A new online search engine for Victorians to discover their family members who headed for the battlefields of WWI was launched last Wednesday.
Veterans Affairs Minister Damian Drum announced the site which allows Victorians to “search the embarkation rolls and make a personal connection”.
“Perhaps an ancestor is listed among the thousands of names. Perhaps a nurse from their hometown, or a soldier who once lived where they now call home, boarded one of those troopships in Port Melbourne,” Mr Drum said.
The first Victorian WWI convoy of 17 ships carried thousands of troops, nurses, weaponry, supplies, horses and 20 police officers, including Constable Herbert Arthur George Fowles, of Ballan.
Constable Fowles embarked on the HMAT Shropshire A9 from Melbourne on October 20, 1914.
The gunner was stationed at Richmond before he was deployed to Turkey, where he was killed. He was just 27 when he died while fighting at Shrapnel Valley, Gallipoli.
By the end of WWI, 60,000 Australian men and women had been killed; 112,399 Victorians had enlisted, among them 137 Victoria Police officers.
On Sunday afternoon, thousands of Victorians marched from Station Pier to Princes Pier to commemorate the first Victorian convoy.
The public is being invited to discover the first convoy at www.anzaccentenary.vic.gov.au/discover.
“The Anzac centenary is an opportunity to honour the commitment of those who served in WWI and a time to acknowledge the thousands of Victorian men and women, past and present, who have served so courageously,” Mr Drum said.
