Scheyvillians and friends
After a number of successful memorial activities in its home area of the Hunter, The Hunter ANZAC Memorial Limited (HAML) has taken on the challenge of ensuring the some of the Scheyville site is retained as a reminder of how the site has been used within the recent history of Australia.
Under the former government, the Scheyville Site was selected to be one of twenty ‘Veterans Hubs’. The incoming government in 2022 scrapped the ‘Veterans Hubs’, but later reinstituted ten sites to become ‘Veterans Hubs’. Scheyville was one! However, the government has been very slow in actually transferring the funds to HAML, and although HAML, with the NSW State Government through National Parks, has financed some works, further works have stalled awaiting the promised funding from the Federal Government.
Attached is a letter drafted by HAML that members are requested to forward to various parliamentarians in the hope that some early action may occur with the transfer of funds to HAML.
Recipients of this email are requested to forward the letter to:
Mr Matt Keogh, the Minister for Veterans Affairs, and your local Federal Member
For NSW Scheyvillians, please also forward the letter to:
Mr David Haris, Minster for Veterans Affairs, NSW, and Ms Robyn Preston, Member for Hawkesbury, (Deputy Opposition Leader), NSW
The preferred method of forwarding this letter is my ‘snail mail’ as a ‘pile of letters’ is harder to ignore than emails, which as we know can disappear quickly off a screen and never be read again.
The Hon Matt Keogh MP, Minister for Veterans Affairs and Minister for Defence Personnel
PO Box 6022, House of Representatives, Parliament House, Canberra, ACT, 2600 or Matt.Keogh.MP@aph.gov.au
For your local federal member, contact details can be found at:
https://www.aph.gov.au/Senators_and_Members/Members
https://www.aph.gov.au/Senators_and_Members/Guidelines_for_Contacting_Senators_and_Members
The Hon David Harris MP,
Shop 4, 142 Pacific Hwy, Wyong, NSW, 2259. Email: wyong@parliament.nsw.gov.au
Ms Robyn Preston MP,
PO Box 505, Richmond, NSW, 2753. Email: hawkesbury@parliament.nsw.gov.au
Your support for HAML, by sending the following letter to the parliamentarians would be appreciated.
Address
Dear Minister (or Member),
I am a writing to you regarding the Scheyville Veterans, Families and Community Centre (or “Veterans’ Hub”), which is now part of the Scheyville National Park, located in the Hawkesbury Region of NSW.
Scheyville has a rich history, starting with Aboriginal occupation dating back thousands of years, to more modern times when it has seen:
- A Labour Farm,
- The Dreadnought Scheme (teaching boys farming): 1911-1915 and 1917-1930s,
- An Army Camp: (World War II) 1940-1944,
- A Migrant Camp: 1950-1964, and
- The National Service Officer Training Unit: 1965 – 1973.
In the early 1960s, in response to the need to expand the Australian Army to allow a deployment to Borneo during the Indonesian Confrontation, the Federal Government introduced Conscription. Shortly after this decision was made, Australia deployed units to the war in South Vietnam.
The Officer Training Unit (OTU) was opened at Scheyville in 1965 where it trained National Service Officers and Army Air Cadets in a gruelling 14-hour day, 22-week course in military leadership skills as an infantry platoon commander.
Between 1965 and 1973, 1,881 officers graduated from Scheyville OTU. The course was a combination of classroom-based training, extensive field exercises and tough physical fitness.
Facilities at OTU included the quadrangle buildings, which formed the administration block on the northern end with the southern end the dining room and kitchen for the Officer’s Mess. The dormitory huts on the east side were used to house the Army staff who provided the training, while the dormitory huts on the west side were used to house the Officer Cadets.
The Commandant and family were housed in the old Farm Manager’s house while the Regimental Sergeant Major and family were in the Overseer’s cottage. Two ‘SAAR’ huts were converted to provide gymnasium facilities and the Officer Cadet’s dining and recreation facility. A Parade Ground was established to the south-west of the quadrangle and adjacent to that on the east of the Parade Ground, an “E” shaped teaching facility was constructed.
In addition to reusing existing buildings, OTU made extensive use of the surrounding farmlands and scrub, establishing obstacle courses, a small arms range, challenge (or obstacle)courses and a tough route march trail.
Over 360 OTU graduates served in the Vietnam War, eight of whom died in action. Other OTU graduates served in Malaysia, Singapore and Papua New Guinea. Many who trained at the OTU, such as Jeff Kennett and the late Tim Fischer, reached
positions of importance in civilian life and attribute their success to their training at Scheyville.
The Hunter ANZAC Memorial Ltd (HAML) is a Charity determined to make a difference by supporting our proud military history and embracing ways to better educate current and future generations of Australians. HAML is working closely with the Veteran community to embrace programs that improve mental health, self-worth, and respect of veterans.
Sadly, many of the buildings at Scheyville, a place that has given so much to the fabric of the Nation, have been left to deteriorate. All the Cadet accommodation, classrooms, stores and medical buildings have been demolished.
To preserve what is left of the OTU buildings at Scheyville, HAML has taken extensive steps to gain control of the building precinct and return the site to its previous prestige befitting its history including the sacrifice of so many Australian young men of the period. This includes turning the site into a “Veterans Hub”.
As HAML marches on ANZAC Day, recites the “ODE”, “Stating we will remember them” and “Lest We Forget”, it is determined to retain the unique period of military history at Scheyville.
HAML has been successful in obtaining several Federal Government grants to enable the establishment of the Scheyville “Veterans Hub”. Much of this money will be spent on building a disabled toilet, preserving remaining buildings, building new paths that will cater for mobility devices and establishing the facilities to assist veterans, their families and the local community.
However, much more needs to be done if we are to achieve the potential of the Scheyville site, including the development of the sporting fields, once used by officer cadets, for use by the local community.
As stated by HAML; Australian Veterans “Past, Present and Future” should never be forgotten as they have always gone to fight for the “Rights and Freedoms of Others”, “in places they never knew existed, for people whose faces they have never seen and names they have never heard”. If we do not remember the past, we have no future.
HAML requests Members of Parliament to ensure that the “Veteran’s Hub” funding already allocated is quickly forwarded to them so that the redevelopment of the site continues, and it also requests that further funding be given to HAML to help restore and preserve the Scheyville site.
Flor further information, contact HAML Chairman Mr Brett Wild on
0488 255 666 or at chairman@hunteranzacmemorial.org.au
