THE heritage, limestone walls and cosy intimacy of the Norfolk Hotel’s basement made it the perfect place to film Tony Robinson’s latest series, Tour of Duty, commemorating 100 years of Anzac.

The Time Team presenter was looking his 68 years after a hectic schedule that saw him in New Zealand and a number of towns and cities in the eastern states before heading to Fremantle.

But the recently knighted Sir Tony was ever the English gentleman, fielding questions from fans and posing for photos, before and after shooting.

“I have been interested in history since I came out of the womb,” the man who will always be Baldrick told the Herald. “How can you know who you are if you don’t know your antecedents.”

With everyone jumping on the 100th anniversary of the WWI bandwagon, Tour of Duty, with its focus on Anzac and Gallipoli, is a chance to do something different, Robinson says.

The Norfolk’s mural of Dorothy Tangney and the Fremantle army museum on Cantonment Hill were Sir Tony’s drawcard to the port city.

Tangney, Australia’s first female senator and longest serving federal Labor MP (25 years) was a staunch advocate for war brides, who were often abandoned by their GI husbands.

Divorce was only possible in the US, making it prohibitively expensive for post-WWII Australian women to make a fresh start.

Born in Fremantle, Ken Brown’s mum was a war bride and he told a heartbreaking tale of his father being shipped out, only to be wounded in battle and sent back to the US.

His father wrote and sent money for two years, but his wife received neither.

“My grandmother took the money for her gambling habit, and destroyed the letters,” Mr Brown told the Herald before filming got underway.
Many years later he shook hands for the first time with his dad (who had remarried), and discovered the truth in a teary, but heartwarming, family reunion between his parents, who by then were in their 80s.

Tour of Duty airs on Pay TV’s history channel next year.

by JENNY D’ANGER