"They went out to this village, and they went through it with the bayonet.” In the second of a three-part series, RNZ's Black Sheep investigates the Surafend massacre of December 1918.
Read more about the story of Surafend on the RNZ website here.
“They got their heads together, the New Zealand and Australians, and they went out to this village and they went through it with the bayonet.”
- Edward O'Brien, Veteran of the Anzac Mounted Division, 1988
These are the words of Edward O’Brien - a former member of the Anzac Mounted Division. His words were recorded on tape by an oral historian and now sit in the archives of the Australian War Memorial.
Edward was one of a handful of Anzac's to admit seeing the Surafend massacre first hand, but his testimony does little to explain what happened.
In the second of a three part series, RNZ's Black Sheep podcast unpicks the story of the massacre, and the events which followed it - including the Anzac's little known role in suppressing the 1919 Egyptian revolution.
William Ray speaks to military historian Terry Kinloch, author of Devils on Horses, Paul Daley, author of Beersheba and New Zealand Defence Force Historian John Crawford
Further sources:
Go to this episode on rnz.co.nz for more details
