The presence of 20,000 Australian servicemen in Narrabri district during World War 2 is well documented.
Less well known except to family members and local historians is the fact that 14 of those men remain here more than 70 years later, interred at Narrabri cemetery.
The First Armoured Division was stationed in the northwest, centred on Narrabri and spread across the area as far afield as Bellata, Burren Junction, Boggabri and Gunnedah.
The Armoured Division was only here for one year, 1942, but in that time 14 died during training exercises and in accidents.
The condition of the graves of the 14 concerned Narrabri’s Tom Gleeson.
“I am interested in our history and the history of the Armoured Regiment here,” Tom said.
The graves, like many others at the old cemetery, had suffered the depredations of vandals, floods and time.
Tom contacted the Commonwealth War Graves Commission in Canberra to ask that the servicemen’s graves be restored and the Commission responded.
“They have done a great job,” said Tom.
The graves are now marked with uniform headstones bearing bronze plaques, the same style and size as appear on the graves of Australia’s service people at war cemeteries in other parts of Australia and the world.
Because the servicemen were deemed to have died on active service, although not in a combat zone, their graves fall under the responsibility of the War Graves Commission.
Tom Gleeson began his quest on behalf of the 14 Armoured Division troops last year and the Commission assisted.
“They had all the information on the gravestone inscriptions”said Tom.
Each of the men has a story attached to the way they died and Tom has learned what he can.
“Corporal Hannaford was a despatch rider and was killed on his motorbike in an accident on the corner of Denison and Maitland Street,” he said.
“RAAF Flying Officer Wilkinson, 19, and Flight Sergeant J.R Close were killed when their Wirraway aircraft crashed near Cryon on September 28, 1942.”
Other service people died in drowning and other accidents over the course of the Division’s time in the area.
Tom Gleeson praised the work of the War Graves Commission.
“They went out of their way to help and they cared about the restoration of the graves”Tom said.
“The Commission only needs people to notify them if similar war graves need attention at other cemeteries.”
Among Tom’s correspondence with the Commission is a letter from the director, Brigadier Chris Appleton who said the Commission has
responsibility for 313,000 official commemorations in more than 2000 sites across Australia.
Brigadier Appleton told Tom the grave headstones with bronze plaques at Narrabri were the same as those at the large war cemeteries in Lae and Bita Paka, Papua-New Guinea, the Adelaide River War Cemetery in the Northern Territory and Goulburn War Cemetery.
One grave at Narrabri cemetery records the death of Private W. Pawley on July 31, 1939, before the start of the Second World War, and doesn’t fall within the Commission’s area of responsibility.
Private Pawley’s gravestone inscription reveals that he was a member of the Australian Naval and Military Expeditionary Force.
The Australian Naval and Military Expeditionary Force (ANMEF) was a small volunteer force of 2,000 men, formed soon after the outbreak of the First World War to seize and destroy German wireless stations in German New Guinea in the south-west Pacific.
Australia’s first casualties of the First World War were sustained in the operation.