Anzac Day 2025: Bravery runs deep in this unique military family’s blood

The Forbes family is believed to be unique, with the National War Memorial saying it is unable to find any records of another family whose members include three Military Cross recipients.

Korean War veteran and Military Cross recipient Patrick Forbes, 95, with his medals ahead of Anzac Day. Picture: Matt Turner

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A sense of national duty is so ingrained in the Forbes family that it counts three members who were awarded the Military Cross for distinguished service in the defining wars of the 20th century.

On the eve of this Anzac Day, with retired lieutenant colonel Patrick Forbes set to march in Adelaide on Friday for what he says will be the last time, this decorated veteran laments the decline in our sense of duty and our national unpreparedness for future conflicts.

The Forbes family is believed to be unique, with the National War Memorial saying it is unable to find any records of another family whose members include three Military Cross recipients.

Now 95, Mr Forbes was awarded the MC for his service in Korea with the 2nd Battalion with the Royal Australian Regiment.

His late brother Jim Forbes, a lieutenant, was awarded the MC for his gallantry in the southwest Pacific in World War II where he served in the A Field Battery and 2nd Mountain Battery artillery units in New Guinea and Bougainville.

After the war, he also went on the become a minister in the Menzies, Holt and Gorton governments, holding the South Australian seat of Barker for the Liberals for 20 years and serving as minister for navy, army, health and immigration.

Patrick Forbes fought in Korea.

Brigadier Alexander (Alec) Forbes, awarded the Military Cross for his service in France in World War I.

Patrick and Jim’s father Alexander (Alec) Forbes, a brigadier, was awarded the MC for his service with the 102nd Battery in France during World War I, holding the line at Sailly and during the operation on the Somme including the capture of Pozieres in 1916.

In addition, Patrick and Jim’s other brother David Forbes, a flight sergeant, flew some 40 to 50 missions in the Pacific with the RAAF in World War II and was mentioned in dispatches for his “keenness to engage the enemy”, including being hit by flak three times and on one occasion bailing out over the sea.

As he looks back on his life, Mr Forbes said his family had ­always assumed that one would be prepared to serve when the ­nation was under threat.

“It wasn’t something you thought about, it was just what you did,” he said.

“I do worry this sense of service has become lost over time.”

But he baulked at any romantic notions of warfare and said the human toll of war troubled him to this day.

He said he had never been much of a marcher, worrying that the Anzac Day march can be wrongly interpreted as a celebration, but prefers the solemnity of the Dawn Service.

“For me the Dawn Service is the most powerful and respectful way of commemorating the sacrifices that have been made,” he said. “I always get along to a Dawn Service, it is the most appropriate form of reflection.”

Lieutenant Jim Forbes, awarded the Military Cross for service in the Pacific in World War II.

After his military career ended Mr Forbes moved, like his brother Jim, into public service and headed several postings for the South Australian government as trade commissioner in Europe and Asia. He said he had managed to cope with the psychological impact of the war by leading a busy life and having a loving family who have kept him well occupied, with his wife of 68 years, Janet, four sons, eight grandchildren and three great-grandchildren.

But he said that it was only when he retired and was less occupied that he started to think more deeply and frequently about what he had seen in Korea.

“Back in those days no one talked about PTSD or anything like that, there was just a sense that you had to get on with things,” he said.

“But I will never forget the appalling loss of life that we witnessed when just two days before the official armistice, the Chinese army sent about 3000 soldiers to their death.

“They were ordered to attack positions when there was no justifiable reason given the truce was about to take place. It was absolutely idiotic, a total act of futility. I am not saying all wars are futile. There are times you have to fight. But what I saw there … was just a terrible waste, a completely avoidable example of nothing other than futility and stupidity.”

Patrick Forbes with his sons Tony and Richard in Adelaide. Picture: Matt Turner.

The Forbes Family Military History, meticulously prepared by Patrick’s son Richard, documents his father’s service in Korea where he was honoured with an MC.

“Whenever an assault pioneer was required to carry out a dangerous or difficult task Lieutenant Forbes was always present to carry it out,” it reads. “On two separate occasions he was involved in recovering our casualties from within a minefield. At all times his personal courage, zeal and efficiency were a constant inspiration to those who worked under him and a great example to all members of the unit.”

There were 40 men who served with him in his platoon in Korea in the 1950s. Seven decades on, only two others remain.

While the Forbes family story is a reminder of the sacrifice made by many Australian families across multiple conflicts, Mr Forbes said he did not see any heroism in what he or his other family members had achieved.

“It was just a question of being prepared to serve,” he said. “That’s all we did.”