By Callum Ludwig
The Seville War Memorial is set to be made accessible just in time for this year’s Anzac Day dawn service.
With support from the Community Bank of Wandin/Seville, the two damaged panels will be removed over the coming weeks alongside the temporary fencing and further plans to replace them are underway,
Despite only two panels set to be standing at the memorial for the foreseeable future, Chair of the Seville War Memorial Committee Anthony McAleer OAM said they’ll still have two important stories up there for the community to focus on during the Anzac Day service.
“The dawn services have been getting increasingly bigger each year, we were building on that momentum but didn’t want to have the situation like we did on Remembrance Day where the memorial that we worked so hard for was closed off with no access to it,” he said.
“Our message to the community is to come along and support the service, we’ve certainly put a lot of work into getting a war memorial done for this community and certainly are extremely appreciative of the Bendigo Bank and their support to enable the memorial to be opened enough for Anzac Day for our Dawn Service.”
The Seville War Memorial has been fenced off since mid-September 2023 after a vandalism attack left the panels featuring Private Bruce Bethune and Victoria Cross recipient George Ingram shattered.
Chairman of the Community Bank of Wandin/Seville Ray Barrett said while they are happy to support the first stage of replacing the panels, it’s very sad that it got to this stage.
“It is vastly disappointing that these people in the community don’t respect what’s there, so that’s why we wanted to step in and take the two panels down so Anthony can run the dawn service,” he said.
Branch Manager Jackie Butler said she thinks the service is really important for the community.
“It’s built year on year and it was important the residents got something in their own community so they didn’t have to go anywhere else,” she said.
The vandalism incident at the Seville War Memorial has not been an isolated attack in the Yarra Ranges; the Montrose War Memorial was graffitied on the morning of Remembrance Day in 2023 and the Hookey Park War Memorial in Mooroolbark previously had a plaque stolen back in 2016.
Mr McAleer said they want the memorials can overcome the incidents and be restored to their former glory and they don’t want to have mindless vandals to be the ones to destroy that for the community.
“Since we had the memorial unveiled, the Seville community has certainly embraced it but there’s even people coming from outside of the district to come and see the memorial,” he said. “Number one, because it recognises a person of national significance in the fact that George Ingram was the last Australian Victoria Cross recipient for World War One, but also because it’s quite unique, the whole project was all about creating a public work of art as well as having a a memorial that would educate people,”
“It’s become an icon for Seville.”
Mr McAleer, Lilydale RSL President Bill Dobson and Mt Evelyn RSL President Matt Crymble have been in discussions with Evelyn MP Bridget Vallence to advocate for greater penalties for the vandalism of war memorials, with Ms Vallence having brought up the concern in parliament and told the Star Mail in January this year that it is one of her goals for the year ahead.
President of the Seville Township Group Graeme Black said they hope to increase the security of the memorial when it is restored.
“It’s our hope that by perhaps Remembrance Day we may have the complete restoration,” he said.
“The other thing is that we’re imminently expecting CCTV cameras which will capture this area and the along the highway, these have all been passed and funded by the Federal Government and so we expect that to happen fairly soon.”
On 31 January 2019, $440,000 in funding from the Department of Home Affairs was allocated towards the Yarra Ranges Safety Camera Network following an election promise from former Casey MP Tony Smith set to bring a network of CCTV cameras to Seville, Warburton, Montrose, Monbulk and Millgrove.
