Ballarat Anzac honoured at Australian War Memorial

Flying Officer Charles Edward Suffren

Portrait of Flying Officer Charles Edward Suffren

Flying Officer Charles Edward Suffren will be commemorated at the Last Post Ceremony on Monday 3 February 2025. Photo supplied by the veteran's family.

The Australian War Memorial in Canberra will commemorate the service and sacrifice of Ballarat resident Flying Officer Charles Edward Suffren at the Last Post Ceremony on Monday 3 February, which marks the opening of Australian Federal Parliament for 2025.

“Charles Suffren was born on 20 January 1922 in Ballarat, the youngest of four children born to Charles Suffren, a salesman, and his wife Euphemia,” Australian War Memorial Director Matt Anderson said.

“Known as ‘Ted’, Suffren attended Ballarat Grammar School and was working as a bank clerk when the Second World War broke out in 1939.”

Ted Suffren enlisted in the Royal Australian Air Force on 20 July 1941 and arrived in England on 18 November 1942.

In mid-September 1943, Suffren joined his first operational unit, No. 460 Squadron of the RAAF, which was chiefly involved in strategic bombing offensives.

In the early hours of 10 April 1944, Suffren was severely injured after his Lancaster was attacked by German night fighters and crashed in Denmark. Rescued by Danish people, German officials demanded he be moved to Germany. Ten months later, Ted Suffren died of his wounds in hospital at Hohe Mark on 16 February 1945. He was 23 years old.

The Last Post ceremony is held at 4.30 pm every day except Christmas Day in the Commemorative area of the Australian War Memorial.

Each ceremony shares the story behind one of 103,000 names on the Roll of Honour. To date, the Memorial has delivered more than 3,800 ceremonies, each featuring an individual story of service from colonial to recent conflicts. It would take more than 280 years to read the story behind each of the 103,000 names listed on the Roll of Honour.

“The Last Post Ceremony is our commitment to remembering and honouring the legacy of Australian service,” Memorial Director Matt Anderson said.

“Through our daily Last Post Ceremony, we not only acknowledge where and how these men and women died. We also tell the stories of who they were when they were alive, and of the families who loved and, in so many cases, still mourn for them.

“The Last Post is now associated with remembrance but originally it was a bugle call to sound the end of the day’s activities in the military. It is a fitting way to end each day at the Memorial.”

The Last Post Ceremony honouring the service of Flying Officer Charles Edward Suffren will be live streamed to the Australian War Memorial’s YouTube page: https://www.youtube.com/c/awmlastpost.

The stories told at the Last Post Ceremony are researched and written by the Memorial’s military historians, who begin the process by looking at nominal rolls, attestation papers and enlistment records before building profiles that include personal milestones and military experiences.

HANDOUT images: VWMA

www.awm.gov.au/collection/C311775

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