*FFFAIF AGM

The Annual General Meeting of the FFFAIF was held in Canberra on Monday 10 November. The meeting was attended by 27 members and their guests.

Photo: Getting down to business. [Heather Ford]

The 2008/09 Committee are:
President: Russell Curley
Vice President: Jim Munro
Treasurer: Alan Kitchen
Secretary: Chris Munro
Committee Members: Maurice Campbell, Lorraine Curley, Graeme Hosken, Margaret Snodgrass and Andrew Willetts.

Photo: The Committee hard at work! [Heather Ford]

The Committee reported that both memberships and funds had grown significantly during the past year with continued development of DIGGER as a flagship publication, the launch of the www.fffaif.org.au website, introduction of an expanded range of FFFAIF merchandise, increased involvement in commemorations and the very successful John Laffin Memorial Lecture. Graeme Hosken has stepped down from the Vice -President’s role and will continue as  a committee Member as well as Editor of DIGGER and Alan Kitchen continues in the role of Membership Secretary.  Due to work committments, Trevor Munro has stepped down from the Committee.  Graeme and Trevor were both thanked for their contributions.  New Committee member Lorraine Curley was welcomed.

At the conclusion of the AGM the guest speaker and Western Australian member, Andrew Pittaway, presented his talk on Freo Anzacs. Andrew is an Archivist with the City of Fremantle who since 2003 has been researching the AIF volunteers who enlisted from the Fremantle area. The audience was given an insight into not only his project, but into many of the stories behind the ‘Fremantlites’.

Photo: Introduction of guest speaker Andrew Pittaway by DIGGER Editor Graeme Hosken. [Chris Munro]

Members and guests then dined together to complete a very successful day. During the dinner the inaugural FFFAIF raffle was drawn and stories shared. The results of the raffle can be seen in Trench News  along with more photos of the gathering.

Photo: The drawing of the Raffle. [Heather Ford]

The next morning members gathered at the Australian War Memorial for the commemoration Remembrance Day service. More details of this service can be seen in RECENT NEWS item: Remembrance Day.

*****

The Families and Friends of the First AIF thanks the Australian, UK and French governments for affording Australian and British soldiers – presently buried in mass graves at Pheasant Wood – dignified individual reburials in a new CWGC cemetery at Fromelles, and applauds Minister Snowdon and his British counterpart, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Defence and Minister for Veterans, Kevan Jones MP, for their joint decision to DNA test the remains at exhumation and use every reasonable method to attempt identification of each soldier.