IN the tiny hamlet of El Arish, in the harsh climate of Tropical North Queensland, the proud community annually pays tribute to the Anzac legend.
As one of Australia’s traditional soldier’s settlements, where diggers were allocated land to set up farms following their return from WWI, the Anzac spirit lives on.
It is their heritage.
This morning, hundreds of residents attended perhaps one of the earliest dawn services to be held on the East Coast, at 4.20am.
Among those, were descendants of several of the original soldiers who settled in the area from 1921 onward, including Marie Carmen, whose grandfather Willy Hugh Williams was a WWI veteran.
Mrs Carmen, with a band of equally dedicated volunteers, is a custodian of the region’s rich history which is preserved for future generations in a remarkable collection at the El Arish History Station.
She and her team will ensure the legacy of the returned soldiers and others who founded the successful sugar cane town lives on.
It was 1921 when the Australian government allocated 72 lots in El Arish in a ballot for returned soldiers.
Originally known as the Maria Creek Soldier’s Settlement, the community voted to renamed the town El Arish, after its namesake Al Arish in Egypt’s northern Sinai which the Australian Light Horse took in 1916.
Times were tough in those early days. Veterans were given 40 or 50 acres on which to clear and grow cane and another 20 acres to maintain horse paddocks. It came at a cost, in form of repayable loan of 625 pounds, of which 260 pounds could be spent on building a cottage.
“It was a case of getting a block of land in April 1921 and just coming on to the land and making a start,” Mrs Carman said.
“There’s probably six or eight families who are still on their original blocks here in El Arish, whose farms are nearly 100 years old.
“It was such a feat of logistics to make originally 72 blocks ending up about 150 blocks here between two creeks so you had water for horses everywhere.”
Mrs Carman said the government provided help for the new farmers to plant their first 10 acres.
The cost was about 30 pounds per acre, which equated to about 3000 cane plants.
“There were about 3000 cane plants per acre, all of which were planted by hand in those days, and the land was cleared by hand too,” Mrs Carman said.
The closest reachable mill was at Giru for the first harvest in 1923, with farmers first taking their cane via horse to the QR line, which would often experience delays due to strikes.
The South Johnstone mill came on next, before Tully opened in December 1925, bringing relief to growers.
The opening of the small gauge locomotion line was another reason to celebrate in 1930.
But it wasn’t for everyone.
"A lot of people couldn't handle it though, sometimes people just walked off their land and couldn't do it," Dii Donlop said.
Mrs Carmen said some people chose to give up their land to become support staff, or leave the region entirely.
"The climate, the hard work those two factors are pretty bad up here, you don't realise how harsh it is. It was tough,” she said.
"They had to be physically fit too and of course they'd just been in the war for all those years, so they came back damaged and shell shocked.
"There was a lot of alcohol involved, there was a lot of fighting and scruffing around the place, but they formed a community and it's been 100 years.”
And the legacy of their forebearers will never be forgotten. Lest we forget.
