ABSTRACT

Basing my research on the Great War letters of an Australian soldier, I have uncovered a pioneering community where, in the struggle to settle in an alien environment, heroism was the norm. Faced with the challenge of war, the people mobilized their community structures to send their ‘soldier-heroes’ to the battlefront and to support them and their loved ones on the home front. When death came, the rhetoric of heroism became a coping mechanism that restored community wellbeing. Whereas in peacetime, the identity of the women was obscured, the wartime supporting roles they adopted made them visible.