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Westbrook War Memorial is a heritage-listed memorial at 114 Toowoomba Road, Westbrook, Queensland, Australia. It was constructed in 1922 by Toowoomba masonry firm Bruce Brothers, and lies adjacent to the Westbrook Public Hall, which it predates. It stands 4.2 metres high, and consists of a statue of a digger atop a sandstone pedestal and base. The memorial contains the names of the 10 local men who died during World War I on the front face, and the 37 who served on the side faces. It was added to the Queensland Heritage Register on 21 October 1992. == History == The Westbrook War Memorial was unveiled prior to June 1922 by local MP, the Hon Littleton Groom. It was designed and executed by Bruce Brothers (successors of Walter Bruce) of Toowoomba, The memorial was erected by the residents of the district. It honours the 47 local men who served in the First World War, including the 10 fallen.〔 About half of the families listed are represented by more than one member, two families by four members, indicating the impact of the war upon the small community.〔 The town of Westbrook is located on the Darling Downs. The first white settlers arrived on the Downs in search of rich grazing land and by the 1840s, led by the Leslie brothers and John Campbell had established over twenty stations. Westbrook was the site of John Campbell's run. These stations prospered until their expansion was curbed due to the pressures of selection legislation and land was resumed for agricultural use. The area, which had previously been a primary producer of wool, diversified into wheat and dairy farming. By the 1920s, wheat had become the primary crop with state experimental farms located at Westbrook and other places providing the area with superior varieties of wheat.〔 Australia, and Queensland in particular, had few civic monuments before the First World War. The memorials erected in its wake became our first national monuments, recording the devastating impact of the war on a young nation. Australia lost 60,000 from a population of about 4 million, representing one in five of those who served. No previous or subsequent war has made such an impact on the nation.〔 Even before the end of the war, memorials became a spontaneous and highly visible expression of national grief. To those who erected them, they were as sacred as grave sites, substitute graves for the Australians whose bodies lay in battlefield cemeteries in Europe and the Middle East. British policy decreed that the Empire war dead were to be buried where they fell. The word "cenotaph", commonly applied to war memorials at the time, literally means "empty tomb".〔 Australian war memorials are distinctive in that they commemorate not only the dead. Australians were proud that their first great national army, unlike other belligerent armies, was composed entirely of volunteers, men worthy of honour whether or not they made the supreme sacrifice. Many memorials honour all who served from a locality, not just the dead, providing valuable evidence of community involvement in the war. Such evidence is not readily obtainable from military records, or from state or national listings, where names are categorised alphabetically or by military unit.〔 Australian war memorials are also valuable evidence of imperial and national loyalties, at the time, not seen as conflicting; the skills of local stonemasons, metalworkers and architects; and of popular taste. In Queensland, the soldier statue was the popular choice of memorial, whereas the obelisk predominated in the southern states, possibly a reflection of Queensland's larger working-class population and a lesser involvement of architects.〔 Many of the First World War monuments have been updated to record local involvement in later conflicts, and some have fallen victim to unsympathetic re-location and repair.〔 Although there are many different types of memorials in Queensland, the digger statue is the most common. It was the most popular choice of communities responsible for erecting the memorials, embodying the ANZAC myth and representing the qualities of the ideal Australian.....loyalty, courage, youth, innocence and masculinity. The digger was a phenomenon peculiar to Queensland, perhaps due to the fact that other states had followed Britain's lead and established Advisory Boards made up of architects and artists, prior to the erection of war memorials. The digger statue was not highly regarded by artists and architects who were involved in the design of relatively few Queensland memorials.〔 Most statues were constructed by local masonry firms, although some were by artists or imported.〔 When first unveiled, the memorial stood in front of open fields however in recent years, a hall has been constructed around the memorial. Although executed by Bruce Brothers, it is thought that the statue was obtained from Batstone's of Brisbane. The pedestal was a standard design, also used by Bruce Brothers for war memorials at Dulacca (Queensland) and Amosfield (New South Wales).〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Westbrook War Memorial」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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