REMEMBRANCE DAY (9 November 2023) ~ DINNER SPEAKER
Our after-dinner speaker at this year’s Remembrance Day commemoration describes as a ‘magnificent obsession’ his pursuit of finding, recovering and honouring the remains of Australia’s missing diggers from the infamous Battle of Fromelles during the First World War.
It has led him to becoming not only one of Australia’s foremost experts on the country’s participation in the Great War and the subject of several books but also the recipient of an Order of Australia in recognition of his ground-breaking work.
At the turn of the century, Greek-born but locally raised Lambis Englezos (pictured right below) had become convinced that Australian diggers were still lying in unmarked mass burial pits left by the victorious Germans after the Battle.
Despite official non-recognition of his efforts he persisted and in 2008 he and his team were vindicated when they uncovered the mass burial site.
Lambis’s long journey to have the memory of the fallen diggers properly recognised and honoured will prove fascinating to those at the dinner.
