Vindicatrix Boy

The Land Management Corporation is working with a Seafarers Memorial Committee to move the Vincent Street Navigator sculpture to a more prominent waterfront location in Port Adelaide.

The memorial will be adapted by sculptor Karen Genoff and dedicated to all seamen who have served in wartime.

It will commemorate the tragedies of World War II when the Australian Merchant Navy suffered a higher rate of casualties than the military services.

The memorial will be a focus for World Maritime Day and for ANZAC Light on the Water on Anzac Eve.

Australian merchant shipping was attacked by German and Japanese naval forces along the Australian coast as well as in international waters.

The project involves Port Adelaide Mayor Gary Johanson; Councillor Bruce Johansen; Port Adelaide Federal Member Mark Butler’ Maritime Union Secretary Jamie Newlyn; Maritime Museum Director Kevin Jones; Andre Stuyt, Port Centre Co-ordination Group; Rex Munn, Maritime Union; Keith Shegog, Port Adelaide Historical Society; Pat Perry, retired Industrial Advocate; Keith Ridgeway, International Transport Workers Federation; John Ford, National Trust; and John Williams, Vice President, Merchant Navy Association SA.

Karen Genoff’s professional arts practice spans 29 years. She is represented in many public and private collections with several major public works in Adelaide, interstate and internationally in Japan and New Zealand.

“My work is diverse and I create individual objects. installations and objects grouped as dialogue.”

Read more about the ANZAC Light on the Water event here.

I am seeking the support of all members of the Merchant Navy Association, Vindicatrix Association and Semaphore Port Adelaide RSL for our 2008 ANZAC Eve commemoration on the Port River.

It is a wonderful opportunity to participate in a significant community event Anzac Light on the Water which honours those who served in many conflicts around the world.

ANZAC Eve 2007 saw the inaugural staging of this unique and moving tribute when Adelaide schoolchildren, veterans and families launched a fleet of paper and cardboard lifeboats bearing lighted candles on the Port River.

It was a stunning new ANZAC image and a fitting tribute to the seafarers who rowed our troops ashore at Gallipoli.

Many of the school students had put the name of their veteran great-grandfather or grandfather on the side of their paper or cardboard lifeboat. Other students had written ‘World Peace’.

The event was a poignant reminder that many of the troopships that transported Australian troops to Gallipoli departed from Port Adelaide.

As the troopships pulled away from the wharf many of the troops were standing in the lifeboats that later would transport them to the landing beach at Anzac Cove.
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Our photos show that a happy time was had by all eleven lucky folk from South Australia who attended the Vindicatrix Reunion in Fremantle.

A boat trip up the Swan River to view the houses of Perth’s rich and famous, a tour of the Swan Bells building and David Partridge reading and then unveiling of a plaque of his poem Heroes dedicated to merchant seamen were highlights of the event.

On Friday November 9 approximately 100 Vindi Boys and Girls (11 from SA) were to gather together once again, this time at the Cockburn Power Boat Clubhouse in Fremantle.

We were told that transport had been arranged to take us to the venue and that we should wait outside the caravan park entrance. Imagine our surprise when a number 208 red double decker bus arrived with other Vindi Boys and Girls on board. No room below so we had to go up top.

This was a casual evening with a buffet dinner with a joke or two from Tommy Cooper (aka David Partridge) and the usual raffle.
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