From the Collection #33 - In a Distant Corner - Basra Memorial to the Missing
Part of the "From the Collection" series prepared and distributed to a subscribers' list during 2022 as a follow on to the "Virtual Visit" series initiated during the COVID lockdowns of 2020 and 2021 The collection focus of this item is the Memorial to Australians who died as prisoners of the Ottomans who have no known grave.
The Commonwealth War Graves Commission Basra Memorial to the Missing commemorates 40,626 members of the Imperial Forces who have no known grave and who were lost in the Middle East (excepting Gallipoli) and Africa from the beginning of hostilities through August 1921. Only the Thiepval Memorial on the Somme battlefield in France and the Menin Gate Memorial in Ypres, Belgium bear more names of the missing. Until 1997 the Memorial was situated on the main quay of the former Royal Navy dockyard at Maqil, on the west bank of the Shatt-al-Arab, eight kilometres north of Basra, but in 1998 the Memorial was summarily removed by the Saddam Hussein government, re-erected at a site 32 kilometres up the road from Basra to Nasiriyah, near the site of a battlefield during the 2003 war.
Details
Details
Typically only a small portion of a museum collection is exhibited at any one time. This is due not only to practical consideration of display space but a range of professional considerations designed to protect and preserve the artefact. This series highlights objects and stories you may have overlooked in the galleries or collection items awaiting the opportunity to be viewed and share their story.
Australian Army Museum of Western Australia
Australian Army Museum of Western Australia
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