On a recent trip with my wife to visit relatives at Agnes Water, we detoured to Maryborough (260km north of Brisbane) and just a slight detour off the Bruce Highway. Included in our tourist activities in Maryborough was a visit to the Maryborough Military & Colonial Museum.

This privately-owned museum has amassed an eclectic collection of around 10,000 items of military and colonial memorabilia, exhibited around the various campaigns in which Australia has been involved.

The museum houses a VC awarded to Lieutenant (later Major) Herbert James, 4th Battalion, Worcestershire Regiment for gallantry at Gully Ravine, Cape Helles, Gallipoli on 28th June and 3rd July 1915. It is one of only 39 VC’s for the Gallipoli campaign and the only one in Australia outside the Australian War Memorial.

The museum has two of the most historically significant medal groups to Australian soldiers for the Vietnam War – 1964 to 1973.

The Museum now has the largest collection of original Boer War medals on display in Australia. 

The Museum library houses many forms of written historical data including over 2,000 books, primarily of Australian and New Zealand military history, dating from pre-Boer War and pre-Federation to the present. Hundreds of files are made up of original military documents, photographs, serviceman’s diaries, newspapers, periodicals, maps and correspondence.

Click here for more information.

https://www.maryboroughmuseum.org

My wife was taken by this photo – given that she chose the path of the Empire Air Training Scheme in Canada for her fictional war hero Richard Belleville in her Belleville novels.

There is much more like this in the museum.

OUR VERDICT: It is certainly worth a visit if you are in the area – and when travel is once again permitted. 

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