information but sadly it was in vein. Four years later his body was found and it was ruled that he too had been killed in action at Gallipoli on 25 April 1915. 

Carnamah labourer John Davern served at Gallipoli after the landings but only for six days. He was shot in the thigh and on retiring his lieutenant said they'd send stretcher bearers for him. Unfortunately none came and he laid there until the afternoon when he was captured by Turkish forces. He was a prisoner for the remainder of the war and kept variously in hospitals, prisons and churches across Turkey. At one hospital his wounds were never dressed and they turned black. At another the treatment was exceptional and after five months his wounds finally began to heal. At the end of the war he was repatriated to England and later returned to Australia.

Left: Bill Laundy of the Carnamah Lions Club
Right: Andrew Bowman-Bright of the Carnamah Historical Society & Museum

It’s also worth remembering that Anzac Day isn't just about Gallipoli or the First World War. It is a day to acknowledge and remember the service and sacrifice of all men and women in all conflicts. On the war memorial in Carnamah are 17 names.

We remember Carnamah railway fettler Aeneas Murray, labourers Sydney Brooks, James Keenan and Edward Statham, and two men whose full names have been lost to the passages of time and which no one can positively identify – E. Kennedy and W. Regan. We also remember three men whose names were omitted from the memorial, either unintentionally or because at the time Winchester was seen as a district of its own. They are Winchester farmer Major Christopher Hoskyns-Abrahall, Winchester farmhand Charles Vernede and clearing contractor Herbert Larkin.

From the Second World War we remember Carnamah bank teller Bernie O’Hara, Coorow farmhand Spanner Spencer, former Carnamah policeman Maurie Plunkett, Carnamah farmhands George McGowan and James Murphy, Waddy Forest farmers Jim Morcombe and Keith Morcombe, and Carnamah mechanics Bill Clark and Ivan Johnson.

The Carnamah Historical Society & Museum, with support from Lotterywest, is a partner in the WA Museum’s Remembering Them project, which is to stage small exhibitions on the First World War across regional Western Australia. The exhibition was on show at the community breakfast at the Carnamah Bowling Club and will continue at our museum.

We have also created a virtual exhibition on the First World War, which can be seen at www.carnamah.com.au/anzac. This was made possible thanks to the Anzac Centenary Local Grants Program, Bankwest and the North Midlands Project. Special thanks are also due to Reg Ellery for his photo-editing contributions.

37 men from Carnamah and Winchester served during the First World War with ten never returning home.

Lest We Forget.