More revisionism, I sighed, viewing the title of this book. First it’s the extent of frontier warfare between Indigenous Australians and settlers, now it’s the 1930s Depression. Doubtless in the next year or two we shall have a history demonstrating that the trauma of Gallipoli has been much exaggerated, since most of those who took part survived and some lived to ripe old ages. I was too hasty. David Potts has produced a subtler and more nuanced study than might be expected from the book’s title and advance publicity. Some of his findings are open to debate, but he underpins his arguments with evidence based on many years of oral history research with his undergraduates in the splendidly creative school of history at La Trobe University. It is this use of oral history that makes for controversy.
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