[2] The Historical Collection of the Survey Corps is maintained by the Australian Army Museum of Military Engineering at Holsworthy Barracks, south-west Sydney, New South Wales.

Survey Corps Associations of ex-members, family and friends are located in Adelaide, Bendigo, Brisbane, Canberra, Perth and Sydney.

Cook had learned surveying in Canada from Royal Engineer Samuel Holland who then (1758) was the first Surveyor-General of British North America.

[4] For 113 years after the arrival of the First Fleet, much of the mapping of Australia, mainly for colonial exploration, settlement and development, was supervised and conducted by naval and military officers.

Most recently a royal commission into the way the British Army had conducted itself in South Africa (Boer War) found that the troops had to fight without adequate topographic information.

[7] The Department of Defence and the Government considered a number of options to address the important and urgent need for a military survey, finally deciding in late 1907 to raise the Australian Intelligence Corps (AIC) manned by part-time Citizen Military Force (CMF) officers who were trained in surveying or draughting and whose duties included the preparation of strategic and tactical maps and plans.

The Royal Engineer topographers (Corporal Lynch, Lance-Corporals Barrett, Davies and Wilcox) arrived in Melbourne on 11 April 1910 and on 16 April 1910, draughtsman Warrant Officer John J Raisbeck was the first Australian appointed to the Survey Section and soon after he was joined by draughtsman Warrant Officer Class 1 George Constable.

[11] At that stage it was understood that the British Army would provide the maps required for the Australian Imperial Force (AIF) war fighting.

However, by 17 August the Draughting sub-Section of the Survey Section RAE in Melbourne had prepared a map of the north-east frontier of France for reproduction of 1,000 copies by photo-lithography by the Victorian Lands Department for issue to the Australian Imperial Force.

[11] Survey Corps members started to enlist in the AIF in November 1915, with three Warrant Officer draughtsmen (Murray, Shiels and MacDonald) working with the Headquarters of the Egyptian Expeditionary Force by late 1916.

For a prolonged period this Warrant Officer was engaged on surveying the area between the lines repeatedly working under machine gun fire and sniping.

The Survey Corps undertook this field and computation work linking QLD, NSW, VIC and SA with a 1st Order trigonometric network by 1939.

Then in 1938, with war clouds once again on the horizon, a three-year Long Range Mapping Programme was approved, with additional funding bringing the total to ninety-seven all ranks.

In September 1940 significant expansion of the Australian Survey Corps was approved by Cabinet with a view to speed up map production for the home forces.

Over the next four years fifteen survey units with various roles relating to production of topographic maps provided survey and mapping support to military operations in the South West Pacific Area theatre of the war including Northern Territory, Papua, New Guinea, New Britain, New Ireland, Bougainville, Dutch New Guinea, Borneo, Philippines and the States of Australia, in particular northern Australia.

On 13 November 1942, Lieutenant-General Edmund Herring, General Officer Commanding New Guinea Force, wrote to Director of Survey Advanced Land Headquarters thanking him for the noteworthy efficiency and splendid cooperation in having an urgently needed map of Buna, Papua, sent to 2/1st Army Topographic Survey Company RAE in Toowoomba QLD for printing, and then returned for issue to forward troops 48 hours later.

At Morotai, the 1st Mobile Lithographic Section was given the privilege of preparing the Instrument of Surrender signed by Commander, Second Japanese Army and countersigned by General Blamey, Commander-in-Chief, Australian Military Forces.

By 1996 the Corps had completed more than 1900 of these maps by – field surveys using mainly US TRANSIT and GPS satellite positioning systems and aircraft mounted laser terrain profiling, new coverage aerial photography, aerotriangulation, compilation and cartographic completion on computer assisted mapping systems and produced both digital and printed topographic products.

Production of the military specification Joint Operation Graphics scale 1:250,000 is mentioned in the section "National Survey and Mapping Programmes" below.

These included: production of air navigation charts for the Royal Australian Air Force covering Australia and a large area of its region totalling about eight per cent of the earth's surface; printing hydrographic charts for the Hydrographer Royal Australian Navy; joint and single service training area special surveys, maps and models including live fire requirements; vital asset protection maps; safeguarding maps for ammunition depots; digital terrain data and models for command and control, communications, intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance, simulation, weapons and geographic information systems; photomaps using air and satellite photography.

2 Squadron RAAF using Canberra bombers fitted with Army Wild RC-10 mapping cameras (Operation Skai Piksa 1973-75 and 1981), supported by Survey Corps surveyors and photogrammetrists to plan the photography requirements and for quality control to ensure that the photography met the high technical standards for the subsequent mapping processes.

Projects commenced in 1970 in Indonesia and expanded over 25 years to include Solomon Islands, Fiji, Tonga, Kiribati, Nauru, Tuvalu, Vanuatu and Western Samoa.

Technical Advisers were posted to national survey and mapping organisations in Fiji, Indonesia, Malaysia, Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands and Vanuatu.

[2] All field survey operations outside of Australia, and indeed in Australia, would not have been possible without essential support of most other Army Corps (Engineers; Signals; Aviation – Cessna, Porter, Nomad, Sioux, Kiowa; Chaplains, Medical, Dental, Transport, Ordnance, Electrical and Mechanical Engineers, Pay, Catering, Service), the Royal Australian Navy (Hydrographic Service, Landing Craft, Patrol Boats) and at times the Royal New Zealand Navy (Hydrographic Service), the Royal Australian Air Force (Canberra, Hercules, Caribou, Iroquois) and civil charter fixed wing and helicopters for aerial survey work and transport.

In the late 1980s and early 1990s efficiency reviews led to an Army direction that the non-core strategic mapping functions of the Corps were to be tested as part of the Defence Commercial Support Program.

[2][3] From the 1960s, most Corps officers were tertiary educated with many at the post-graduate level in either mapping or computer disciplines and military command and staff training.

He acknowledged the essential nature of mapping for military operations, the work that the Survey Corps did for conflicts around the world and also for the nation building of Australia.

He said "But it is the active service, the sacrifices and the contributions made by the men and women of the Royal Australian Survey Corps that we commemorate here today.

Moved by Senator MacGibbon on 31 May 1990, the Notice states: "I give notice that, on the next day of sitting, I shall move: That the Senate – (a) notes that 1 July 1990 marks the 75th anniversary of the foundation of the Royal Australian Survey Corps which produces maps and aeronautical charts required by Australia's defence forces; (b) notes that from the time of the explorer Sir Thomas Mitchell, Surveyor General NSW, who as a Lieutenant on Wellington's staff served as a surveyor in the Peninsular War, military surveying has played a vital role in the mapping of and development of Australia; (c) acknowledges the Corps' contribution to the knowledge of Australia's geography, topography and environment; (d) notes that the Royal Australian Survey Corps with its high level of professionalism, has served Australia well in war and in peace; (e) acknowledges the valuable mapping service rendered to New Guinea, Indonesia and the south west Pacific by the Survey Corps as part of Australia's overseas aid program; and (f) congratulates the Royal Australian Survey Corps on its meritorious achievements through the 75 years of existence.

Should that situation ever change, and the story receive the wider recognition that it deserves, then the part within that tale occupied by military mapmakers is worthy of special acclaim by a grateful nation.