Charles Hewland

Here is Bill's story about a return he has just completed: 

‘I have for some time thought of asking Glyn to include a new heading on our Blog: From the biscuit tin.

Whose biscuit tin is another story, mums, dads, granma's, grandad’s? The name changes but the contents; birth certificates, marriage certificates, cuff links, old watches, badges and of course medals, never does.

It is from such a tin that the search for the next of kin of VP7483 Major Charles James Hewland comes.

From Margaret, the daughter of the tin's owner, now deceased, we learned that the medals had been in the family for close on 35 years. The one thing that was certain is that there was no Charles Hewland in the family.

After a search that took a number of strange turns and with the co-operation of two real estate agents, one in South Australia and the other in Queensland, we were able to finally return the medals to James' granddaughter Sarah.

What is still to be answered is how the medals got into the tin and the whereabouts of the WW1 medals awarded to 117A SergeantCharles James Hewland and the attendant MID.’

Hewland's service number is a little unusual with the VP prefix. This is the first one that we have come across. The VP indicates that Hewland was a member of the permanent military from Victoria rather than the 2nd AIF. The returned medal tally is now 1108.