FHACT March Monthly Meeting

Family History ACT Monthly Meeting: Tuesday 4 March 2025 at 7pm.  (In person at the FHACT Education Room, Cook Community Hub, Templeton Street, Cook, or online via Zoom). 

Join members of Family History ACT to hear Greg Fraser as he talks about his book For King and Country: The Family’s Military Service, his family members and how he researched and created this book.

All welcome. Members and guests interested in attending should register for this event here

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For King and Country: The Family’s Military Service is the story of 10 of Greg Fraser’s family members who served or sought to serve their country in major world conflicts spanning almost 200 years – the Napoleonic Wars, World War I, World War II and the Vietnam War:

• Swein McDonald a humble Scotsman from Inverness fought Napoleon’s forces in Canada, the West Indies, Egypt, Malta, Ireland and France from 1794 – 1816,

• Bruce Fraser a dashing, handsome and adventurous recruit from Granville fought the Turks in Palestine as a member of the 1st Light Horse Regiment in 1917-18,

• Frank Baines an English immigrant from Salford Lancashire opposed the Kaiser’s armies on the Western Front, fought in a number of battles, including Fromelles, 

• Aleck Fraser an officer in the Army Reserve in the 1920s enlisted to fight the Nazis was captured by the Germans and Italians at El Alamein, suffered 3 horrific years as a POW in Italy, Poland and Germany,

• David Fraser, a Scottish cousins, was captured at St Valery near Dunkirk and survived four years of brutality as a POW at the hands of the Nazis,

• Colin Wallace Fraser a young, daring and patriotic lad from Bondi Beach took part in Australia’s last engagement against the Japanese in Borneo and then served 2 years in the occupying forces in Japan after 1945,

• Colin John Fraser, Wallace Fraser, John Graham and John Hempenstall, good men and true, also served or sought to serve in World War 1 or the Vietnam War.

After 10+ years of passionate and painstaking research, the book tells the stories of dedicated, courageous and brave service in very trying and often frightening conditions on and off the battlefield and of their personal battle for survival. The book is richly illustrated with many photos and maps. The book also provides an historical context to the wars and battles that each of them fought in and traces the impacts of war service on some of these men, including the pain some of them suffered as POWs and the high price they all paid in carrying the trauma of their experiences for the rest of their lives.