Quoting from http://www.abc.net.au/7.30/content/2017/s4692782.htm
ABC 7.30 report “Items possibly belonging to Breaker Morant found on country rubbish tip”
Australian Broadcasting Corporation
Broadcast: 27/06/2017
Reporter: Peter McCuthcheon
A seemingly priceless collection of Boer War relics and Australian Federation papers has been found on a country rubbish tip. A military arms valuer has told 7.30 he has no doubt some of the items belonged to the infamous Harry 'Breaker' Morant, who was executed in 1902 for the murder of Boer prisoners.
Transcript
LEIGH SALES, PRESENTER: Breaker Morant is one of the most intriguing characters in Australian history and now we might learn something more about his life thanks to an unexpected discovery.
A seemingly priceless collection of Boer War relics and Australian Federation papers has turned up in a country town rubbish tip and it has caught the attention of those campaigning for Breaker Morant to be given an official pardon, as Peter McCutcheon reports.
PETER MCCUTCHEON, REPORTER: In the most unlikely of places, an incredible discovery.
JAMES UNKLES, LAWYER: It's the quintessential Aussie story, isn't it, of stuff you find in someone's shed, they treat it as rubbish, someone finds it and it is gold.
PETER MCCUTCHEON: This is what a collector stumbled across in a country New South Wales town tip, just over 12 months ago.
In one of the bins a hessian bag overflowing with extraordinary historical treasures.
How much would they be worth?
IAN SKENNERTON, ARMS VALUER: Look, it's priceless, you can't put a value on this.
PETER MCCUTCHEON: Many of the items appear to have belonged to one of the most infamous soldiers in Australian military history, Breaker Morant.
MR COLLECTOR: That's what I spotted first, sitting out of the top of the bag.
PETER MCCUTCHEON: The person who made this historical breakthrough says he doesn't want any publicity and requested we refer to him only as Mr Collector. But he did agree to 7.30 film him showing the collection to military valuer, Ian Skennerton.
MR COLLECTOR: The bag was chocker, I mean chocker. 90 per cent of it was a rat's nest, damp, smelly, stinky paperwork.
PETER MCCUTCHEON: Mr Collector threw away many of the damaged papers before he knew what he had found, and even tried to mend some items.
MR COLLECTOR: I actually tried to re-solder it, taking in mind we had no idea what this is. I thought I just scored a good bag full of bloody military shit.
PETER MCCUTCHEON: What are the standout items for you?
IAN SKENNERTON: Personally the most standout item, of course, is the penny.
PETER MCCUTCHEON: The engraved penny is damaged and according to Ian Skennerton, it has clearly been clipped by a bullet of Boer War vintage.
IAN SKENNERTON: This one is stamped "Edwin Henry Morant" so there is no way in the world that has belonged to anybody else and the fact that he was executed on 27 February 1902, and the bullet has just gone through the bottom of it which would have been over his heart when he said, "Shoot straight, you bastards. Don't mess this up!"
(Extract from movie, Breaker Morant)
BREAKER MORANT: Shoot straight, you bastards! Don't make a mess of it!
(End of extract)
PETER MCCUTCHEON: Lieutenants Morant and Peter Hancock were executed by the British Army in 1902 for the murder of Boer prisoners.
DR CRAIG WILCOX, BOER WAR HISTORIAN: The awful side of war which can include killing your battlefield prisoners, that started being extended by Morant's unit into killing these people who were coming into surrender, it was in effect killing civilians.
PETER MCCUTCHEON: But to some they're not war criminals but scapegoats, following the orders of British commander Lord Kitchener in a bitter guerrilla war.
JAMES UNKLES: Other British officers who did exactly the same thing, obeyed Kitchener's orders to shoot prisoners were never tried.
PETER MCCUTCHEON: The folk legend of Australian rebels exposing British hypocrisy was celebrated in the 1980 movie, Breaker Morant.
(Extract from movie, Breaker Morant)
JAMES THOMAS: Hold them up as murderers or obeying orders?
(End of extract)
PETER MCCUTCHEON: Their trial lawyer, Major James Thomas, played by Jack Thompson in the 1980 movie, appears to have inherited Morant's possessions and brought them back to Tenterfield in New South Wales after the war.
How they ended up in the town's rubbish tip 74 years after the major's death remains a mystery.
JAMES UNKLES: These items clearly have been picked up from one of his properties that Major Thomas had in Tenterfield. He had no family of his own, so someone has picked them up and they probably sat in somebody's shed and the people that threw them on the tip clearly didn't understand and why would they, how important these items were.
PETER MCCUTCHEON: Although the Australian War Memorial say it is would have to conduct a detailed analysis to verify the items' history, Ian Skennerton has no doubts about their authenticity, with Henry Breaker Morant's initials on four items and an uncanny match between the bandolier and this 1901 photograph and the one found in the tip.
IAN SKENNERTON: On his bandolier, one of the tabs is turned up, one is straight, one is slightly turned and the other is flat, and it is exactly the same as in this photograph of him.
Now, if it was just one or two tabs, a coincidence, but not one, two, three, four.
PETER MCCUTCHEON: As well as military treasures, there are books and papers from one of the architects of Australian Federation, Sir Henry Parkes, giving a glimpse into the birth of a nation and one of the earliest examples of an Australian flag.
A 1901 design that is currently in storage at Melbourne University's Centre for Cultural Materials Conservation.
JAMES UNKLES: And it has got inscriptions on it written by Major Thomas and also other soldiers who attended the funeral, so that's why the flag is so important.
PETER MCCUTCHEON: Melbourne lawyer James Unkles arranged to have the flag restored. He hopes the discovery will add momentum to his campaign to have Morant and Hancock pardoned.
JAMES UNKLES: They don't have a direct impact on the legal case, but what they have an impact on is to demonstrate to those in the community and in particular the Australian Government just how important this case is, needs to be heard, needs to be reviewed by an independent authority.
MR COLLECTOR: This is all newspaper clippings. Most of the Boer War ones are all at Tenterfield in the museum still.
PETER MCCUTCHEON: And as to the fate of the historical treasures, Mr Collector is in the process of donating it all to the Tenterfield Museum.
IAN SKENNERTON: It is stunning. It is anything that a historian could dream of seeing, finding, viewing, or handling.
CRAIG WILCOX: In the end, the Morant story, whichever way you look at it is about human failings, and they are possibly precious reminders of some of those failings and the awfulness of war.
Comments
A fabulous find, watched the 7.30 Report on iview after Ian Skennerton got in touch; the items will be used to help pardon John Breaker Morant...further news to come :-)....watch channel 2 for more news in weeks to come especially regarding where the items can be seen after conservation