‘For kin, family and country’: the Indigenous servicemen finally being recognised

Reginald Saunders (second from right) served in the second world war and Korea. He and other Indigenous servicemen are finally being recognised. Photograph: Australian War Memorial

Glenda Humes bursts with pride for her father. “Dad fought for kin, for family and for country,” she says. Capt Reginald Walter Saunders, one of most distinguished Indigenous servicemen, served in the Middle East, Greece and Japan, as well as New Guinea and Korea.

Saunders fought at the Battle of 42nd Street in Crete, leading a bayonet charge against Nazi German forces. He and several fellow soldiers were then stranded after being left behind while the rest of their surviving battalion was evacuated.