Certified Legendary Thread Remembering fallen mates - Peter Chant

Rooch in his double pager today talks about Anzac round and discusses Peter Chant and his on going effect on his 9RAR mate and the footy club.

http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/sp...t/news-story/c54fe2f543c7f80bfbda1f4a9d97e9bb
LEST we forget ...

Australian football is wrapping itself in patriotism this weekend, all the way to the now-showcase Essendon-Collingwood game at the MCG on Anzac Day. Port Adelaide last night opened the Anzac Round with a home game at Adelaide Oval — an event the Power will never take off its annual request list to the AFL with the fixture. The match — and all its justified tributes — draws memories to the club’s patriarch, navy serviceman Fos Williams. He not only encouraged the Diggers to continue beyond the Anzac Day march to Adelaide Oval, but he put many of them in the Port Adelaide changerooms as a reminder of the men they were to honour in a football game.
.....
This Anzac weekend marks the 50th anniversary of Peter Chant — who played 10 SANFL league games with Port Adelaide in 1961-62 — signing up for the regular army. Two years later, Chant was killed as his unit, 9 Platoon Charlie Company 9RAR, was trapped in a Vietcong bunker ambush.

It also is the 50th anniversary of the 9RAR being formed, a moment that will be recalled with a ceremony in Adelaide in November. Their legacy with the Port Adelaide Football Club is not only with Chant’s memory but next month’s historic AFL clash in Shanghai. The Power’s path to China was marked four years ago when a group of Vietnam veterans, including Hong Kong-based Port Adelaide supporter Denis Way, gathered in Adelaide for the Anzac tributes and to remember Chant. One of these Vietnam veterans, Mick Mummery OAM, keeps returning for any Anzac round clash hosted by Port Adelaide.

He does not hide his emotions when the videoscreens at Adelaide Oval carry an honour roll of Port Adelaide footballers who have served — and lost their lives, as Chant did on Valentine’s Day 1969. “That moment gets very close to the bone,” Mummery says. “And it takes me some time — up to quarter-time — for me to get over the emotion of the Anzac ceremonies and the minute’s silence at the start of the game. It is very hard for me to explain what this Anzac round means to those of us who have served. “This is a moment of recognition, a reminder of those who went away — and the loved ones who did not return and how the rest of us live with that loss. “And it should go beyond Collingwood and Essendon. “It is far more than Collingwood and Essendon. It is an event with Port Adelaide. And the Anzac game at Adelaide Oval serves as a very significant reminder of the Anzac story to all those who attend.”

Lest we forget ...
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/sp...t/news-story/c54fe2f543c7f80bfbda1f4a9d97e9bb
 

Rexie J

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Was the Honour Roll screened last night?

I thought we'd watched all on the screen and also a couple of other people seemed to have missed it.
 
Was the Honour Roll screened last night?

I thought we'd watched all on the screen and also a couple of other people seemed to have missed it.
Just before the game last night I received a text from Matthew Richardson who was at Before The Bounce, telling me that the framed medals, photos and citations for Pete, also for Bob and George Quinn, were on display in the McLachlan Room. Mick Mummery, quoted in Rooch's article, was the prime mover in having those memorials made up, including Bob's MM and Magarey Medals, and presented to the families and the Club in time for ANZAC Round 2014.
Pete, in his own quiet style, has become a little Club legend himself methinks.
Mission accomplished.
Lest we forget.
 
Was the Honour Roll screened last night?

I thought we'd watched all on the screen and also a couple of other people seemed to have missed it.
I got to my seat at 7.01 and Port were already on the ground so there wasn't any roll call from then on but might have been beforehand.
 
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From the Australian War Memorial Roll of Honour.

452018_475deb4f7909ad73c4c74b73fd78f92d.jpeg
 

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PETER CHANT's Vietnam campaign medals, badges (military and life-saving), and photos of him in Prison Bars (1961-1962) and formal khaki battle-dress have been put together on dark-green felt and framed by 9RAR Association, and delivered to the Club for mounting in an appropriate place.

PETE IS BACK HOME.

During ANZAC Round the framed memorial will be officially presented to the Club by Pete's next-of-kin.
This will not be the only ceremony within a larger ANZAC ceremony performed by the Club... more detail re which I'll include in a separate thread.

So concludes this particular BF thread.
It has achieved quite amazing results in twelve months - for Pete and our memory of him, for his mates, and for our Football Club.
Thank you all for your interest, attention and your support.

Different conflict, but this may be of interest to you LR, I have been recently contacted by a cousin of my mother, a niece of my two great uncles, who were both killed in action in early 1943 during the Kokoda campaign.
They were originally forward scouts and it was believed they died on the track itself, but it turns out that it was in the latter stages of that conflict when they were trained as bren gunners after the Japanese had been pushed back to the beach head where they had originally landed.

Whilst cleaning out the personal effects of another relative, she found a letter from their commanding officer recommending Jim, who had taken out two Japanese machine gun emplacements single handedly, for the VC.
He lost his life to a third emplacement, but saved the lives of a number of his mates in the process.
His brother Clarry was shot by a sniper when attempting to retrieve Jim's body the next day, both are buried in adjoining graves in the Bomana war cemetery in Port Moresby.

She has given a copy of the letter to her local RSL, but as you are probably aware only one Victoria Cross was given for the whole Kokoda campaign, and no doubt there would have been dozens of acts of bravery that could have deserved that honour.
The medals that they did receive are worn proudly by her brother's grand daughter when she marches in a Caledonian pipe band every Anzac day.
 
……………………… SITREP (Situation Report) FOR L/CPL PETER CHANT …………………………

G’day old mate.

Here we are again. Round 5. ANZAC Round. 2018.

Let’s do a recce back five years to Round 5, ANZAC Round 2013. That’s when it started, mate. Right? That’s when you reappeared, so to speak, to make PAFC and the Port faithful aware of who you are and what you did ... for all of us. You, the most recent, hopefully the last, senior Port Adelaide footballer to fall on the field of battle ... your status gloriously recognised by the Club five years ago this week.

I don’t need to go into details again, Pete, now do I. It’s all in here, starting with the first few pages of this thread. You’ve been promoted, mate, you’ll have noted. You now have your name in the title of a Certified Legendary Thread. That’s the equivalent, in BigFooty terms, of a Victoria Cross.
And I’m hereby asking Ford Fairlane to add a ribbon to your thread’s title, to pin ‘5th Anniversary’ on its end. Thanks, Ford.

Five. That was the lucky omen in 2013, Pete. Number 5. Round 5. Five wins in a row. Victory by 5 points after being down by 41 in the third ... all foreseen when the combo at the pre-match function in the Magarey Room at Footy Park played Dave Brubeck’s Take Five.

But that’s not all that happened that night, Pete, right? Something new got started that night, Saturday, 27 April 2013, and you played a crucial role. China got started. Didn’t it, mate.

Catalyst

They say that something which causes a chemical reaction but takes no physical part in that reaction is called a catalyst. That’s you. That’s Peter Chant - Lance Corporal Catalyst. You were the catalyst in the chemical reaction that followed the mixing of Port Adelaide Football Club, on the edge of insolvency, with the ‘clear air’ of China.

In Hong Kong, before the current international airport was opened at Chek Lap Kok on Lantau in 1998, the planes used to do a 90-degree right turn over Kowloon and land on the strip at Kai Tak. Right next to the strip there was a drain, called a nullah. It stank. It stank to high heaven. James Clavell christened that stink, when he wrote the opening scene to Noble House, as ‘the smell of money’.

In the first few pages of this thread I describe how I was invited down to Allan Scott Power HQ on Monday, 22 April 2013 to talk about you. I took Mick ‘Mumbles’ Mummery and John ‘Mother Country’ England with me. This was a consequence of this thread being created by Ford on my behalf, and the Club being made aware, in time for ANZAC Day, that there was a story waiting to be told. What a story it has turned out to be, old mate. And the story carries on, like never-ending ones are meant to do.

What next ?

What comes next, you ask. I’d love to be able to tell you, but I do not dare. No way will I risk hexing something we’ve been putting together for over three years. There is something substantial in the air - that ‘clear air’ - that is taking on definitive shape. By this time next year you will have long known what I’m hinting at.

It has to do with a new era at Alberton. It has to do with new walls, new rooms and new doors by which to enter them. It has to do with special rooms with new names, one of them perhaps even yours, mate, with your framed medals, photos and citation - the project Mumbles took charge of in time for ANZAC Day 2014 at Adelaide Oval, where you played in the black and white in the early 1960s - mounted and spotlighted.

So hang in there, Pete. Watch on, and enjoy. It’s Geelong this Saturday night, and it’s the Day next Wednesday when all your old mates will drink to your memory and chorus: “Lest we forget.”

No bloody way. Not if I have anything to do with it. Never forget, never ever forget, that’s us. And your story, the Peter Chant Story, is never ever ever going to end.

Cheers, old mate.
 
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……………………… SITREP (Situation Report) FOR L/CPL PETER CHANT …………………………

G’day old mate.

Here we are again. Round 5. ANZAC Round. 2018.

Let’s do a recce back five years to Round 5, ANZAC Round 2013. That’s when it started, mate. Right? That’s when you reappeared, so to speak, to make PAFC and the Port faithful aware of who you are and what you did ... for all of us. You, the most recent, hopefully the last, senior Port Adelaide footballer to fall on the field of battle ... your status gloriously recognised by the Club five years ago this week.

I don’t need to go into details again, Pete, now do I. It’s all in here, starting with the first few pages of this thread. You’ve been promoted, mate, you’ll have noted. You now have your name in the title of a Certified Legendary Thread. That’s the equivalent, in BigFooty terms, of a Victoria Cross.
And I’m hereby asking Ford Fairlane to add a ribbon to your thread’s title, to pin ‘5th Anniversary’ on its end. Thanks, Ford.

Five. That was the lucky omen in 2013, Pete. Number 5. Round 5. Five wins in a row. Victory by 5 points after being down by 41 in the third ... all foreseen when the combo at the pre-match function in the Magarey Room at Footy Park played Dave Brubeck’s Take Five.

But that’s not all that happened that night, Pete, right? Something new got started that night, Saturday, 27 April 2013, and you played a crucial role. China got started. Didn’t it, mate.

Catalyst

They say that something which causes a chemical reaction but takes no physical part in that reaction is called a catalyst. That’s you. That’s Peter Chant - Lance Corporal Catalyst. You were the catalyst in the chemical reaction that followed the mixing of Port Adelaide Football Club, on the edge of insolvency, with the ‘clear air’ of China.

In Hong Kong, before the current international airport was opened at Chek Lap Kok on Lantau in 1998, the planes used to do a 90-degree right turn over Kowloon and land on the strip at Kai Tak. Right next to the strip there was a drain, called a nullah. It stank. It stank to high heaven. James Clavell christened that stink, when he wrote the opening scene to Noble House, as ‘the smell of money’.

In the first few pages of this thread I describe how I was invited down to Allan Scott Power HQ on Monday, 22 April 2013 to talk about you. I took Mick ‘Mumbles’ Mummery and John ‘Mother Country’ England with me. This was a consequence of this thread being created by Ford on my behalf, and the Club being made aware, in time for ANZAC Day, that there was a story waiting to be told. What a story it has turned out to be, old mate. And the story carries on, like never-ending ones are meant to do.

What next ?

What comes next, you ask. I’d love to be able to tell you, but I do not dare. No way will I risk hexing something we’ve been putting together for over three years. There is something substantial in the air - that ‘clear air’ - that is taking on definitive shape. By this time next year you will have long known what I’m hinting at.

It has to do with a new era at Alberton. It has to do with new walls, new rooms and new doors by which to enter them. It has to do with special rooms with new names, one of them perhaps even yours, mate, with your framed medals, photos and citation - the project Mumbles took charge of in time for ANZAC Day 2014 at Adelaide Oval, where you played in the black and white in the early 1960s - mounted and spotlighted.

So hang in there, Pete. Watch on, and enjoy. It’s Geelong this Saturday night, and it’s the Day next Wednesday when all your old mates will drink to your memory and chorus: “Lest we forget.”

No bloody way. Not if I have anything to do with it. Never forget, never ever forget, that’s us. And your story, the Peter Chant Story, is never ever ever going to end.

Cheers, old mate.
really nice post
 

Smithy7

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Port Adelaide continues to support the families of Australia’s front line
WHY Port Adelaide’s programs mean so much to the families of the Australian Defence Force

THEY are the families that live the military lives most of us have only seen in the movies: endless moves, children going to several schools a year and living with the fear for their husband’s safety as he serves on Australia’s front line.
Port Adelaide yesterday celebrated its six-year-long partnership with the Australian Defence Force by putting on a clinic for those families at Adelaide Oval No. 2 and those involved could not speak more highly of what it meant to meet others in the same situation.
More ..
http://www.news.com.au/sport/afl/po...e/news-story/f84c62816004ef9fcae7d19b1a586480
upload_2018-4-18_9-19-32.png


Port Adelaide’s Robbie Gray with defence force children and their mothers.
 

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……………………… SITREP (Situation Report) FOR L/CPL PETER CHANT …………………………

G’day old mate.

Here we are again. Round 5. ANZAC Round. 2018.

Let’s do a recce back five years to Round 5, ANZAC Round 2013. That’s when it started, mate. Right? That’s when you reappeared, so to speak, to make PAFC and the Port faithful aware of who you are and what you did ... for all of us. You, the most recent, hopefully the last, senior Port Adelaide footballer to fall on the field of battle ... your status gloriously recognised by the Club five years ago this week.

I don’t need to go into details again, Pete, now do I. It’s all in here, starting with the first few pages of this thread. You’ve been promoted, mate, you’ll have noted. You now have your name in the title of a Certified Legendary Thread. That’s the equivalent, in BigFooty terms, of a Victoria Cross.
And I’m hereby asking Ford Fairlane to add a ribbon to your thread’s title, to pin ‘5th Anniversary’ on its end. Thanks, Ford.

Five. That was the lucky omen in 2013, Pete. Number 5. Round 5. Five wins in a row. Victory by 5 points after being down by 41 in the third ... all foreseen when the combo at the pre-match function in the Magarey Room at Footy Park played Dave Brubeck’s Take Five.

But that’s not all that happened that night, Pete, right? Something new got started that night, Saturday, 27 April 2013, and you played a crucial role. China got started. Didn’t it, mate.

Catalyst

They say that something which causes a chemical reaction but takes no physical part in that reaction is called a catalyst. That’s you. That’s Peter Chant - Lance Corporal Catalyst. You were the catalyst in the chemical reaction that followed the mixing of Port Adelaide Football Club, on the edge of insolvency, with the ‘clear air’ of China.

In Hong Kong, before the current international airport was opened at Chek Lap Kok on Lantau in 1998, the planes used to do a 90-degree right turn over Kowloon and land on the strip at Kai Tak. Right next to the strip there was a drain, called a nullah. It stank. It stank to high heaven. James Clavell christened that stink, when he wrote the opening scene to Noble House, as ‘the smell of money’.

In the first few pages of this thread I describe how I was invited down to Allan Scott Power HQ on Monday, 22 April 2013 to talk about you. I took Mick ‘Mumbles’ Mummery and John ‘Mother Country’ England with me. This was a consequence of this thread being created by Ford on my behalf, and the Club being made aware, in time for ANZAC Day, that there was a story waiting to be told. What a story it has turned out to be, old mate. And the story carries on, like never-ending ones are meant to do.

What next ?

What comes next, you ask. I’d love to be able to tell you, but I do not dare. No way will I risk hexing something we’ve been putting together for over three years. There is something substantial in the air - that ‘clear air’ - that is taking on definitive shape. By this time next year you will have long known what I’m hinting at.

It has to do with a new era at Alberton. It has to do with new walls, new rooms and new doors by which to enter them. It has to do with special rooms with new names, one of them perhaps even yours, mate, with your framed medals, photos and citation - the project Mumbles took charge of in time for ANZAC Day 2014 at Adelaide Oval, where you played in the black and white in the early 1960s - mounted and spotlighted.

So hang in there, Pete. Watch on, and enjoy. It’s Geelong this Saturday night, and it’s the Day next Wednesday when all your old mates will drink to your memory and chorus: “Lest we forget.”

No bloody way. Not if I have anything to do with it. Never forget, never ever forget, that’s us. And your story, the Peter Chant Story, is never ever ever going to end.

Cheers, old mate.

That is sensational LR. What a fantastic job you, your mates, and the PAFC are doing in the memory of those that have gone before us, and in particular your mate Peter Chant.

#LestWeForget
 
This from the Club website. From next year the AFL will acknowledge senior players from state leagues other than VFL who gave their lives in conflicts up to and including WW2. If they try a little bit harder they might even realise that there could also be players who died in Korea, Vietnam, etc.

‘AFL to recognise Port players killed in line of duty from 2019

‘The AFL has committed to including the records of players killed in active service from outside Victoria in its honour roll from next year, after a push by people in other states – including Port Adelaide supporters.

‘The AFL put out a list of players killed on active service during the Boer War, World War I and World War II this week but it included only those who had played for clubs in Victoria.

‘The operator of the Ports1870 twitter handle was one of the first to react, saying the omission of servicemen from the Port Adelaide Football Club was “absolutely disgraceful”

‘“In truth the AFL is a national competition and servicemen from the WAFL, SANFL and TSL should also be included,” the Twitter message read.

‘AFL spokesman Patrick Keane was questioned about the matter on ABC Radio Adelaide and said from next year, the AFL hoped to recognise servicemen from the SANFL and WAFL, plus those from other states and territories.

‘“We’re well aware that we have a significant gap for players outside of Victoria and it’s something we need to address and we intend to from now,” Mr Keane said.’
 
I’ve been told there was a pre-match PAFC ANZAC video presentation at the Oval on Saturday night which included Peter Chant. Can’t find it on the website. If anyone can post it here, I would be extremely grateful.
 
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I’ve been told there was a pre-match PAFC ANZAC video presentation at the Oval on Saturday night which included Peter Chant. Can’t find it on the website. If anyone can post it here, I would be extremely grateful.
It was very good presentation. Email the club, I'm sure they'd provide you of all people with a copy.
 
Five. That was the lucky omen in 2013, Pete. Number 5. Round 5. Five wins in a row. Victory by 5 points after being down by 41 in the third ... all foreseen when the combo at the pre-match function in the Magarey Room at Footy Park played Dave Brubeck’s Take Five.

Five. Again. Won by five points again. Crows’ winning run ends at five. Robbie Gray kicks five goals in one quarter.
 
1555204774654.jpeg


‘This could be the last photo ever taken of Pete. He and his 9 Platoon mates are kitted up in 9RAR Charlie Coy. lines in Nui Dat waiting for transport to Kapyong Pad. From there they will be choppered north into the dense jungle of the Hat Dich region to the east of Saigon to resume Operation Goodwood. Their objective will be to contribute to heading off any repeat of the NVA/Viet Cong’s full-scale surprise offensive a year earlier during Tet 1968. Infantry movement through dense jungle entails the risk of passing between the buffalo horns of an enemy bunker system without knowing it until too late.’

The above photo and caption have been copied from the OP of my Autopsy thread: ‘UP THE CHINA RABBIT-HOLE - The TV Docudrama Series.’

https://www.bigfooty.com/forum/threads/up-the-china-rabbit-hole-the-tv-docudrama-series.1212264/

Also posted here to supplement this thread honouring Pete’s memory is the link below to the opening segment of Episode 4 of the Docudrama: Tribal Instinct - which records my side, in my style, of what was happening in Vietnam at the time Pete lost his life.

https://www.bigfooty.com/forum/thre...t-hole-the-tv-docudrama-series.1212264/page-5


LEST WE FORGET.
 
A few days ago I was alerted by 9RAR Association that the Shrine of Remembrance in Melbourne is seeking from the Veterans community photographs connected with the Battles of Hat Dich and Binh Ba to be featured this ANZAC Day in a 50th anniversary memorial of those battles. Pete was killed at Hat Dich and so I sent off a copy of the photo of Pete and 9 Platoon above along with a suitable story as to its relevance. I received the following quick reply:

Dear Denis,
Thank you for responding so promptly. This is a very moving photo, and one I note the Australian War Memorial in Canberra does not appear to hold; I don’t know if you have had any contact with them regarding making it available to them. I will pass it on to the Victorian RSL for their Anzac Day commemoration. This year as part of the prelude to the Dawn Service they are commemorating the 50th anniversary of the Battles of Hat Dich and Binh Ba. This involves the MC making a short speech on various relevant topics accompanied by a visual display. I am not sure if it is sufficient resolution for display on the big screen; their technical person will advise me.
Thank you again, your help on such short notice is very much appreciated.

Kind regards


Katrina Nicolson
Exhibition Research/Grants Officer
Shrine of Remembrance
 
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