IN EVERY theatre of war, Wagga’s sons and daughters have answered the call to duty. Even in times of peace, war has shaped our region in ongoing ways.
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The Museum of the Riverina’s Botanic Gardens site has exhibitions on display that show how war has shaped lives in and around Wagga – and it is open on Anzac Day.
Through original artefacts, photographs and first-hand accounts, He Belonged to Wagga unearths the private, personal and touching stories of those who enlisted for World War I and their loved ones who waited for them at home. When war was declared in Europe on August 4, 1914, the men of Wagga answered the call to arms. From the earliest enlistees who joined the Australian Naval & Military Force expedition to German Guinea to the nation-defining Dardanelles campaign, and on to the bloody battlefields of the Western Front, and beyond.
From Barbed Wire to Boundary Fences sheds light on the ongoing impact of WWI and II on the communities of Tarcutta and Wantabadgery, through the allotment of Soldier Settler blocks in both communities. It is the story of two of the Wagga Land District's largest estates, and the men, women and children who made their homes there.
Take a journey through the trials and tribulations encountered by soldiers exchanging bayonets for ploughs. Discover how the children on the post-WWI Tarcutta estate entertained themselves. Find out how the enterprising locals battled the hordes of rabbits which overran Wantabadgery in the 1950s.
A third exhibition, Worth Their Weight in Gold, explores the contributions of Wagga women during wartime. In November 1916, local newspaper the Wagga Wagga Express published a letter written from the front by Private Walter Day. He declared that the parcels sent by the people of Wagga were “worth their weight in gold,” and that the same could be said for Wagga's womenfolk.
From the nurses who risked their lives on foreign shores, to the ladies who worked tirelessly on the home front, Australia's women proved instrumental to the war effort. This 'war to end all wars' not only changed the lives of the men who fought, but also the lives of the women who worried, worked and waited for news of their loved.
