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After Britain requested 12,000 soldiers from Australia, many men were very willing to sign themselves up to go and fight for their country in the war. The men were so eager to become heroes and be remembered individually in history for their heroic acts but that was not the case for most.
After the AIF men left to the Western Front, many families were left
without a husband/father in their home. This meant that, with the majority of the male population absent, the remaining women were left to take on their roles.
At first, many businesses were against having a woman working in the place of man. However, with the absence of almost all of the country’s fittest, youngest men, the women had to step in and take their place or else many of the country’s businesses would suffer.
The children of fathers who had left for war would have suddenly found themselves without a father. Without having a father at work, many families suffered financially, this meant that the older children of some families would have had to leave their school in order to work and make money in order to support their families.
There was also the threat of families losing their fathers/husbands; over 2,000 men were lost at the Gallipoli landing alone. While the steady supply of soldiers didn’t lesson, Australians were exposed to the harsh reality of war and the death that it brought with it.
Once the reality of war was exposed the nation, they began to take a more realistic view towards it. This meant that families were forced to expect the fact that their father’s may come home severely injured or not come home at all. This was , sadly, the reality for thousands of families, and they were never even given the chance to have a funeral because thousands of men were never found.