AN estimated 7000 people attended the Tuesday’s Anzac Day dawn service in what has been hailed as a record.
Katie Baddock brought her son, five-year-old Harrison, to the service.
“We come to remember and let the kids know what it’s all about and pass on all the history,” she said.
Mrs Baddock said she had appreciated the dawn service after visiting Gallipoli in her teens.
The family also attended the march later in the morning to watch Harrison march with his fellow Orange Anglican Grammar School students.
“He’s a bit worried about his feet getting sore,” she said with a laugh.
“I think it’s great [he gets to march] because I did my schooling in the city and that wasn’t an opportunity for us – it gives them an appreciation of what happens and why they’re doing it.”
Andrew Robinson and his sister, Jennifer Rosser, brought their children to the dawn service.
“There’s something about this service that makes you think,” Mr Robinson said.
“I like the nice quiet reflection,” Ms Rosser said.
For Sally Turnbull and her daughter, Katie, the dawn service was an opportunity to remember her brother, Timothy Cutcliffe, who died when he stepped on a mine in Vietnam 50 years ago.
Mr Cutcliffe was conscripted into the 2nd Battalion Royal Australian Regiment and was just 21 when he died – Ms Turnbull was 12.
She remembered him as a good looking boy who excelled in polo, swimming, diving and football.
“He did buck jump riding at the Sydney show to my mother’s horror,” she said.
“We were devastated – my dad was on the council at the time so the funeral was huge, it stopped the town.”
She said her parents did not want their son to go and she remembered attending protests against the war.
“For a long time, we didn’t go to Anzac things but I don’t want people to forget – for our family, it’s as if it just happened, we were normal and it just turned upside down.”
