Category General Perspectives

In war there are no unwounded soldiers, No unsightly wounds to show, No limbs are missing of these men, But inward pain and thoughts crowding on, The mind of ageing veteranswho saw it but have nought to show, Only memories…

National Servicemen’s Day, February 14 each year. This 14th day in February, the 45th day of the year, is remembered for many events. In recent times in Australia, Decimal Currency was introduced with metrics overtaking the Imperial measures from this…

This is article is reproduced with the kind permission of author, Mark Dapin. It contains interviews undertaken by Mark of fellow Chalkies Les Rowe, Wayne Bensley, Andrew Remenyi, Ray Nichol, Ray Bassett, Peter Porteous and Chris Poulton.First published in 2014,…

This is an NCO course, with documentation from Col Ron Lange, re-done by Greg Ivey. We are indebted to Col Lange for the material. Greg did a great job with the old file, which was showing it’s age. Quite a…

____________________________________________________________________ Editor’s Note: This article was copied from the NSW Teachers News website education.nsw.gov.au/news unaltered and in its entirety. We (the Chalkies) sought and received permission to copy the article. We copied it here to acknowledge an important milestone in…

____________________________________________________________________ Editor’s Note: This article was copied from the The Singleton Argus unaltered and in its entirety. We (the Chalkies) acknowledge it is the property of the newspaper and will receive no monetary gain in using it. We copied it…

by Darryl Dymock, Taurama Barracks 1969-70 It’s been quite a task pulling together the responses to the 2015 Chalkies’ survey, mainly because there was such a great response: 73 in total – and they all (thankfully) had a lot to…

by Terry Edwinsmith Registrants to this conference which was held at the Camberwell RSL, Victoria, on 30th May 2015 were welcomed by Colonel Marcus Fielding (Rtd) in his role as Conference Chair and President of the Military History & Heritage…

by WO2 Dan Winkel Very few people in Australia are aware the plan for the Australian Defence Forces as put forward by Lord Kitchener to the Federal Parliament in 1908 envisaged the Australian Military Forces as consisting of two elements.…

by Ron Inglis 1971 ‘Chalkie’ at Moem and Igam Barracks, Ron Inglis, attended the opening of the Pacific Islands Regiment (PIR) Exhibition held at the Australian Army Infantry Museum, Singleton, on October 1, 2013. It was an opportunity to gather…

Courtesy of Peter Darmody Igam Barracks, situated near Lae on the north coast of Papua New Guinea, was one of the places that Chalkies were sent between the years 1966 and 1972. Igam was opened in 1968 by Phillip Lynch,…

by Lt. Col. Roger Jones (retd.) End of the First World War In winter 1917/18, the Canadian Army established its ‘Khaki College’ at Witley Camp in the UK to run classes and lectures of a vocational and rehabilitation nature. It…

LIEUTENANT COLONEL ROGER JONES (Assistant Director of Army Education, PNG 1967 – 1969) I believe the scheme originated about 1965 and was promoted and developed very rapidly not long before the first National Service Chalkies appeared in PNG in late…

by John Hain 1971-72 The National Service adventure began with the arrival of one’s call up documents. I was called up into the first intake of 1971 which was designated as 1 An article on how the National Service scheme…

The photo on this page is of massive importance to those interested in the history of the Chalkies scheme. This is the only photo we have of Brigadier Ian Murray Hunter with Chalkies. All are Queensland Chalkies and in our…

An Extract The following article was kept by Greg Ivey from his time in Townsville prior to being sent to PNG… The information was provided to the newspaper by the Minister for the Army at the time, Phillip Lynch. Note…

Norm Hunter (1967-68) It’s 42 years since I arrived in Port Moresby in June 1967 as a Sergeant in the Royal Australian Army Education Corps. I’d completed three months of recruit training and three months of infantry training. On the…

I initially went to PNG for the Australian National University to develop a program which would allow people to develop entrepreneurial skills. PNG was mainly a subsistence economy. With this system, you can never gain capital and therefore not be able…