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Two weeks ahead of ANZAC Light on the Water 2010 on Saturday April 24, 28 street flags are today flying throughout Port Adelaide — the first time for an ANZAC event

Federal Minister for Veterans Affairs Alan Griffin and local member Mark Butler helped to secure a special grant for the flags, which will go up each year to draw public attention to the event and to ANZAC Day itself.

This year Light on the Water will commemorate all those lost at sea in World War II; 3000 candlelit cardboard lifeboats made by local school students will be floated on the Port River as a tribute to Army, Navy, Air Force, Merchant Navy, medical and rescue, waterside workers and other civilians lost at sea around the world.

The event will begin at 6.30 pm on Queens Wharf on the river side of the Fisherman’s Wharf Markets building near Birkenhead Bridge and will include performances by the SA Pipes and Drums, the Community Choir of Hope and Harmony and an RAN ceremonial unit.

Our photos show the new ANZAC flag outside Port Adelaide Town Hall and along Commercial Road.

This is the first release of renowned Port Adelaide artist John Ford’s new painting for ANZAC Light on the Water 2010.

Voted Community Event of the Year in 2009, this commemorative event on the Port River on Anzac Eve, April 24, will be a special tribute to everyone lost at sea in World War II.

That includes all army, navy, airforce, merchant navy, medics, nurses, small craft crew , wharfies and civilian men, women and children.

Millions of people of all nations who died on oceans and rivers and in harbours from Darwin to Vladivostok, will be represented by 3000 candle-lit cardboard lifeboats made by local school students.

Many local families and visitors from around Australia are expected to gather on McLaren Wharf outside Fishermen’s Wharf Markets, to the left of Lighthouse Square, from 6.30 pm to pay their respects and remember their loved ones.

Each year renowned John creates a painting on the theme of the event; last years was the Australian hospital ship Centaur; it featured on the front cover of the programme for the special national commemorative service in Brisbane Cathedral last month following the finding of the wreck by shipwreck detective David Mearns.

With numerous exhibitions and art awards, John is one of South Australias leading marine artists and his work has been commissioned for many Australian, international, private and corporate collections, including the Make a Wish Foundation, the SA Maritime Museum, the Royal Australian Navy, Australia Post and the ABC series Navigators.

He also teaches art professionally from beginners to advanced.

About 400 brave souls ventured out on a wet and windy night for ANZAC Light on the Water 2009, which paid tribute to the 268 Australians who were lost when the hospital ship Centaur was torpedoed off the Queensland coast in May 1943.

Strong winds prevented the lighting of candles in the 3000 cardboard replica lifeboats made by local primary school students.

However, North Haven Lifesaving Club volunteers came to the rescue and valiantly managed to light some of the candles in the 268 lifeboats that bore the name of each of the victims of the wartime tragedy. 

The small group of spectators were entertained by a smaller Bay Big Band, a larger than life Steve Foster, lone piper Don Macaulay and the hugely impressive Royal Australian Navy Guard and Ceremonial Unit.

Port Kids for Anzac Patron Jack Buckskin, 22, welcomed everyone to the land of his Kaurna people and his fellow Patron, Paralympian Jay Dohnt, 19, spoke about the role of young people in the future commemoration of Australia’s military forces, merchant navy and civilian support groups in many conflicts and peacekeeping operations. They are pictured here with the Channel Ten camera crew after a national interview with David and Kim for 9AM.

“I encourage all young people to become more involved in ANZAC day events during this and future commemorations, many of the soldiers who fought to create this fantastic legacy of mateship and patriotism were as young as 16, boys who changed the dates of their birth certificates for an opportunity to represent and protect this country — a sense of morality and pride that I believe still exists within Australian youth today,” Jay told the crowd.

“ANZAC day is an opportunity to reinforce that very sense of pride we have simply by being an Australian — a sense of pride that steams back to the attitudes and achievements of the Anzacs, a sense of pride which optimises Australia and Australians.
 
“Tonight’s ceremony is the first step for John Williams, Jack Buckskin and I in establishing Port Kids for ANZAC, a group which is dedicated to reminding SA’s youth about the importance of the ANZACs and ANZAC Day. 

“Together with Jack and John I hope to be able to recruit more young people from schools all over SA and fulfil the saying “lest we forget”.

Other speakers included South Australian Treasurer Kevin Foley, local Federal Labor MP Mark Butler, Port Adelaide Mayor Gary Johanson and the Rev Ali Wurm.

Because organisers were unable to light many candles, local community and visitors at the event took home most of the 3000 lifeboats and promised to return them for launching when David Mearns of Blue Water Discoveries and the Federal and Queensland Government search team locates the wreck of the Centaur later this year.

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On ANZAC Eve Friday, April 24, the fleet of 3000 cardboard lifeboats will be launched on the Port River from 6.30 pm in a special Commemoration for the hospital ship Centaur which was sunk in 1943 with the loss of 268 Australians.

To mark the loss of 179 ambulancemen and 11 nurses, local ambulance drivers and nurses in uniform will be among the 5000 people expected at the event, which from this year will gradually be taken over, organised and staged by school students, under guidance from Semaphore Port Adelaide RSL.

The names of all those lost, including 45 merchant navy crew, will be on the sides of 268 of the candle-lit lifeboats.

One of the patrons of Port Kids for ANZAC will be Australian Paralympian Jay Dohnt, who won a swimming bronze medal at the Beijing Olympics, along with Federal MP Mark Butler and Port Adelaide Mayor Gary Johanson.

Jay will be visiting Adelaide schools to recruit students for the Port Kids For ANZAC team to take over ANZAC events from older volunteers.

Framed prints of a painting of Centaur are being presented to Prime Minister Rudd, Veterans Affairs Minister Alan Griffin, Queensland Premier Anna Bligh and “shipwreck detective” David Mearns who will take it with him on the search vessel later this year. 

David said: “Thank you, the painting is beautiful.  I would be proud to take it with us.  

“I did an interview with ABC radio today and mentioned the ANZAC Eve event and how this is being used to teach school children about Australia’s war time history.”

A copy of the painting is also being presented to the Caloundra RSL who have kept the flame alive for Centaur over many years.

This painting of the Australian hospital ship Centaur for the 2009 ANZAC Light on the Water commemoration by renowned Birkenhead maritime artist, John Ford (F.A.S.M.A.) is shown here for the first time.

To raise funds for the spectacular Port River ANZAC commemoration on April 24, this brilliant painting is the prize in a raffle to be conducted among the 400 people at the 1940s Dance Party fundraiser at the Maritime Workers Hall on Saturday April 4.

Locals will sport 1940s fashions and hairstyles as they dance to the Bay Big Band with singers Marlene Richards, Terry Brooker, Wally Carr, Jenny Loftes and the Not The Andrews Sisters.

A few tickets are still left for this memorable event at $25 per head (concession $20) from the Port Mall Newsagency in Port Adelaide, by phone on (08) 8447 2961 or by email

The historic Waterside Workers Hall is at 11 Nile Street, Port Adelaide.

Semaphore Port Adelaide RSL is staging a 1940s Dance Party at the Waterside Workers Hall in Nile Street Port Adelaide on Saturday April 4 and it promises to be be a memorable night.

It’s not just a touch of nostalgia for the older generation — it’s the latest dance rage around Adelaide. 1940s dancing and hairstyles are back in fashion.
 
Entertainment will include the Bay Big Band and singers Marlene Richards, Terry Brooker, Wally Carr, Jenny Loftes and the Not The Andrews Sisters.. 
 
Young and old will be wearing 1940s fashions and and some locals will be donning their old World War II uniforms.
 
The 1940s Dance Party, which will run from 8 pm till 11 pm,  is a fundraiser for ANZAC Light on the Water 2009. Bring a 1940s Supper Plate; a bar will be open with beer, wine and soft drinks.

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Together with a multi-cultural event and an Indigenous event that celebrated Aboriginal and Maritime history, ANZAC Light on the Water was featured in the Culture and Community section of the Annual Review.

All three events had contributed to the community’s responsibility to ensure the next generation of young people has a greater understanding and acceptance of cultural differences in Australian society.

“Then, on the eve of Anzac Day, there was another moving tribute-this time to the 645 crew lost in the sinking of HMAS Sydney in 1941, and especially its South Australian members in the second Light on the Water event.
 
“It has clearly captured the imagination of a new generation of Australians, “ said Port Adelaide Enfield Mayor Gary Johanson.
 
“3000 candle-lit  cardboard lifeboats were launched on the river this year, all of them made by local schoolchildren who have taken this event to their hearts.”

This year, as the world commemorates the 70th Anniversary of the start of World War II, people around Australia will focus on two significant events in Port Adelaide.

On ANZAC Eve, Friday April 24, the third Light on the Water on the Port River will commemorate the sinking of the hospital ship Centaur in a year when Veterans Affairs marks the World War II 70th Anniversary with a major focus on the role of women at war.

Eleven Australian Army nurses were among the 268 Australians who perished when the Centaur was struck by a deadly Japanese torpedo off the coast of Queensland on May 12, 1943.

Australian Merchant Navy crew, medical staff and men of the 2/12th Field Ambulance and 44 others made up the rest of those killed.

Australia’s second Merchant Navy Day march in Port Adelaide on September 3 will be on the very day that World War II started and a large number of veterans are expected to march.

The first casualty of World War Two was the British merchant vessel Athenia on September 3.

German U-boat Commander, Oberleutnant Fritz-Julius Lemp  sighted the ship 250 miles off the coast of Ireland. 

He maintained radio silence to achieve surprise and surprise is what happened because the British had just declared war that day of September 3, 1939. 

Just under 12 hours later, Lemp ordered his men to fire on the ship and four torpedoes crashed into the side of the unarmed passenger ship.

The ship exploded immediately killing all but 112 people. 

Lemp later claimed that the sinking of the Athenia was an accident, and that he didn’t know it was unarmed and believed it was an armed merchant ship. 

German command told Lemp to forget about it, and destroy all evidence he had of the sinking including diaries, papers, and any other article mentioning the sinking. 

The Germans were then going to blame Winston Churchill for the sinking of the ship by stating that Churchill had ordered the ship to sink to get the U.S. into the war.

The U.S. and British of course did not believe this story.

The story of the Athenia sinking is from this Battle of the Atlantic page.

And there is a very good account with pictures of Athenia, the U-boat that sank her and contemporary newspaper reports by Mike Kemble.

The man who led the team that discovered HMAS Sydney says $4.3 million is enough money to find the Australian World War II hospital ship Centaur.

Light on the Water in Port Adelaide on ANZAC Eve 2009 will commemorate the loss of Centaur.

The Federal Government yesterday committed the money to search for the hospital ship that was torpedoed by a Japanese submarine off the south-east Queensland coast in 1943, in which 268 people died

It is believed the ship lies on the sea bed somewhere between Caloundra and North Stradbroke Island.

British shipwreck hunter David Mearns says the search for HMAS Sydney cost $5 million.

“It was a little bit more a complicated project because of the nature of the navigation and also we were looking for two ships — not just one,” he said.

“The other advantage now is that fuel prices have gone down so we’re actually in a better economic climate in terms of the cost to do it.

“So I think $4.3 million is quite a healthy budget.”

Story from ABC Online

David Mearns, who found HMAS Sydney, is keen to find the wreck of the Australian hospital ship Centaur before ANZAC Eve 2009.
 
David told us that he would like to find Centaur before Port Adelaide’s major ANZAC event Light on the Water on April 24 commemorates her sinking.
 
Adelaide school students will make 3000 cardboard candle-lit lifeboats that will float on the Port River to honour those where lost when Centaur was torpedoed and sunk off Queensland in 1943.
 
In an interview with Sydney Morning Herald writer Jonathan Dart, David said the task was feasible so long as there was funding.
 
The world-renowned shipwreck hunter said he has conducted preliminary research on Centaur and said it would be easier to find than Sydney and Kormoran.
 
He said the only barriers to finding Centaur were a lack of money and political will.
 
“On the basis of what I’ve seen of her, I believe she’s findable,” he said. “The information, even at this preliminary stage, is better than what I had to deal with in locating … Kormoran and Sydney.
 
“I think the water depth isn’t a barrier; I don’t think there are any environmental problems. But how it’s organised, who funds it — those are all big questions.”

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