‘The Absent Minded Beggar’ is a patriotic poem written by Rudyard Kipling in 1899 in order to raise money for soldiers fighting in the Second Boer War.

Morant (Edward Woodward) and Handcock (Bryan Brown) march to their executions.

In a lonely, windswept hill camp, far out in the veldt, Captain Hunt (Terence Donovan) instructs Captain Taylor (John Waters) to execute Boer prisoners brought in by Morant (Edward Woodward).

Morant (Edward Woodward), Handcock (Bryan Brown) and Witton (Lewis Fitz-Gerald) meet their lawyer, Major J.F. Thomas (Jack Thompson), a country solicitor.

Director Bruce Beresford's Breaker Morant (Australia, 1980) was a tense psychological drama of injustice and brutal pragmatism in which the British put a group of Australians on trial

This actuality footage was taken by the official photographer of the Queensland Department of Agriculture, Frederick Charles Wills, and his assistant, Henry William Mobsby in 1899.

Officers of the Queensland Mounted Infantry lead some reluctant horses down a ramp to board the SS Cornwall on 31 October 1899 in Brisbane, prior to departing for the Boer War.

The Lumière Collection includes some of the oldest footage in the NFSA collection: over 30 short films made in 1899.