ANZAC day commemorates the heroic services of Australian and New Zealand troops overseas since the first world war starting in 1914, and memorises those who unfortuantely lost their lives in the process. It occurs annually on 25th April 2015, the date on which ANZAC troops took part on the ill-fated invasion of Turkey at now what is called Anzac Cove. In the follwing 8 monts until the surviving troops were evacuated to Egypt, c. 11,500 AUstralian and New Zealand troops were killed. Turkey was targeted because that country supported the German and Austrian participants in the first world war.
Every year since the 1920s Australia has declared a public holiday to commemorate not just the Turkish campaign, but also Australians who served in a long chain of military events including the second world war (especially the campaign against Japan); the Korean War; Vietnam War; and conflicts in Iraq, Afghanistan; or East Timor. We've side with Americans in nearly all those events.
Anyway here are some pictures of Armidale's event last Sunday. Armidale's celebratory march started at the former courthouse in Armidale's CBD and headed to a remembrance service in Central Park a few hundred meters away. Here we see some troops assembling for the start of the march and also members of the public watching this process.
I have a video of the march itself which I can distribute to those requesting it, but it lasts a while and is rather too large to pin here. After we reached Central Park a large crowd of maybe a couple of thousand people stationed themselves in a large circle around the central memorial.
He we see a group army personel marching to a position south-west of the memorial to await their turn on proceedings.