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26 australian maritime issues 2009: spc-a annual
Lieutenant Hugh Syme, GC, GM*, RANVR in London (AWM 141700)
War without honour is simply brutalism, but the Australian sense of honour is
bequeathed by our heroes, not unthinking fanatics. A case in point is Lieutenant
Hugh Randall Syme, Royal Australian Navy Volunteer Reserve (RANVR), one of the
most highly decorated Australian naval officers of WWII. Syme won the George Cross
and George Medal twice, not for brief moments of heartless killing, but for sustained
gallantry in the delicate and unforgiving business of mine disposal. Recalling this
officer, and other RAN members similarly awarded for intrepidness, George Hermon
Gill records that in every instance ‘the citation tells of ‘’gallant and undaunted devotion
to duty’’ … ‘’courage, initiative and devotion to duty’’ … ‘’skill and undaunted devotion
to duty’’. There could be no higher commendation’. 12
Such recollection of the past is both meaningful and evocative, and underlines our
inherited appreciation of the idea of honour. The sense is that we may learn ‘how to
act among our contemporaries by studying the actions of those who have preceded us.
[Our forebears] give stability and coherence to our moral lives – and to our military
lives. Notions about right and wrong are remarkably persistent’. 13 In other words, to
recognise honour now, we need to be acquainted with the traditions of honour that
have been passed down to us by the naval men and women of the past.