Mick Batchelor was travelling through the outback a few years back when he chanced upon a truckload of horses at a rodeo at Tibooburra in Far West New South Wales.
Mr Batchelor, a stock contractor, naturally took a closer look.
To his surprise, he learned that they had come from Naryilco Station in Queensland's Channel Country.
And, to his horror, that they were on route to a knackery in South Australia.
"They were all work horses and hadn't been used for a while and had been out on a river paddock in a real big drought year of 2017," he said.
Cattle company S Kidman & Co. had recently sold the station to Gina Reinhart's Hancock Agriculture and was getting rid of excess horses.
Among them was a broadly built, 10-year-old, dark bay gelding, standing 16 hands, by the name of Deets, that caught Mr Batchelor's eye.
The rodeo proprietor tested the horses for their bucking ability, to see if any might find a new career in the rodeo ring.
Deets barely raised an eyebrow let alone a ruckus.
Ideal for a packhorse, thought Mr Batchelor.
As luck would have it, he met local horse breaker Timmy Norris. Years earlier, Mr Norris had broken Deets in and confirmed his placid temperament.
Deets also had an illustrious lineage. He was a Waler, the type of horse whose wartime deeds had won worldwide acclaim, especially in the blazing deserts of the Middle East during World War I.
Back then, Sir Sidney Kidman — "Australia's Cattle King" — supplied thousands of horses to the Australian Army; from officers' chargers to sturdy general riding horses, as used by the Australian Light Horse as well as heavier, haulage horses like Deets.
"Well, he's wide enough on the rump you could sit around him and play a game of cards I reckon," Mr Batchelor said.
"Horses had such an integral role in warfare," historian Rachel Caines of the Australian War Memorial explained.
"They were used to pull the ambulances, to bring the artillery to and from the field, to help bring the wounded, to help transport supplies."
So, for $200 and a bit of paperwork, Mick Batchelor bought Deets and found homes for the other 25 horses on the truck.
Horses and Anzac Day
Now the large dark bay has an integral role as a ceremonial troop horse.
A stalwart supporter of the Riverina Light Horse, Mr Batchelor — dressed in the authentic uniform and kit of a light horseman — is kept busy parading his horses at commemorative events across the country.
This Anzac Day, mounted on his chestnut gelding, Wallace, he'll attend the unveiling of the new war memorial at Cobar, in New South Wales.
The presence of horses at such events seems to strike an evocative chord with everyone.
"When they see the horses, the people just flock [to you] and want to look and ask questions. It seems to be a tradition that has grown on the public. They want to know more," Chris Walsh of Narromine said.
Mr Walsh has been a volunteer light horse drill instructor for several decades, motivated by a desire to remember the wartime sacrifice of humans and animals.
"A lot of horses came from the country areas, and so on, and they were part of families and working stations and they never came back," Mr Walsh said.
"So we've gotta remember them too: the horses, their sacrifice, both on the Western Front and the Middle East."
The hardiness and endurance of Waler horses in Palestine and Sinai in World War I became legendary.
Mr Batchelor said this was largely because most had been bred in the harsh Australian outback.
"So, those horses could stand up to a bigger day — less water and less feed — than the European horses," he said.
However, it's often overlooked that the majority of the horses Australia sent to the war — somewhere between 130,000 and 160,000 — served on the killing fields of France and Belgium.
"Most of them were dealing with gas, shell explosions. The mud is often commented on and a really important part of horses' experience at war, I think," Ms Caines said.
The average life expectancy for a heavy horse such as Deets on the Western Front in World War I was six weeks.
As for Deets, he's in good company at Grong Grong in New South Wales. He shares a paddock with a mule and a donkey that Mr Batchelor also sourced from the outback.
Mules and donkeys were also pressed into wartime service and became part of an estimated eight million horses, mules and donkeys that were killed during World War I.
Most perished from the extreme conditions they endured.
"We're trying to preserve the history," said Mr Batchelor, who said animals have a crucial role in modern-day remembrance.
"And I think that's a better way to educate people, rather than walking into an old museum.
"They can come and see it, smell it, feel it."
