Sheep dogs, medieval knights and vale Victor Trumper

The Australian Gazette was typical of multi-part silent newsreels, with a mix of serious and lighter news coverage, that kept people at home informed during the First World War. Sheepdogs trials like the one seen in the first segment had been held in Australia from as early as the 1870s. The British steel barque Inverness-Shire, seen in the second segment, lost three of her four masts in a storm off Tasmania before being towed by a tug into the port of Hobart. The Melbourne parade in the third segment records the strong association Australians have had with the French Red Cross, particularly during this period when Australia fought with the Allied Powers, including France, against the German, Austro–Hungarian and Ottoman Empires. Many of the costumes in this procession depict identities or scenes from French history such as crusaders, medieval knights and the Emperor Napoleon. The final segment shows the funeral procession for Victor Trumper, a popular cricketer renowned for his stylish batting technique. He died at the age of 37 and 20,000 mourners lined the route of his funeral procession, the largest ever seen in Sydney to that time.