1. Animals
2. Bravery
3. Cartography
4. Courage
5. Danger
6. Death
7. Fear
8. Gallipoli
9. History
10. Humanity
11. Loss
12. Remembrance
13. Soldiers
14. Survival
15. War
16. WW1

Childhood friends Jack and Billy part in northern England, only to meet again at Gallipoli. John Simpson Kilpatrick, as a member of the 3rd Australian Field Ambulance Corps, and Billy, as one of over 300 wounded men brought to safety through Shrapnel Valley on a donkey.

Mark Greenwood and Frané Lessac, who are married to each other, are one of the great creative partnerships of Australian children’s books. Greenwood’s meticulous research skills are applied to characters from Australian history, often shining light on a pivotal event in the person’s childhood. This subject matter is perfectly matched by Lessac’s naïve paintings which are full of life and detail which make for rich reading over colourful double spreads. The historical military blunders – landing at the most vulnerable site on the peninsula, charging with fixed bayonets into machine gun fire – is suggested, and the casualties are not gratuitously violent. (Most of the red on each page is not blood but the red crosses worn by Jack and his company.) Shells explode in the background, and then closer to Jack and his donkey Duffy, as his twenty-four days of transporting water to the front line and then returning with the wounded, come to an end.

A visual link between Jack’s childhood leading donkeys across the sands of Tyneside through training in Egypt to the Dardanelles is established and maintained by this exceptional artist through the colours of sand. The faces, though, are individual, and readers feel the pain and dignity of their sacrifice. Greenwood’s text supports Lessac’s depiction of all nationalities involved in this battle, ally and enemy, making this book less Anzac-centric than others. Notes at the end of the book support this broader view of what will be to many readers a familiar conflict.

1. Mark Greenwood author website https://markgreenwood.com.au/
2. YouTube 9 June 2012 Frané Lessac in her studio explains her artistic process https://www.google.com/search?q=youtube+frane+lessac&oq=youtube+frane+lessac&aqs=chrome..69i57j69i64.8788j0j4&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8#fpstate=ive&vld=cid:b65fd91c,vid:vJvql-OARg8
3. Walker Books Classroom Ideas for ‘Simpson and his Donkey’ prepared by Mark Greenwood and Sue Whiting 2009 http://www.scool.scholastic.com.au/schoolzone/toolkit/assets/pdfs/simpson_and_his_donkey_book_notes.pdf
4. Monument Australia ‘Private John Simpson Kirkpatrick & His Donkey’ sculpture in Melbourne https://monumentaustralia.org.au/themes/people/military/display/32490-private-john-simpson-kirkpatrick-and-his-donkey
5. YouTube includes two programs, the first includes historical clips of the war, accompanied by the song ‘And The Band Played Waltzing Matilda’, written by Scottish-born Australian singer-songwriter Eric Bogle. The second YouTube is a reading of the book by Alistair Stewart. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=398BlpdZnzo
6. Anzac Day Websites, The Man with the Donkey, Simpson and his Donkey, and The legend of John Simpson Kirkpatrick offers many links to material about these topics, including classroom activities, games and puzzles http://www.anzacwebsites.com/people/simpson/simpson.htm
7. Australian War Memorial RSPCA Purple Cross and certificate of award to Simpson’s donkey, ‘Murphy’ https://www.awm.gov.au/collection/C323745