RECONNAISSANCE MAGAZINE Winter Issue 2025

 

“From the Editor” column of the Winter 2025 Issue of Reconnaissance, the quarterly magazine of The Military History Society of New South Wales.

Welcome to the Winter 2025 Issue of Reconnaissance.

This issue’s cover feature is a stark reminder of just how impressive were the men who volunteered to fight for Australia in World War I. Robert Thomas’ account of Lieutenant Reginald Black’s pursuit of duty to death on the field of battle is all the more powerful for his matter-of-fact telling of the story. A grazier from Boggabri NSW, Black had no military training when he enlisted in November 1914. Joining the 6th Light Horse Regiment, he was shipped to Egypt in February 1915, and would soon be embroiled in the war’s mythical upheavals. In May, the 6th Light Horse landed in Gallipoli. Black’s C Squadron was deployed in “demonstrations” against Turkish lines, resulting in such heavy casualties that he was prematurely promoted to corporal. September brought more demonstrations, this time against “the whole line”, more heavy casualties, and another promotion, to lance sergeant. Shortly after, the carnage wreaked by “heavy shelling” saw Black commissioned as a 2nd Lieutenant in the field.

The general evacuation from Gallipoli in December returned the regiment to Egypt and service in the Palestine Campaign, mostly across the Sinai Peninsula. This entailed gruelling marches, patrols and training exercises under the hot desert sun. C Squadron, now under Black’s command, took part in some successful attacks on Turkish outposts and played an active role in the famous Battle of Romani on 4 August 1916. By January 1917, life for C Squadron settled into a routine of daily patrols and night outposts. Following a series of such activities in February, Black was Mentioned in Despatches. In the course of a later reconnaissance patrol in June, Black and C Squadron established a listening post overlooking the Beersheba Road, from where he reported that an enemy column was dangerously close to regimental headquarters. He was rewarded with the Military Cross. In August, tragically, while arranging dispositions for a line of outposts, Lt Black was mortally wounded by gunfire, a model of devotion to duty until the very end.

Also in this issue: Walter Burroughs revisits ‘The Battle of Broken Hill’, one of the most peculiar and least known episodes of the Great War. Underscoring that this was a “world war” with ripples across the whole globe, a call for jihad against the British Empire by the Sultan of Turkey reached the ears of two Muslim ‘Ghan’ cameleers in Broken Hill, with fatal consequences for three townsfolk on an ambushed train headed for New Years Day festivities, 1915. Then Phil Craig presents a fascinating enquiry into the origins of the war in Vietnam, tracing this protracted conflict to the post-war occupation by Britain and France and their stubborn determination to resuscitate their empires. Even to the extent of using surrendered Japanese troops to suppress pro-independence insurgents. Following on is Patricia Skehan’s entertaining account of the chance encounters which enabled her to write a book based on the wartime diaries of NSW veteran Jim Armitage, who served on Anzac Ridge in Flanders during 1917-18. Next Alexander Muscat explains why the siege and fall of Jerusalem to the Romans in 70AD was such a turning point in history, transforming the practice of Judaism, launching Christianity on a new course and setting a long-lasting precedent for how unit discipline, sophisticated engineering and psychological operations (psy-ops) can deliver success in siegecraft.

Finally, I would like to thank for their fine book reviews, Dr Tom Lewis OAM on Greg Blake’s Into the Valley of Death, Nathan Thomason on Patricia Skehan’s The Secrets of ANZAC Ridge in Flanders Fields, and Dr David Martin on Perry Anderson’s Disputing Disaster and Steve Vizard’s NATION, MEMORY, MYTH: Gallipoli and the Australian Imaginary.

Editor, Reconnaissance

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