MORE than 280 people paid tribute to one of the region’s most decorated war heroes on Sunday.
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The Buangor grave of General Sir Cyril Bingham Brudenell White - a hero of Gallipoli and World War One – was rededicated 75 years after his death.
Guest speaker, federal Member for Wannon Dan Tehan, said the ceremony was a fitting tribute.
“There is an untold story of Gallipoli, that thanks to Sir Burdenell White’s expert military guidance, 80,000 soldiers were able to be withdrawn from the Gallipoli peninsula without a single loss of life,” he said.
“Sir Robert Menzies, who was in my view Australia’s greatest Prime Minister, said Sir Brudenell White was the greatest Australian he knew. That says a lot about this truly magnificent Australian.
“The grave site and storyboard are a fitting tribute, I hope we now see more Australians visiting the cemetery to pay their respects.”
Russell Rachinger spent three years preparing for Sunday’s rededication.
He said it was now up to future generations to preserve his legacy and memory.
“It has taken three years, but it came to fruition and let’s hope Sir Brudenell White is forgotten no more.”
Born in St Arnaud in 1876, he was commissioned into the Queensland Regiment of the Royal Australian Artillery in 1899. General Bridges’ chief of staff during the establishment of the first AIF in 1914, General White landed at Gallipoli on April 25, 1914.
He planned and supervised the evacuation, the most successful operation of the entire campaign, before going on to make his mark on the Western Front. Knighted by King George V in 1919, he returned to Australia in 1920 as the chief of the general staff before retiring in 1923.
He purchased properties in Middle Creek and Buangor in the late 1920s and early 1930s and was again made chief of the general staff in 1939. He was killed when the aircraft he was in crashed approaching Canberra on August 13, 1940. He was honoured with a state funeral in Melbourne before being buried at Buangor cemetery.