The Office of Australian War Graves (OAWG) is a branch within the Australian Government Department of Veterans' Affairs. The branch was initially a stand-alone agency, formed 1 January 1975. In 1980, the War Graves Act 1980 (Cth) formalised the position of Director War Graves within the Department of Veterans' Affairs. [1] The OAWG acts as Australian agent for the Commonwealth War Graves Commission. [1]
The responsibilities of the OAWG generally fall within the following five areas. [2]
The OAWG is also responsible for the maintenance of some 20,000 graves of Commonwealth war dead in 76 war cemeteries & plots and in numerous civil cemeteries, as well as Memorials to the Missing listing over 3,000 names throughout Australia, Norfolk Island, Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands.
Name | Period | Ref. |
---|---|---|
K. F. Macdonald | 1978 – 3 May 1981 | |
Hon. Lance Barnard AO | 22 June 1981 – 9 April 1984 | [3] |
Peter Young | 9 April 1984 – 1 October 1985 | [4] |
Alf Clarke AM | 1 October 1985 – 19 June 1991 | [5] |
Air Vice Marshal Alan Heggen AO | 19 June 1991 – 3 October 1997 | |
Air Vice Marshal Gary Beck AO | 3 October 1997 – August 2005 | |
Major General Paul Stevens AO | 2005–2010 | |
Brigadier Chris Appleton CSC | December 2010 – November 2015 | |
Ken Corke | December 2015 – 10 January 2019 | |
Brigadier Paul Nothard AM CSC CSM | 11 January 2019 – present | [6] |
Anzac Day is a national day of remembrance in Australia, New Zealand and Tonga that broadly commemorates all Australians and New Zealanders "who served and died in all wars, conflicts, and peacekeeping operations" and "the contribution and suffering of all those who have served". Observed on 25 April each year, Anzac Day was originally devised to honour the members of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC) who served in the Gallipoli campaign, their first engagement in the First World War (1914–1918).
Memorial Day is one of the federal holidays in the United States for honoring and mourning the U.S. military personnel who died while serving in the United States Armed Forces. It is observed on the last Monday of May. Memorial Day is also considered the unofficial beginning of summer in the United States.
Remembrance Day is a memorial day observed in Commonwealth member states since the end of the First World War to honour armed forces members who have died in the line of duty. The day is also marked by war remembrances in several other non-Commonwealth countries. In most countries, Remembrance Day is observed on 11 November to recall the end of First World War hostilities. Hostilities ended "at the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month" of 1918, in accordance with the armistice signed by representatives of Germany and the Entente between 5:12 and 5:20 that morning. The First World War formally ended with the signing of the Treaty of Versailles on 28 June 1919.
The Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) is an intergovernmental organisation of six independent member states whose principal function is to mark, record and maintain the graves and places of commemoration of Commonwealth of Nations military service members who died in the two World Wars. The commission is also responsible for commemorating Commonwealth civilians who died as a result of enemy action during the Second World War. The commission was founded by Sir Fabian Ware and constituted through royal charter in 1917 as the Imperial War Graves Commission. The change to the present name took place in 1960.
The Waverley Cemetery is a heritage-listed cemetery on top of the cliffs at Bronte in the eastern suburbs of Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. Opened in 1877 and built by R. Watkins and P. Beddie, the cemetery is noted for its largely intact Victorian and Edwardian monuments. It is regularly cited as being one of the most beautiful cemeteries in the world. The cemetery contains the graves of many significant Australians including the poet Henry Lawson. Also known as General Cemetery Waverley, it was added to the New South Wales State Heritage Register on 28 October 2016.
The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier is a tomb situated before the National War Memorial in Confederation Square, Ottawa, Ontario. The tomb is dedicated to Canadian service members, and holds the remains of an unidentified Canadian soldier who died in France during the First World War; selected from a Commonwealth War Grave near Vimy, in the vicinity where the Battle of Vimy Ridge took place. A similar memorial was installed in June of 2024 at the National War Memorial in St. John's, Newfoundland to contain the unidentified Great War remains of a soldier of the Royal Newfoundland Regiment.
A war grave is a burial place for members of the armed forces or civilians who died during military campaigns or operations.
Major-General Sir Fabian Arthur Goulstone Ware was a British educator, journalist, and the founder of the Imperial War Graves Commission (IWGC), now the Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC). He also served as Director of Education for the Transvaal Colony and editor of The Morning Post.
Eastern Suburbs Memorial Park, Eastern Suburbs Crematorium and Botany General Cemetery, is a cemetery and crematorium on Bunnerong Road in Matraville, New South Wales, in the eastern suburbs district of Sydney, Australia.
The Department of Veterans' Affairs is a department of the Government of Australia, established in 1976, and charged with the responsibility of delivering government programs for war veterans, members of the Australian Defence Force, members of the Australian Federal Police, and their dependants.
The St Symphorien Military Cemetery is a First World War Commonwealth War Graves Commission burial ground in Saint-Symphorien, Belgium. It contains the graves of 284 German and 229 Commonwealth soldiers, principally those killed during the Battle of Mons. The cemetery was established by the German Army on land donated by Jean Houzeau de Lehaie. It was initially designed as a woodland cemetery before being redesigned by William Harrison Cowlishaw after the Imperial War Graves Commission took over maintenance of the cemetery after the war.
The National Field of Honour is a military cemetery for Canadian and Allied Veterans and their loved ones. It is located in Pointe-Claire, Quebec, Canada. It is operated by the Last Post Fund.
The Australian National Memorial, Villers-Bretonneux is the main memorial to Australian military personnel killed on the Western Front during World War I. It is located on the Route Villiers-Bretonneux (D 23), between the towns of Fouilloy and Villers-Bretonneux, in the Somme département, France. The memorial lists 10,773 names of soldiers of the Australian Imperial Force with no known grave who were killed between 1916, when Australian forces arrived in France and Belgium, and the end of the war. The location was chosen to commemorate the role played by Australian soldiers in the Second Battle of Villers-Bretonneux.
The Stone of Remembrance is a standardised design for war memorials that was designed in 1917 by the British architect Sir Edwin Lutyens for the Imperial War Graves Commission (IWGC). It was designed to commemorate the dead of World War I, to be used in IWGC war cemeteries containing 1,000 or more graves, or at memorial sites commemorating more than 1,000 war dead. Hundreds were erected following World War I, and it has since been used in cemeteries containing the Commonwealth dead of World War II as well. It is intended to commemorate those "of all faiths and none", and has been described as one of Lutyens' "most important and powerful works", with a "brooding, sentinel-like presence wherever used".
Founded in 1917, the Ramscappelle Road Military Cemetery is located two kilometers east of the city of Nieuwpoort in the province of West Flanders (West-Vlaanderen), Belgium. It is on the N367, the road which leads from Nieuwpoort to the village of Sint-Joris, near the intersection with Ramscappelle Road (Ramskapellestraat).
The Gibraltar Cross of Sacrifice is a war memorial in the British Overseas Territory of Gibraltar. It is located west of North Front Cemetery, at the junction of Winston Churchill Avenue and Devil's Tower Road. The Cross of Sacrifice was designed by Sir Reginald Blomfield in 1917, and his monument is found in numerous Commonwealth War Graves Commission cemeteries. The cross in Gibraltar was erected by the Royal Engineers for the commission, and unveiled on Armistice Day 1922. The British Pathé film recorded at the dedication ceremony that day represents the first motion picture made in Gibraltar. The Gibraltar Cross of Sacrifice served as the focus of Remembrance Sunday ceremonies in Gibraltar until 2009, at which time the location was changed to the Gibraltar War Memorial.
The United Nations Memorial Cemetery in Korea, located at Tanggok in the Nam District, City of Busan, Republic of Korea, is a burial ground for United Nations Command (UNC) casualties of the Korean War. It contains 2,300 graves and is the only United Nations cemetery in the world. Laid out over 14 hectares, the graves are set out in 22 sites designated by the nationalities of the buried servicemembers.
Yokohama War Cemetery is a military cemetery in Hodogaya-ku, Yokohama, in Japan and located next to Yokohama Municipal Children's Botanical Garden.
Atherton War Cemetery is a heritage-listed cemetery at the corner of Kennedy Highway and Rockley Road, Atherton, Tablelands Region, Queensland, Australia. It was built in 1942. It was added to the Queensland Heritage Register on 19 November 2010.
The Delhi War Cemetery, in the Delhi Cantonment, Delhi, India, is the site of the graves of 1,154 service personnel who served the British Empire during the First and Second World Wars. The cemetery was established in 1951 to ensure the permanent preservation of the remains of soldiers across various cemeteries in northern India.