International conference
1918 Year of Victory
Speakers
The Hon Alan Griffin MP, Minister for Veterans’ Affairs
Alan Griffin, Member for Bruce (Vic), was born in Melbourne in 1960 and educated at the Australian National University, Canberra. A member of the Australian Labor Party since 1979, he was elected to the House of Representatives in 1993. He was a member of the Opposition Shadow Ministry from October 1998 and served on numerous parliamentary committees and overseas delegations. He has a long-standing commitment to Australia’s veteran and ex-service community, having been Shadow Minister for Veterans’ Affairs since 2005. He has gained an insight into the unique experiences of veterans and ex-service personnel, and the issues that face them and their families, through his active engagement with veterans across Australia. He was appointed Minister for Veterans’ Affairs in December 2007 on the election of the Rudd Labor government. As Minister, he has visited the battlefields of the Western Front and he has a keen interest in the history of the First World War.
Keynote address: 1918: the road to victory
Jay Winter is Charles J. Stille Professor of History at Yale University. He is an internationally renowned scholar of the First World War and its impact on the 20th century. His interests range widely, including the remembrance of war in the 20th century, European population decline, the causes and institutions of war, British popular culture in the era of the Great War and the Armenian genocide of 1915. Professor Winter is the author or co-author of over a dozen books, including Socialism and the Challenge of War, Ideas and Politics in Britain, 1912-18, The Great War and the British People, The Fear of Population Decline, The Experience of World War I, Sites of Memory, Sites of Mourning: The Great War in European Cultural History, 1914-1918: The Great War and the Shaping of the 20th Century, Remembering War: The Great War between History and Memory in the 20th Century, and Dreams of Peace and Freedom: Utopian Moments in the 20th Century. He has contributed more than 40 book chapters to edited volumes, and edited or co-edited 13 books including a collection of essays entitled America and the Armenian Genocide. His most recent publications include The Great War in history: Debates and controversies, 1914 to the present (with Antoine Prost, 2005), Remembering war: The Great War between memory and history in the twentieth century (2006), Dreams of peace and freedom: Utopian moments in the twentieth century (2006), and Capital cities at war: A Cultural History (2007), the second volume of his two-volume collective history (with Jean-Louis Robert) of Paris, London, and Berlin during the First World War. (The first volume, on social and economic history, was published in 1997.) In 1997, Professor Winter received an Emmy award for the best documentary film series of the year as co-producer and co-writer of The Great War and the Shaping of the Twentieth Century, an eight-hour series broadcast on PBS and the BBC, and shown subsequently in 28 countries. Professor Winter is one of the founders and a member of the comité directeur of the research centre of the Historial de la grande guerre, the international museum of the Great War, in Péronne, Somme, France. He is presently working on a biography of René Cassin, author of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
Stabbed in the front: the German defeat in the West, 1918, and the myth of the Armistice
Robin Prior is Visiting Professorial Fellow at the University of Adelaide. He was inaugural Head of the School of Humanities and Social Sciences at the University of New South Wales, Australian Defence Force Academy where he taught for twenty-two years. A world authority on the history of the First World War, he specialises in the study of military operations, command, and technology. He is the author of numerous books and articles, including Churchill’s ‘World Crisis’ as History; and (with Trevor Wilson), Command on the Western Front: The Military Career of General Sir Henry Rawlinson 1914-1918 (1992), Passchendaele: The Untold Story (1996), The First World War (1999) and The Somme (2005). He is also a co-editor and contributor to The Oxford Companion to Australian Military History (1995, 2008) and has published chapters in numerous other books, including Hugh Cecil & Peter Liddle (eds), Facing Armageddon: the First World War experienced (1996), journal articles, and entries in The Oxford Illustrated History of the First World War, the Encyclopaedia of 20th Century Europe, the New Dictionary of National Biography, and the Encyclopaedia of Twentieth Century Britain. Robin recently completed a new book on Gallipoli for release by Yale University Press in 2009, and he is presently working on a book on Britain in 1940, funded by an Australian Research Council grant.
Finest hour? The British Expeditionary Force’s operations on the Western Front in 1918
Gary Sheffield, holds the Chair of War Studies at the University of Birmingham. Previously he was Professor of Modern History at King's College London, a post held concurrently with that of Land Warfare Historian on the Higher Command and Staff Course at the UK's Joint Services Command and Staff College. He started his career in the Department of War Studies at Royal Military Academy Sandhurst. His publications include Douglas Haig: War Diaries and Letters 1914-1918 (with John Bourne, 2005) and Forgotten Victory: The First World War—Myths and Realities (2001). His next book, Douglas Haig, the British Army and The First World War is due to be published in 2009 and he is also working on a study of the experience of the British and Commonwealth soldier in the Second World War. He is on the advisory board of the Journal of the Royal United Services Institute, and is Regimental Historian of The Rifles. Gary Sheffield is a regular broadcaster on radio and television, and writes for the British national press.
From victory to defeat: the German army in 1918
Robert Foley is Senior Lecturer in Modern Military History at the University of Liverpool. Before joining the University of Liverpool, he taught for five years at the Joint Services Command and Staff College. A specialist in German military thought, he has published extensively on the subject. His German Strategy and the Path to Verdun (2005) won the Royal Historical Society’s Gladstone Prize in 2005. He has also published an annotated translation, Alfred von Schlieffen’s Military Writings (2002), and, with Dr Helen McCartney, The Somme: An Eyewitness History (2006). Robert’s next major publication will be German Strategy and the Quest for Decisive Victory in the First World War, which will provide a re-examination of Erich Ludendorff’s strategic and operational thought during the First World War.
A French victory, 1918
Elizabeth Greenhalgh is a Research Fellow in the School of Humanities and Social Sciences in the University of New South Wales at the Australian Defence Force Academy, and editor of the international journal War & Society. She has published a number of articles on the 1916 Battle of the Somme, as well as on wider questions regarding the Franco-British coalition in such journals as Historical Journal, International History Review, Journal of Contemporary History, Journal of Military History, and War in History. She is the author of Victory Through Coalition: Britain and France During the First World War (2005). Elizabeth is currently working on a study of the military command of General Ferdinand Foch, who was supreme allied commander in 1918.
The cost of inexperience: Americans on the Western Front, 1918
Meleah Ward was a 2008 Summer Scholar at the Australian War Memorial where she completed a project on the interaction between Australian and American soldiers in the Great War in 1918. She has recently completed an honours degreee in history at the University of Adelaide with a thesis on the British weapons system in 1918. Her publications include, ‘Diggers for a Day’, Wartime: The Official Magazine of the Australian War Memorial, no. 43, 2008, and ‘A Very Different War’ Wartime, no. 44, 2008. Meleah plans to commence research towards a PhD in 2009.
Fighting to exhaustion: morale, discipline and combat effectiveness in the armies of 1918
Ashley Ekins is Head of the Military History Section at the Australian War Memorial. A graduate of the University of Adelaide, he has worked as a military historian with the Memorial since 1989, specialising in the history of the First World War and the Vietnam War. He is the co-author (with Ian McNeill) of two volumes of the The Official History of Australian Involvement in Southeast Asian Conflicts 1948-1975 dealing with the Australian Army in the Vietnam War: On the Offensive (2003), and Fighting to the Finish (forthcoming 2009). He has published widely on the role of Australian soldiers in the First World War and contributed chapters to several books. He has also made a detailed study of the Gallipoli campaign and visited Gallipoli on twenty separate occasions to explore the battlefields extensively with Turkish, Australian and British historians. He published the popular Guide to the battlefields, cemeteries and memorials of the Gallipoli peninsula (1998, 2000, 2002, 2008). Ashley is presently completing a comprehensive study of military discipline and punishment in the Australian army of the First World War.
Maintaining the advance: Monash, battle procedure and the Australian Corps in 1918
Peter Pedersen joined the Military History Section at the Australian War Memorial as a Senior Historian in 2008. He has written six books on the First World War and contributions to several others, as well as numerous articles on campaigns from the Second World War, the Vietnam War, and battlefields and military and aviation museums worldwide. He has guided many tours to the Western Front and other battlefields in Europe and Asia. A graduate of the Royal Military College, Duntroon, the Australian Command and Staff College and the University of New South Wales, he commanded the 5th/7th Battalion, the Royal Australian Regiment, and was a political/strategic analyst in the Australian Office of National Assessments. Peter’s publications include Monash as a Military Commander (1985), Images of Gallipoli (1988), Hamel (2003), Fromelles (2004), Villers-Bretonneux (2004), and most recently, The Anzacs: Gallipoli to the Western Front (2007).
Associate Professor Glyn Harper
Bloody Bapaume: New Zealand soldiers battle for the town August–September 1918
Glyn Harper is Director of the Centre for Defence Studies at Massey University. A graduate of Canterbury University and the University of New England in Australia, he left a teaching career to join the Australian Army as an Education Officer in 1988. He transferred to the New Zealand Army in 1996 and has commanded the New Zealand Army’s Military Studies Institute. In 2001 he was Visiting Fellow at Massey University and then appointed Senior Lecturer in Command Studies at Massey. Glyn is the author or co-author of seventeen books, including the best-selling Massacre at Passchendaele: the New Zealand story (2000), Spring Offensive: New Zealand and the Second Battle of the Somme (2003), and Dark Journey (2007). His latest book is Images of War: World War One—A photographic record of New Zealanders at War 1914-1918 (2008).
Bloody victory: the Canadian Corps in the Hundred Days campaign
Tim Cook is the First World War historian at the Canadian War Museum in Ottawa where he curated the South African and First World War permanent galleries, as well as several temporary, travelling, and internet exhibitions, including a special exhibition on the culture of First World War soldiers. He is also an Adjunct Research Professor of History at Carleton University where he teaches and supervises graduate students. He has published more than 25 academic articles in Canadian and international journals and is the author of four books. His book, No Place to Run: The Canadian Corps and Gas Warfare in the First World War (2000) won the C.P. Stacey Award for the best book published in Canada on a Canadian military topic in 1999–2000. His second book, Clio's Warriors: Canadian Historians and the Writing of the World Wars, was published in 2006. Tim’s latest work is the award-winning, two-volume history of the Canadian Corps in the First World War: At the Sharp End: Canadians Fighting the Great War 1914-1916 (2007), and Shock Troops: Canadians Fighting the Great War 1917-1918 (2008).
Victory at sea, 1918
David Stevens is Director of Strategic and Historical Studies at the Defence Sea Power Centre. He joined the Royal Australian Navy College in 1974 as a cadet midshipman and subsequently completed a BA degree at the University of New South Wales. He served in a variety of Australian fleet units, eventually specialising as an anti-submarine warfare officer, and serving on exchange in the Royal Navy. In 1992 he graduated from the Australian National University with an MA (Strategic Studies) and in 2000 received his PhD from the UNSW at ADFA. Since retiring from the Navy in 1994, he remains an officer in the RAN Reserve and he served as the historian attached to the staff of the Australian Task Group Commander during operational deployments during the Iraq conflict in 2003. He has lectured extensively on naval history and maritime strategy and his published works have been translated into several languages. His publications include: The Royal Australian Navy in World War II (1996 & 2005), In Search of a Maritime Strategy: the maritime element in Australian defence planning since 1901 (1997), U-Boat Far From Home (1997), Maritime Power in the twentieth century: the Australian experience (1998), Southern Trident: Strategy, History and the Rise of Australian Naval Power (2000 with John Reeve), The Royal Australian Navy (2001), The Face of Naval Battle (2003 with John Reeve), The Navy and the Nation (2005 with John Reeve), Australia’s Navy in the Gulf: From COUNTENANCE to CATALYST, 1941-2006 (2006 with Greg Nash), Sea Power Ashore and in the Air (2007 with John Reeve), and Strength through Diversity: The combined naval role in Operation STABILISE (2007). Most recently the Naval Records Society has published his chapter, ‘Australian Naval Defence: Selections from the papers and correspondence of Captain W.H.C.S. Thring, 1913-1934’, in S. Rose (ed.) The Naval Miscellany Vol VII, (2008).
Rear Admiral James Goldrick AM, CSC, RAN
Victory at sea, 1918
James Goldrick joined the RAN in 1974 and saw extensive sea service with the Royal Australian Navy, Royal Navy and US Navy, including command of HMAS Cessnock and HMAS Sydney (twice), and the RAN Surface Task Group. He also commanded the RAN task group and the multinational maritime interception force in the Persian Gulf in 2002. He was Commandant of the Australian Defence Force Academy (2003-2006) and Commander Border Protection Command (2006-2008). He became Commander Joint Education, Training and Warfare and Commander of the Australian Defence College in May 2008. A graduate of the RAN College, he holds degrees from the University of NSW and the University of New England and a Doctorate of Letters honoris causa from UNSW. He is also a graduate of the Harvard Business School Advanced Management Program. He has written and lectured extensively on naval history and contemporary naval affairs. Admiral Goldrick’s publications include numerous scholarly articles on the role of the Royal Navy in the First World War and the following books: The King’s Ships Were at Sea: The War in the North Sea August 1914-February 1915 (1984) and No Easy Answers: The Development of the Navies of India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka (1997).
Victory in the air, 1918
Peter Hart has worked at the Imperial War Museum as Oral Historian of the Sound Archive since 1981. His interviewing speciality at present is the modern British Army up to the present day but he has interviewed hundreds of veterans of the Great War and also of the Second World War. He is currently working on a book on Gallipoli primarily devoted to the major battles at Helles. He has published widely on various aspects of war, particularly on soldiers’ experiences. His numerous books include Defeat at Gallipoli (with Nigel Steel, 1994), To the Last Round: South Notts Hussars, 1939-1942 (1996), At the Sharp End: From Le Paradis to Kohima (1998), The Heat of Battle: The 16th Durham Light Infantry, 1943-1945 (1997), Passchendaele, 1917: The Sacrificial Ground (with Nigel Steel, 2000), Jutland 1916: Death in the Grey Wastes (with Nigel Steel, 2003), The Somme, 1916 (2005), and 1918: A Very British Victory (2008). Peter is an authority on the air war in 1914-1918 and his books on this subject include: Tumult in the Clouds: British Experience of War in the Air (with Nigel Steel, 1997), Bloody April; Slaughter in the Skies over Arras, 1917 (2005), Somme Success: The RFC and the Battle of the Somme, 1916 (2001), and most recently, Aces Falling: War above the trenches, 1918 (2007).
The peace settlement of 1919: prelude to the Second World War?
Trevor Wilson is Emeritus Professor and Honorary Visiting Research Fellow at the University of Adelaide, where he was Professor of History for 25 years. He is the author of The Downfall of the Liberal Party 1914-1935 (1966) and The Political Diaries of C.P. Scott 1911-1928 (1970). His numerous books on the First World War include his magisterial volume, The Myriad Faces of War: Britain and the Great War 1914-1918 (1986), and (with Robin Prior), Command on the Western Front: The Military Career of General Sir Henry Rawlinson 1914-1918 (1992), Passchendaele: The Untold Story (1996), The First World War (1999) and The Somme (2005). He has also published numerous articles and chapters in several books, including George A. Panichas (ed.), Promise of greatness: the war of 1914-1918 (1968), and Hugh Cecil & Peter Liddle (eds), Facing Armageddon: the First World War experienced (1996). He was historical consultant and commentator in the award winning joint PBS-BBC documentary film, The Great War and the Shaping of the Twentieth Century (1996), and BBC television programmes, ‘Sir Douglas Haig as military commander’ and ‘The War Memoirs of David Lloyd George’. Professor Wilson is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society and the Australian Academy of the Humanities. In 2007 he was appointed an Honorary Member in the General Division of the Order of Australia (AM) “for service to education in the area of World War I military history through teaching, writing and historical research”.
The veterans’ voice
Martin Crotty is a Lecturer in History at the University of Queensland. Originally from New Zealand, he ‘crossed the ditch’ to do his postgraduate studies in history at Monash University (MA) and at the University of Melbourne (PhD). His initial interests in the history of Australian masculinity, his ancestral connections to the Anzac experience and a 1996 tour of Western Front battlefields and memorials led him to an increasing interest in the cultural and social history of Australians at war. He is the author of Making the Australian Male: Middle-Class Masculinity, 1870-1920 (2001) and Turning Points in Australian History (with David Roberts, forthcoming 2008), and co-editor of seven other books, including Australia to 1901: Readings in the Making of a Nation (2003 with Erik Eklund), The Great Mistakes of Australian History (2006 with David Roberts). Martin has also contributed chapters to ten other books and published numerous articles in both refereed and popular journals. He is currently completing a project funded by the Australian Research Council on the history of the Returned Services League from its inception in 1916 until the immediate post-World War II period.
After dinner talk: Those magnificent men and the Great War
Peter Burness is an historian and curator at the Australian War Memorial where he has worked since 1973. Formerly Head of the Military Heraldry and Technology Section and more recently senior curator in the Exhibitions Section, he has been involved in numerous travelling, temporary, and permanent exhibitions. He has a special interest in the First World War and for the past 15 years has led the Memorial’s annual battlefield tours to the Western Front. He has published numerous articles on Australians in the Great War, the colonial period and other conflicts, as well as entries for the Oxford Companion to Australian History, the Oxford Companion to Australian Military History, and more than 20 entries to the Australian Dictionary of Biography. He recently wrote four of the volumes of the Department of Veterans’ Affairs Australians on the Western Front series and he writes regularly for the Memorial’s journal Wartime. Peter is also the author of the The Nek: The Tragic Charge of the Light Horse at Gallipoli (1996). Recently he was curator of the new Memorial exhibitions Advancing to Victory 1918, and concept leader for Over the front: the Great War in the air.
This conference has been convened by the Australian War Memorial. The support of the Australian Government through the Department of Veterans’ Affairs is gratefully acknowledged.
