Peter "Bocky" Byrne, Legend, Farmer, Anzac

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By Dwain Duxson dwaind@farmtender.com.au

Peter "Bocky" Byrne, Legend, Farmer, Anzac - It's arguably the most important date on the calendar as we all look forward to celebrating Anzac Day. I want to profile a Wimmera (Vic) legend, Peter "Bocky" Byrne, Vietnam Veteran. Bocky is a well know Farmer at Banyena, on the Wimmera Plains. He is also heavily involved in the Minyip Murtoa Football Netball Club, he is a living legend of the club and Minyip before that. Some classify his role today as chief stirrer....

Bocky's son Paul wrote about his Dad talking to his son's school in the lead-up to Anzac Day. This is how Paul recites it. 

He told of Bocky's role as a gunner, manning "Echo" with his other 7 mates, sending shells from 6 miles away into the enemy, relying on the infantry battalion at the battlefront 6 miles and 100 yards ahead, keeping the Viet Cong at bay, and radioing back coordinates to central command, to relay to Dad's battery, so as they could shell the enemy without wounding their own. He spoke of "a few" mortar attacks that rained in on them over the course of his 11-month stay, evacuating to the sandbag-roofed trenches they had dug earlier for protection from such. They slept in canvas tents at night, but when the whistle of mortar came, they had the trench to evacuate to. 

He told of the replacement battery who relieved Dad, only a few weeks after he got home, being overrun by the Viet Cong, and sadly 3 on "Echo" were killed, and 25 in total died - The Battle of Coral, an Australian victory, but not so much for Dad. 

Dad told of his tears saying goodbye to a young 9 yo Vietnamese boy, who for 11 months used to come to Dad's camp, and he would give this boy his smokes (given as rations, " but I never smoked kids, remember it's very bad for you" he told the class!) and the boy told Dad they were to sell so he could get money to help his younger sister who had been wounded in their village, their parents both dead. That choked me up a little. Dad wondered how he was to this day.

His take-home message to the school was, "remember kids, life will be tough at times, you may have issues that affect you as you grow older, but remember the ultimate sacrifice paid by these young soldiers and the horrors they have endured in order or us to have our freedom, maybe life is not so bad".

Have a great Anzac Day and a great week Farming.

Image - Bocky (far right) with his 6 other gunner mates.

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