Blue Mountains District ANZAC Memorial HospitalPrint Page

The Blue Mountains District ANZAC Memorial Hospital commemorates those who died in service or were killed in action during World War One. 

The foundation stone for the hospital was laid in 1925, the honour roll and memorial tablet were unveiled by the Duchess of York on the 31st March 1927 and the official opening of the hospital was performed on the 3rd October 1928. There was strong indignation at the time of the unveiling of the honour roll as the relatives whose names appeared on the roll were not invited to attand. 

Inside the entry hall to the original hospital building is the Honour Roll which comprises three large white marble plaques attached to the brick wall. The inscription and veterans' are engraved and gilded on the plaques.

In May, 1919, the movement was launched by Dr. John Allan, who prepared a preliminary report, and with the assistance of Mr. Fred Wallace, gathered much of the information for the guidance of early workers in the organisation. Progress was slow, the spirit of the acquaintances was willing but the pockets lamentably weak. The founder of the movement had purchased a practice elsewhere, and Mr. John S. Henderson stepped into the breach. Voluntary aid having proved hopelessly inadequate it became imperative that other means of financing the scheme should be found or the movement abandoned. At that time, the B.M.A.H. & I Society was successfully conducting an Art Union, under control of its Secratary, Mr. Edgar Booth. Assistance was sought, co-operation granted, and by this means £7,320 was raised towards the building fund of the institution.

Over 1922-25, Mr. Henderson remained at the helm of a band of willing workers. A site was secured, plans prepared, contract for instruction decided, and in October,1925, the State Governor, His Excellency Sir Dudley de Chair, laid the foundation stone. In March, 1927, an Honor Roll, erected by the Committee to the memory of the district volunteers who had fallen in the Great War, was unveiled, and in the following June the Hospital portals were thrown open and patients received; an Honorary Medical staff, comprising the Doctors of the district, placing its services at the disposal of the institution, Regrettable complications necessitated a postponement of the official opening.

This ceremony took place on Wednesday afternoon, in a westerly gale which screamed about the hospital and bore on its breast driving flakes of snow and sleet.  So fierce was the wind that often the voices of the speakers were drowned and so bitter the cold that the ceremony was curtailed as much as possible. 
The Blue Mountain Echo (NSW), 5 October 1928.  

Location

Details

Dedication