This contribution looks at a broad selection of books or publications read over the first three months of 2024, and is provided for the general interest of readers of this Column.
A range of decades, and subject matters, are represented covering the years of publication from 1949 through to 2024.
- Mr Einstein’s Secretary by Matthew Reilly;
- Australian Foreign Affairs’ Issue 20 – ‘Dead in the Water: The AUKUS delusion;
- ‘The Last Charge of the Australian Light Horses’ by Peter Fitzsimons;
- ‘One Wet Season’ by Ion L. Idriess [published in 1949, including the author’s biography];
- ‘Call Of The Raven’ by Wilbur Smith [with Corban Addison];
- ‘Kidnapped’ by Mark Tedeschi QC [the true story of the kidnapping of 10 year old Graeme Thorne];
- Australia’s Light Horse: The Campaign in the Middle East, 1916-1918, by Phillip Bradley;
- National Geographic special edition – ‘The Story of Jesus’; and,
- Quarterly Essay 93: Bad Cop: Peter Dutton’s Strongman Politics by Lech Blaine.
20th January
‘Mr Einstein’s Secretary’ by Matthew Reilly, published in 2023, 450 pages. This is the first book I have read by that author, generally a writer of crime and thriller fiction which I usually don’t bother with these days. The title attracted me when I was the QBD bookshelf last Friday when I was in Melton recently.. Described as about ‘A secretary like no other in a Epic spanning 40 years’ – leading up to the 2nd World War, during the war and beyond, mainly set in either Nazi Germany or the USA throughout that period. A form of historical novel of the kind I usually enjoy – as described by the author himself – “This a work of fiction. Hanna Fischer [the Secretary] is fictitious. But many of the events depicted in this novel really happened and many of the characters in it actually existed.” He then goes on to describe the real fates of those ‘real’ characters, or events, such as the Nazis, Bormann or Hitler; the Ku Klux Klan march of 1925; the Manhattan nuclear project; the 1936 Berlin Olympic Games; the Muhlviertal ‘Hare’ Hunt; and so on.
The book tells the story of Hanna Fischer, a young woman who aspired to study physics under Albert Einstein. However, her life takes a dramatic turn when she becomes a student, a secretary, a sister, and a spy. The novel takes the reader on a thrilling journey through some of history’s most dangerous times, from racist gangs in Berlin to gangsters in New York City, Nazis in the 1930s, and Hitler’s inner circle during World War II.
As Goodreads describes the novel ……………………
“All Hanna Fischer ever wanted to do was to study physics under the great Albert Einstein. But when, as a teenager in 1919, her life is suddenly turned upside-down, she is catapulted into a new and extraordinary life – as a student, a secretary, a sister and a spy. From racist gangs in Berlin to gangsters in New York City, Nazis in the 1930s and Hitler’s inner circle during the Second World War, Hanna will encounter some of history’s greatest minds and most terrible moments, all while desperately trying to stay alive. She is a most unique secretary and she will work for many bosses – from shrewd businessmen to vile Nazis, to the greatest boss of them all, Mr Albert Einstein… Spanning forty years, this is the thrilling tale of a young woman propelled through history’s most dangerous times. But read it carefully, because all may not be as it seems”.
The book is certainly written in an interesting style – in an interview with the author about the book which is a novel about a secretary navigating her way through a world of gangsters, the 1929 stock market crash, Nazi Germany and World War II, with flashbacks and flash-forwards, multiple points of view and characters including Albert Einstein, Albert Speer, Werner Heisenberg, and several geniuses of the atomic age, well does a novel like this even come about?
Reilly: “I think it’s safe to say….it’s unlike any of my other novels….. In short, I wanted Mr Eistein’s Secretary to be an epic. To be a story that spanned decades. In doing that, I wanted time and place to be characters in the story. Structurally, the story is built on Hanna remembering her life, either during her fake funeral or through the three interrogations she endured [and everything that went in-between]. So if she is recalling been in a particular place or situation, that triggers other memories of being in that place at another time.
Most of the book is written in the first person, from Hanna’s viewpoint and memories, but on occasions, it is her dangerous twin sister [Ooma] relating the memories!!
In writing about the sister, Reilly explains that “I wrote Ooma as a selfish, petty yet brilliant person who has what’s known today as ‘borderline personality disorder’. This story is about Hanna’s remarkable journey – and remarkable growth – through her life. I wanted Ooma to be a wildcard in that life, a constant danger lurking at the edges of Hanna’s world. The way she can change emotions in a heartbeat makes her unpredictable and very dangerous”
I don’t know if I’ll read anymore of Reilly’s books – as indicated earlier the ‘inclusion of historical reality in the fictionized story’ is what attracted this reader on this occasion………………..
11th February 2024
Finished reading ‘Australian Foreign Affairs’ Issue 20 – ‘Dead in the Water: The AUKUS delusion.
The latest issue of Australian Foreign Affairs examines Australia’s momentous decision to form a security pact with the United States and the United Kingdom that includes an ambitious, expensive and risky plan to acquire nuclear-power submarines – a move that will have far-reaching military and strategic consequences.
Dead in the water looks at whether the AUKUS deal will enhance or undermine Australia’s security as tensions between China and the US rise, at the impact on Australia’s ties with its regional neighbours, and at whether the submarines plan is likely to ever be achieved.
Essays by four writers cover the question of whether the deal is a futuristic delusion.
Hugh White examines whether Australia needs nuclear-powered submarines and whether the AUKUS plan will deliver them.
Susannah Patton looks at the lessons for Australia from the region’s responses to AUKUS.
Elizabeth Buchanan explores how Australia could use its valuable geography to enhance ties with AUKUS allies and other partners.
Andrew Davies weighs the benefits of nuclear-powered submarines against the costs of acquiring and maintaining them.
Other writers, such as Hervé Lemahieu propose that Australia pursue a common travel area and an integrated digital market with the Pacific, while Jack Corbett considers Solomon Islands’ economic options in an era of great power rivalry
Meanwhile, from the introductory comment by Jonathan Peasrlman, editor of the Quarterly Essay –
Australia is embarking on the most expensive – and arguably the most ambitious – defence acquisition in its history. Yet the decision to buy nuclear-powered submarines has been subject to little scrutiny, partly because Labor – given hours to consider the AUKUS deal by the Morrison government – duly fell in behind it. Serious questions are now emerging about the plan’s risks and costs. As Hugh White concludes in a scathing assessment: “Coalition and Labor governments have committed Australia to acquire nuclear-powered submarines that we do not need, via a plan which will almost certainly fail”. And time is pressing: if AUKUS is destined to fail, it needs to be abandoned quickly – to lower the wasted costs and to ensure that Australia is not left defenceless.
So in summary, Hugh White [an Emeritus Professor of Strategic Studies at the Strategic and Defence Studies Centre of the Australian National University in Canberra, Australia, long-time defence and intelligence analyst, and author who has published works on military strategy and international relations] in particular, argues in much detail, while considering the pros and cons, that AUKUS is ‘a grave mistake’ He concludes his essay with the statement that ‘our political leaders have given us the charade of AUKUS, which will stand as a fitting symbol of our failure, as a country, to respond effectively to the biggest shift in our strategic circumstances since 1788. If we are to recover from this blunder, and do better, we must start by understanding and accepting how much our region, and the world beyond it, is changing’.
The other writers in the issue explore the prospects of AUKUS succeeding, the logistical challenges [i.e., the enormous costs and challenges in terms of ongoing support and maintenance requirements needed should the scheme ever eventuate], the regional responses, and alternative options.
If the subject and its broader implications are of interest, you may consider it worthwhile purchasing a copy, usually available at most good bookstores, or through Schwartz Books, or www.australianforeignaffairs.com
13th February 2024
‘The Last Charge of the Australian Light Horse’ by Peter Fitzsimons, published in 2023, 497 pages
A great read, as always from this author, and another brilliant depiction of an event and circumstances leading up to it from the early ‘European’ history of Australian.
The book description, as provided by Amazon and various other suppliers reads that –
On 31st October 1917, as the day’s light faded, the Australian Light Horse charged against their enemy. Eight hundred men and horses galloped four miles across open country, towards the artillery, rifles and machine guns of the Turks occupying the seemingly unassailable town of Beersheba. What happened in the next hour changed the course of history.
This brave battle and the extraordinary adventures that led to it are brought vividly to life by Australia’s greatest storyteller, Peter FitzSimons. It is an epic tale of farm boys, drovers, bank clerks, dentists, poets and scoundrels transported to fight a war half a world away, and is full of incredible characters: from Major Banjo Paterson to Lawrence of Arabia; the brilliant writer Trooper Ion Idriess and the humble General Harry Chauvel; the tearaway Test fast bowler ‘Tibby’ Cotter and the infamous warhorse, Bill the Bastard. All have their part to play in the enthralling, sprawling drama of the Australian Light Horse.
Theirs was a war fought in an ancient land with modern weapons; where the men of the Light Horse were trained in sight of the pyramids, drank in the brothels of Cairo and fought through lands known to them only as names from the Bible.
[That fact alone provided a very poignant aspect to the story – read, and basically written at the same time as the modern day tragedies of death and displacement take place in areas of the Middle East which feature so prominently in the book such as Gaza].
The Last Charge of the Australian Light Horse traces the hard path of the Light Horse from the bleakest of starts – being deprived of their horses and fighting at Gallipoli in the tragic Battle of the Nek – to triumph and glory in the desert. Revealing the feats of the Australians who built the legend, it is a brilliantly told tale of courage, resilience and derring-do from Australia’s favourite storyteller.
The text included a couple of quotes from Verner Knuckey [my Mother’s father]. One of those –
“Lone comrades are found too, including the discovery of one Australian trooper of the 8th Light Horse who, Trooper Verner Knuckey will recount, ‘had been shot in both legs and lay out for three days and nights.. When the Turks had found him, they had, ‘made him as comfortable as possible and left a bottle of water beside him. That water saved his life. Any dirty action done can I think be traced to the German and Austrian officers in charge of these Turks”
[from ‘The Last Charge of the Australian Light Horse’ by Peter Fitzsimons, pub. 2023, page 121]
21st February
Today [or tonight] I finished reading ‘One Wet Season’ by Ion L. Idriess, published in 1949 [272 pages].This book was a Christmas gift by my Mother to my Father in 1949, one of a number of books written by Idriess that were in my father’s possession and passed down to myself. I’d read a couple of them previously – my attention was drawn back to him after reading Peter Fitzsimons’ latest book about the charge of the Light Horse [previous review], where a number of quotations throughout the book were attributed to the writings of Idriess who also served with the Light Horse in WWI
‘One Wet Season’ is a book about life in the Kimberley region of Western Australia[1] during the wet season of 1934. The book records true stories of the lives of the pioneers and Aboriginals of the Kimberley, centring predominantly on those living in the King Leopold Ranges and spending the wet season in the town of Derby, Western Australia.
Ion Idriess, who has spent many a long ‘Wet’ in the West Kimberley, puts into print a thrilling account of this aspect of Australian life. Perhaps I mightn’t use the term ‘thrilling’ in describing the book, but certainly enlightening and of historical interest in depicting not just the life of that time & part of Australia, but the attitudes and perspectives from the point of view of those living there and/or passing through. I was especially interested in the attitude to the Aboriginal population by the whites in the area and the many descriptions of interaction between the two races. While far from perfect, in this area of WA in particular, those interactions seemed to come over as less violent in nature, as compared for eg, with the latter part of the C19th century in Queensland.
Times have changed [to some degree] and much of the language used in describing the Aboriginal peoples is no longer acceptable, and rightly so, would simply not be tolerated in today’s society. But in the 1940s and in writing about our native Australians, Idriess was speaking to the culture of the time. Take the following brief selection of quotations from my copy [originally published by Angus and Robertson].
- “Poor old Venus, [from page 250] I believe she really was the ugliest lubra in the Kimberleys, but that dog loved her. ‘Google-eyed Maggie on Napier Downs is about the ugliest gin I ever met’, said an old-timer quietly, ‘but I’m not holding that against her. Many a gin in this country has done a white man a good turn’. The boys puffed silently at their pipes a moment; the old-timer had spoken truly. ‘Ever you noticed,’ remarked Jack Knopp, ‘how the abo when he’s been working for a few years with the whites, but particularly the statin bred abo, turns around on his brother’….”
- Yarning the time away [page 260] – “’There’s still a few more or less wild munjons over the Range,’ mused a stockman, ‘but I suppose they’ll all be broken in time, ‘ he added regretfully. ‘They’re all tame along the Fitzroy now,’ yawned a teamster from Go-Go Station, ‘fat as prime beef. And plenty of piccaninnies amongst them’”
- And speaking of a chase by white authorities [page 263] tracking a group of ‘bush niggers’ who has been spearing the settler’s cattle , but who made their escape despite all precautions by the trackers, one of those chasers noted that – “And yet those low-browed sons of apes knew exactly when we were coming, just strolled out of the trap at their leisure”.
Finally, the following description provides an interesting portrayal of the station Aborigines, certainly on those properties where they were better treated and/or regarded by those they worked for.
From pages 260-261
Well-conditioned now, after nine month’s station feeding. But, after the Wet they will come streaming back to the stations hollow-gutted, ribbed like a stock-horse in drought-time, voracious for plover [flour], tea and tchugar [sugar], and that heavenly luxury, tobacco.
They will gorge like famished wolves until they begin to build up again. For often, during their walkabout, they have gone hungry, cold and wet. Although there is native food in the bush, the hunter must employ constant effort and unremitting bushcraft to secure it. And the station black loses his keen edge of bushcraft, loses his kinship with the Wild, is a child divorced from his Mother Earth.
Yes, most of the ‘tame’ blacks are glad to come back whooping back to the station after a three months’ walkabout. But if tea, sugar, flour, and the precious tobacco grew ready-made in the bush, they would not come back at all”.
About the Author [compliment of a summary from a Wikipedia article].
Ion Llewellyn Idriess OBE (20 September 1889 – 6 June 1979) was a prolific and influential Australian author. He wrote more than 50 books over 43 years between 1927 and 1969 – an average of one book every 10 months, and twice published three books in one year (1932 and 1940). His first book was Madman’s Island, published in 1927 at the age of 38, and his last was written at the age of 79. Called Challenge of the North, it told of Idriess’s ideas for developing the north of Australia. Two of his works, The Cattle King (1936) and Flynn of the Inland (1932) had more than forty reprintings.
Idriess was born in Waverley, a suburb of Sydney, to Juliette Windeyer (who had been born as Juliette Edmunds in 1865 at Binalong) and Walter Owen Idriess (a sheriff’s officer born in 1862, who had emigrated from Dolgellau, in Wales). At birth Ion Idriess’s name was registered as “Ion Windeyer”, although he never seems to have used this name.
From his late teens, he worked in rural New South Wales, particularly in the Narrabri and Moree districts. He travelled extensively around the state, working in a variety of itinerant jobs including employment as a rabbit poisoner, boundary rider, drover, prospecting for gold as well as harvesting sandalwood. He also worked as a shearer and dingo shooter. While working as an opal miner at Lightning Ridge in about 1910, he wrote short pieces for The Bulletin about life on the opal fields. He later headed north, working in several tin mines around Cairns and Cooktown including his own claim. In 1913 he moved to Cape York Peninsula, where he lived with an Aboriginal clan, learning their customs and lifestyle.
With the outbreak of war, in 1914 he returned to Townsville and enlisted in the 5th Light Horse Regiment, AIF, as a trooper. He saw action in Palestine, Sinai and Turkey, being wounded at Beersheba and Gallipoli – where he acted as spotter for noted sniper Billy Sing.
After returning to Australia and recuperating from his wounds, he travelled to remote Cape York, and worked with pearlers and missionaries in the Torres Strait islands and Papua New Guinea where he worked as a gold miner. Other ventures included buffalo shooting in the Northern Territory, and journeys to Central and Western Australia.
In 1928 Idriess settled in Sydney where he wrote as a freelance writer. His writing style drew on his experiences as a soldier, prospector, and bushman. He wrote on a multitude of topics, including travel, recollection, biography, history, anthropology and his own ideas on possible future events. His books were generally non-fiction, but written in a narrative, story style. Most of his books were published by Angus & Robertson. Idriess wrote from real life experiences using knowledge he had personally gained by travelling extensively and working at a variety of occupations. “Idriess was no stylist, but his writing was immediate, colourful, well paced and, despite the speed at which it was written, always well structured.”
Although he generally wrote under his name, some early articles for The Bulletin were written under the pseudonym of “Gouger”. When travelling, Idriess was known as “Jack”.
In 1968 he was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire for his services to literature.
Idriess died at a nursing home in Mona Vale in Sydney on 6 June 1979, at the age of 89.[8]
His work slipped from favour after his death, but has experienced a renewal of interest. In 2017, Nicolas Rothwell said: “As so often in Australian letters, an initial fall into obscurity and the harsh judgments of the literary establishment serve as good indicators of a writer’s pre-eminence”. His work was never adapted for the screen although several books were optioned by producers.
8th March 2024
Read ‘Call Of The Raven’ by Wilbur Smith [with Corban Addison], published in 2020, 410 pages.
Getting into the final few books by Smith – I don’t whether this is a sign of my age, but Smith’s novels have always had a strong element of violence in them, but the last couple I have read, and especially this one, the extremity and prevalence of violence, I found much more noticeable, and at times almost disturbing.
Nevertheless, despite that factor, this novel was another great read by this author whose novels I have been reading since January 1973 [The Lion Feeds was his first novel].
The action-packed and gripping new adventure by number one bestselling author, Wilbur Smith, about one man’s quest for revenge, and the brutality of slavery in America, and the imbalance between humans that can drive, or defeat us. – THE DESIRE FOR REVENGE CAN BURN THE HEART OUT OF A MAN.
The son of a wealthy plantation owner and a doting mother, Mungo St John is accustomed to wealth and luxury – until he returns from university to discover his family ruined, his inheritance stolen and his childhood sweetheart, Camilla, taken by the conniving Chester Marion. Mungo swears vengeance and devotes his life to saving Camilla-and destroying Chester. Camilla, trapped in New Orleans, powerless as a kept slave and subject to Chester’s brutish behaviour, must do whatever it takes to survive. As Mungo battles his own fate and misfortune, he must question what it takes for a man to regain his power in the world when he has nothing, and what he is willing to do to exact revenge
14th March 2024
This next book was Kidnapped by Mark Tedeschi QC, published in 2015, 317 pages. It is the true story of Australia’s only known kidnapping of a child for ransom, from Barrister and Crown Prosecutor Mark Tedeschi. An easily read but fascinating detailed insight into the crime and the investigations that followed, perhaps at a level not seen previously.
It was 64 years ago, when eight-year-old Graeme Thorne was kidnapped on his way to school in July 1960, Australia was gripped with fear and loathing. What monster would dare take financial advantage of the most treasured bond of love – between parent and child? Just weeks earlier, Graeme’s parents had won a fortune in the Opera House Lottery, and this had attracted the attention of the perpetrator, Stephen Bradley.
Bradley was a most unlikely kidnapper, however his greed for the Thorne’s windfall saw him cast aside any sympathy for his victim or his victim’s family, and drove him to take brazen risks with the life of his young captive.
Kidnapped tells the astounding true story of how this crime was planned and committed, and describes the extraordinary police investigation that was launched to track the criminal down. Mark Tedeschi explores the mind of the intriguing and seriously flawed Stephen Bradley, and also the points of view of the victim, his family – and the police, whose work pioneered the use of many techniques that are now considered commonplace, marking the beginning of modern-day forensic science in Australia.
Using his powerful research and storytelling skills, Mark Tedeschi reveals one of Australia’s greatest true crime dramas, and what can only be described as the trial of the 20th century.
Mark Tedeschi KC has worked as a Barrister and Crown Prosecutor for more than forty years, working on some of Australia’s most significant criminal cases. He was the Senior Crown Prosecutor in New South Wales for twenty years, during which he also served as President of the Australian Association of Crown Prosecutors. Mark has published many articles on the law, history, genealogy and photography, and is the author of critically acclaimed non-fiction titles Eugenia, Kidnapped, Murder at Myall Creek and Missing, Presumed Dead.
Better Reading provided the following Synopsis of the book
Kidnapped is about Stephen Bradley, who perpetrated the 1960 kidnapping for ransom and murder of eight-year-old Sydney schoolboy, Graeme Thorne. This was not only a vivid example of murder for greed, but also marked the beginning in Australia of modern forensic science as a tool in the investigation of serious crime. Many of the techniques of scientific detection used to implicate Bradley had never before been used in a police investigation, but have since become commonplace. Certainly, there had never before been a case in which so many methods of forensic investigation had been used in combination to detect and implicate the perpetrator of this terrible crime. This case therefore marks a watershed in the annals of modern criminal investigation. Mark Tedeschi has prosecuted many people who were prepared to kill to acquire the object of their desires. As such he is uniquely placed to present an insight into the mind of Stephen Bradley. A man so motivated by greed and self-entitlement that when he read about the winner of the Opera House Lottery, his first thought was how much more he deserved the money. From there he located the Thorne family in Sydney’s Eastern suburbs and proceeded to plan the kidnap and ransom of their young son, Graeme. The taking of Graeme off a Sydney street in daylight hours caused shock and horror across the nation and when his body was found the police used all means available, both old and new, to track down Stephen Bradley and convict him.. Mark’s new book is a gripping account of a terrible crime that many people today still remember.
17th March 2024
‘The Australian Light Horse: The Campaign in the Middle East, 1914-1918’ by Phillip Bradley, published in 2016, 196 pages. Again, an interesting [and disturbing in view of the enormous casualties faced on all sides] generally overlooked in comparison with the fighting on Gallipoli and the Western Front during WW 1.
Again, Grandfather Verner Knuckey is quoted on a number of occasions, in the early part of the campaign, as he did not remain with the Light Horse much beyond the end of 1916.
It was interesting comparing this ‘history’ with the book summarised earlier on the Light Horse by Peter Fitzsimons. In this case Bradley provides a much broader and extended history of the Australian Light Horse during WW I, in comparison with Fitzsimons specific concentration on the events leading up to the Charge of the Light Brigade and that event itself. That ‘historical’ battle is treated no differently to many other battles and campaigns b the Light horse in terms of he space in the book devoted to it.
As with the following review [re. National Geographic] I found it of particular interest to read of the geographical locations of so much of the travails of the Light Horse, especially in view of the current events in the Middle East.
From the Australian War Memorial site. We read that:
“The story of the famous Australian Light Horse in the desert campaigns of World War 1. Throughout history, mounted troops have been known as elite men of arms and the Australian Light Horse is a part of that legendary tradition.
Part cavalry and part infantry and often recognised by the emu feathers in their slouch hats, the light horsemen, were described by the official historian, H.S. Gullett, as ‘in body and spirit the true product of the Australian countryside’. They remain, today, the embodiment of the digger ethos..
After the Gallipoli campaign most of the Australian Light Horse, commanded by Major General Harry Chauvel, remained in Egypt to defend the Suez Canal. After thwarting the Turkish advance at Romani in August 1916 the Light Horse led the advance into Palestine with sparkling victories at Magdhaba and Rafa.
Twice checked at Gaza despite their bold courage, the light horsemen then broke that stalemate following the legendary charge at Beersheba on 31 October 1917. The fall of Jerusalem, the perilous raids on Amman, the trials of the Jordan Valley and the final breakthrough to Damascus followed before Turkey surrendered on 30 October 1918…In Australian Light Horse their story is brought to vivid life through the diaries, letters and photographs of the light horsemen who took part in the bloody battles of the desert campaigns o f the Sinai and Palestine from April 1916 to October 1918”…
On a personal note, my grandfather is referred to a number of occasions early in the book, though he did not remain long enough with the Light Horse, to participate in the more active campaigns described in this book. For the record, his diaries [which are now held in the Australian War Museum] are referenced on page 8, and on various occasions through pages 36-39.
One of those reads as follows:
“The 8th Light Horse was soon in contact and the firing was pretty brisk. Verner Knuckey was behind the top of a sandhill but was being fired on from the flank. The first thing he knew there was a vicious zip and sand rose about two feet to his right. When the second shot hit the same distance to his left, Knuckey knew it was time to move and sure enough the third bullet hit the ground where he had been lying. His squadron retired soon thereafter, the light horsemen suffering terribly in the heat. The only shade was what the horse threw, Knuckey wrote. In the middle of the day, each man would try to sleep under their horse, which would not move an inch..” …The next four hours was agony for us, wrote Verner Knuckey. Five Echuca boys copped it and only two survived to be invalided home. Knuckey’s tent mate and great friend, Dick Chambers, was one of those killed, along with twelve horses. Poor brutes, Knuckey wrote, there are no half measures about shrapnel pellets…..………“The heat was merciless, the temperature 44 degrees Celsius in the shade, which does not exist. If ever the sun burnt it did that day, Knuckey wrote. The hot sun scorched our skin. Wounded men would crawl off for help. In several cases I saw them crawling on one hand and the other arm practically blown off, blood was everywhere and at last we knew what war was………….[from ‘Australian Light Horse’ by Phillip Bradley, published in 2016, pages 36-39]
The Light Horseman quoted above and in various parts of the two publications was Corporal Verner Knuckey. From the Writer Biographies [quoted on page 179]:
“Corporal Verner Knuckey served with the 8th Light Horse Regiment in the Sinai Campaign before transferring to the Australian Flying Corps as a mechanic in January 1917. Before the war, Knuckey was a clerk at the Commonwealth Treasury from East Malvern in Melbourne, Victoria. He enlisted in July 1915 and returned to Australia in September 1919”.
He later married an English girl from Newcastle, UK, whom he met through family friends while on leave in England during WWI.
Verner Knuckey, and that English lass were my Grandparents, and the parents of my mother, Betty Knuckey. His War Diaries from which the foregoing quotes were taken, are in the possession of the National War Museum in Canberra – eight pocket sized booklets, which my wife initially photocopied in their entirety during the 1970’s while she worked for the Army Department. Later, while the diaries were still in her possession, my Mother painstakingly typed them in full on an ancient typewriter in the late 1970s, while in recent years, those foolscap sized pages were used by my brother, to have the diaries retyped and printed into a modern bound A4 size booklet.
26th March 2024
I’ve just read a National Geographic special edition – ‘The Story of Jesus’, a publication from around December, 2021. While I have not subscribed to National Geographic for some decades, I was a little surprised to find this subject matter in the magazine, suggesting that National Geographic had substantially broadened the scope of the articles they publish. However, on reflection, I should not have been surprised, as the following second paragraph below, clearly indicates the relationship of geography as such to the topic in question, as I recall now, have many articles in past years.
Before Jesus became one of the most famous figures in the world, he was a shepherd and teacher in Galilee living an unremarkable life. In this lavishly illustrated portrait of the life of a prophet, scholars unveil what is known and speculated about Jesus’s youth, life, work, plus the larger events that combined to shape the world in which he lived.
Following in Jesus’s footsteps from Bethlehem to Nazareth, some highlights include: Maps of Jesus’ path across the Holy Land, forensic reconstruction of key biblical sites, and insights into Jesus’ childhood and young adulthood. this writer – with most of the story taking place in the Middle East, and having just read two books about the Australian Light Horse serving in that part of the world – this publication included a number of very detailed maps related to the life of Jesus, and one couldn’t help but take note of the names of towns, rivers. Lakes, etc, all of which had historical Biblical connotations’ – brought to real life today in view of the current war and conflict involving Israel and Palestine and other sites in the wider Middle East environment.
30th March 2024
The Quarterly Essay, No: 93, released in March, 2024 is titled ‘Bad Cop: Peter Dutton’s Strongman Politics’, and authored by Lech Blaine, whose writings have appeared in publication such as the Good Weekend, Griffith Review, The Guardian, and the Monthly, and who is currently the 2023 Charles Perkins Centre writer in residence. Covering some 119 pages,
Blaine traces the making of a hardman, from Queensland detective to leader of the current Federal [Liberal] Opposition in Australia, from property investor to minister for Home Affairs. The essay is described as the story of ambition, race and power, and a politician with a plan – to reach the top!
An interesting Essay, which covers Dutton’s family ancestral background, and Dutton’s early career in the police force in Queensland, which would mould many of his attitudes and policies in his political career, especially in respect to security, crime and the risks of immigration and refugees – perhaps always looking for and anticipating the worst in people and organisations.
In a selected extract from the Essay, we read:
“Peter Dutton eats bleeding-heart lefties for breakfast. He is tall and bald, with a resting death stare. His eyes – two brown beads – see evil so that the weak can be blind. His lips are allergic to political correctness. Peter preaches the gospel of John Howard with the fanaticism of Paul Keating. He wants to do the Labor Party slowly, slowly, slowly, and defeat the woe-is-me heroism of identity politics.
“It’s a movement that seeks to define and divide us by class, sex, race, religion and more besides,” said Dutton in 2023. “Worse, such movements seek to undermine traditional values of ambition, gratitude and forgiveness and replace them with resentment, envy and anger.”
Once upon a time, the federal Opposition leader was a cop in clammy Queensland. He was a listener, a lurker, a watcher; not a storyteller, nor a performer. He set traps for suspects and waited for them to make a mistake. For poker-faced Dutton, leadership isn’t about kissing the cheeks of babies, or the arses of journalists. It is about bleeding for your beliefs and denying the griefs of your enemies. White lies are often the cost of beating the bad guys. “In a different age, we’d be clashing swords,” Dutton told journalist Madonna King in 2014. “I see myself as a contestant in that battle.”
In May 2022, Australia just so happened to elect a good cop as prime minister. Anthony Albanese promised a cuddlier, less bloodthirsty form of leadership. “Safe change,” with a patient embrace of democratic rituals………… Dutton isn’t so happy-go-lucky. He views the world with the pessimism of a Russian novelist. The son of a Brisbane bricklayer, he bombed out of university to become a copper. His earnest conservatism comes from the gut instincts of a suburban upbringing and the racial tensions of being a police officer in Queensland; not from the anti-abortion bootcamps of Bob Santamaria, nor the sermons of Brian Houston.
“I am not the evangelical here, not out and proud on abortion,” Dutton told Niki Savva for her book Plots and Prayers. “I voted for gay marriage.”
Dutton hasn’t fabricated an identity based on feedback from focus groups. “ScoMo” spoke like a NIDA student’s idea of a Queenslander. “Dutts,” as mates call him, doesn’t strain for an ocker accent or drape himself in sporting paraphernalia. His persona? A sombre straightshooter. One tough hombre. The bad cop.”
Worth a read to get a clearer version of the man – not sure how biased the author is, but Dutton is not generally presented as someone you would especially like, but maybe that’s not a handicap to future aspirations?
Blaine ends the essay with “Dutton wants a country where people don’t worry about the powerful and feel threatened by the defenceless…..This is Peter Dutton. Tall and strong at first glance. But when you watch him for a long time, you can see that the man is small and scared”.
Bill's space 
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