I begin by acknowledging the traditional owners of the land on which we meet and I pay my respects to their elders past, present and emerging.
Lieutenant General Simon Stuart, Chief of Army.
Vice Admiral Mark Hammond, Chief of Navy.
Members of the Diplomatic Corps.
Representatives of the Silentworld Foundation.
Shadow Minister for Defence, Andrew Hastie for whom I know tonight holds special meaning.
And most importantly, all of you with a personal connection to those whom we commemorate this evening.
It is a privilege to be here with you tonight, in a place dedicated to the memory of all those who have served our nation to join in honouring your loved ones and forebears.
To pay respect to their service and sacrifice and to fulfil the solemn promise Australia owes to all those who gave their tomorrows for our today.
We will remember them.
The Australian War Memorial was conceived and designed in recognition of that duty.
And so many of you here tonight have done so much to live up to those words, to demonstrate the eternal value and enduring meaning of Lest We Forget.
Whether it be the extraordinary achievement of finding the final resting place of the Montevideo Maru or the many years spent advocating for a rightful place for this tragedy in our national story and a fitting place for commemorating those lost.
Yours has been a long search for due recognition and a long vigil in service of your loved ones’ memories.
Australia – and at least 14 countries who lost some of their own on 1 July 1942, so many of whom are represented here tonight - owe you and your determination a great debt.
Thank you all.
On the 28th of April 1942, in the midst of a Japanese bombing raid on Port Moresby one bomber dropped four mailbags instead.
They fell from the sky trailing white streamers, inside were 395 letters from Australian members of Lark Force.
These soldiers had been sent to the town of Rabaul in the then‑Australian territory of New Guinea in 1941 by a Government that knew if an invasion came, a force of this size would have little hope of holding it back.
The letters were from those who survived that brief and overwhelming battle against the Japanese forces in January of 1942.
Prisoners of war and civilian internees.
All malnourished, many gravely ill.
Captive in some of the most brutal conditions imaginable.
Yet their only thoughts were for those at home.
Providing words of reassurance and hope, love and comfort.
“Please do not worry about me, as I am alright.”
“Don’t know when I’ll be able to write again, but keep your chin well up my beloved.”
“Look after yourself. I love you. Kiss Vicki for me.”
“I hope this letter will stop you worrying yourself.”
“Keep the old bike in good nick, as I will need it again.”
“Don’t worry. Cheerio.”
These letters were written by factory workers and farmhands, sporting stars and members of the Salvation Army Band.
They were addressed to wives and sweethearts, brothers and sisters, mothers and fathers in Claremont and Middle Park, Murrabit and Traralgon.
By the time they worked their way through the censors and the wartime bureaucracy and arrived in letterboxes and on doorsteps in September of 1942 all the men who wrote them – and hundreds more - were already gone.
For what must have been an unbearably long time after that, there was only silence.
More than 1000 dead.
Australia’s worst maritime disaster, in our nation’s darkest hour – and nothing but rumours to go on.
Even peacetime did not bring peace.
Earlier this month, Vicki Freeman told the ABC she remembered her mum taking her down to the wharf, to watch the troopships coming in.
The tears in her mother’s eyes, as she looked for the husband she knew was missing, but still hoped to find.
Doss Heffer, who was only three years old when her father Don left for war in 1940, spoke about how she and her sister would say to each other:
“Maybe he’ll come home…maybe he’ll walk through the door.”
It was not until October of 1945, more than three years after those last letters from Rabaul arrived that official telegrams informed families their loved ones: “became missing” on July 1, 1942 and were presumed dead.
Not until 2012, through the release of archival material by the Japanese Government, that the names of those aboard could be confirmed.
Not until the 22nd of April this year that the final resting place of these lost souls was known at last.
I want to conclude with two final accounts that date from after those extraordinary letters home were written.
The first comes from a witness who watched as the Australians boarded the Montevideo Maru on the 22nd of June 1942, bound for a prison camp.
He said:
“They were half starved and ill….with a smile and a cheery wave for those remaining, the stronger supporting the weaker; arm in arm.”
The second story belongs to the last living member of the Japanese crew.
Who, 60 years after that fateful day, spoke of how, as the ship sank groups of Australians clinging to pieces of wreckage in the water, sang Auld Lang Syne for their brothers already below.
Until the end, their thoughts were of others.
Tonight, let us declare again that those lost on the Montevideo Maru shall not be forgotten.
We shall bring them to mind.
We honour them.
We will remember them.
Lest We Forget.