Peter FitzSimons > Quotes

“We had a teacher called Fanny Menlove, and I remember once when she was out of the room Nancy went up to the blackboard and wrote it backward - Menlove Fanny - and we all fell around laughing. She got into big trouble, but she didn't seem to mind. She had no fear.”
― Peter FitzSimons, Nancy Wake

“One hour of life, crowded to the full with glorious action, and filled with noble risks, is worth whole years of those mean observances of paltry decorum. WALTER SCOTT D”
― Peter FitzSimons, Nancy Wake

“hegemony in the Pacific was the great South Land”
― Peter FitzSimons, Kokoda: 75th Anniversary Edition

“Despite its diminutive stature, the capture of Hill 60 (along with Scimitar Hill and W Hills immediately to its north) will allow the Allied Anzac–Suvla line to push eastward into the Anafarta Range and, crucially, shorten that line. Turkish rifles currently outnumber the Allies’ 75,000 to 50,000, so rounding off and contracting the Allied line is an important defensive strategy that will help secure the ‘bridge’ between the two bridgeheads – Suvla and Anzac – while limiting any immediate threat to the Allies’ Suvla occupation. The problem remains, however, that the Turks hold the high ground and will fight to the death to keep it against those who would try to seize it from them. Who can the Allies call on in their hour of desperate need? Why, none other than the famous 29th Division. No matter that the 29th have been shot and shattered from ship to shore and back again so many times since their tragic landing from River Clyde. No matter that most of the fine soldiers who stood before King George in March stand no more, as no fewer than 30,000 men have now gone through their doomed ranks since the beginning of the campaign, only to be spat out the other side, either dead or wounded. No matter, even, that they can muster fewer than 7500 soldiers capable of holding a rifle. For their arrival on this battlefield, poised as they are to take Scimitar Hill on the left, lifts the army as one.”
― Peter FitzSimons, Gallipoli

“The good stars met in your horoscope, Made you of spirit and fire and dew. ROBERT BROWNING”
― Peter FitzSimons, Nancy Wake

“Never, in maritime history, has an open boat been sailed such a distance, through such savage waters – a little more than 4000 miles, a sixth of the Earth’s circumference, over 47 days – and all without losing a man, at least not at sea.”
― Peter FitzSimons, Mutiny on the Bounty: A saga of sex, sedition, mayhem and mutiny, and survival against extraordinary odds

“That is, they made love, not war.”
― Peter FitzSimons, Nancy Wake

“We thin their ranks, we rob their banks And say no thanks for what we do— Oh”
― Peter FitzSimons, Ned Kelly

“You know, when all this is over, we will say — these were still good times.”
― Peter FitzSimons, Nancy Wake

“The”
― Peter FitzSimons, The Ballad of Les Darcy

“and it must be remembered that the men whose desires lead them to the untrodden paths of the world have generally marked individuality.”
― Peter FitzSimons, Mawson: And the Ice Men of the Heroic Age: Scott, Shackleton and Amundsen

“the first solid European structures ever built in what would become known as Australia.”
― Peter FitzSimons, Batavia

“Everyone was packing as much pleasure into every day as we could, because no-one knew what tomorrow would bring.”
― Peter FitzSimons, Nancy Wake