Topic: "Patrols in the Stone Age"

Dave Wilkins graduated from the Royal Military College, Duntroon in 1963. His career in the Australian Regular Army spanned 26 years including three years in Papua New Guinea with the local Pacific Islands Regiment where his patrols into the wilds of that primitive land confronted threatening locals. It is some of those experiences during his 3 years of patrolling there in the mid-1960s that are the subject of his talk called “Patrols into The Stone Age; Escapades in Papua New Guinea”.

As a Captain he saw active service for 14 months in the Vietnam. Upon his return from active service he embarked upon a new career direction in law, initially as a military lawyer as a Defence Force Magistrate and Judge Advocate for trials by court martial. He retired as a Colonel from the Regular Army in 1985 to work as a barrister in Sydney for the next 20 years.

In 2019 he was awarded the Order of Australia Medal for services to community history, a consequence of the four-volume Rallying the Troops; A World War I Commemoration.