Assistance to New South Wales Police

The relationships I have with the Australian Federal Police and all the State and Territory police forces have been long standing and continue to grow. This particular return follows a request from the NSW Police Force but due to the circumstances I wont be showing pictures of the names on the medals.

The medals happen to be held at a police station close to where I live and I collected them on Thursday. I had a low level of confidence of a quick return, however, that turned out to be completely wrong. By Friday I had the family tree resolved and the name of the veteran's daughter. By Saturday I had the daughter's married name and in turn the name's of her daughters. I came across a link to this family on Ancestry but the account had not been accessed for over 12 months. After sending a message to the account owner, I received a response within a couple of hours and will now be able to return this entire family connection in the near future.

The returned medal tally is now 2969.

WWII Pacific Star

This is the story of the second success I've had after receiving three medals awarded to two different veterans from Lauren D.

This Pacific Star was awarded to VX22662 John Raymond Beaumont. What is interesting is that the medal is hand engraved rather than impressed. However, John's records explain this.

After he enlisted in June 1940, John was serving with  2/22nd Infantry Battalion and saw active service in Rabual. In February 1943 John was promoted to Acting Warrant Officer Class Two and posted to the 1st Water Transport Group. On 24 March 1943, John died of injuries he accidently received following an explosion aboard water transport ship AS 6 in Oro Bay, NG. John left behind his wife Elizabeth and daughters; Joan and Wendy.   

In 1972, John's widow applied to have his medals replaced after they were lost. This explains the hand engraving on the Pacific Star which I received. It is not the original awarded medal but appears to be an official replacement although there is no (D) for duplicate or (R) for replacement. 

John's daughter died in 2022 and I found her death notice. This notice gave me the first names of John's grand children but nothing to indicate where they lived or their surnames. The only clue I found useful was the name of the funeral director who conducted the funeral. I sent the company a message and received wonderful assistance from Karen A who forwarded my details to John's family.

This morning I spoke to John's grand daughter, Sharon who I'll send his medal to in the near future. I am very grateful to Sharon who provided my a picture of John to use in this post.

The returned medal tally is now 2951.    

WWII RAAF pair

It is often the case that when I commence some research I have a flurry of activity which includes the veteran's service information and the family details when they were serving. Then, I can usually track a person through publicly available records. The next step often involves accessing genealogy web site an often the contact details are old or the account hasn't been accessed for some time. The result is that the initial rush of activity is followed by silence and no progress at all. When I think I have a load of stories to post I have actually nothing. This story, and the one to follow, are the opposite of this set of circumstances.

In late December I received a parcel from Lauren D who lives in Victoria. She had come across three medals awarded to two different WWII veterans and asked me to return them. This story is about the War Medal and Australian Service Medal 1939-45 awarded to 125596 John William Wood. As soon as I saw the naming of the medals I knew I was dealing with a member of the RAAF. The number was the first clue but the naming style that is impressed on the rim of the medal is distinctively RAAF. At the time these medals were awarded, each service was responsible for the naming and distribution of medals. The RAAF style is very that the name is rather more heavily impressed than those awarded to Army members.

From John's record his personal details made it easy to follow him, it even included the name of his first born son. However, the records dried up after about 1980 and I couldn't make to final leap to current contact details. Although what was consistent was that all the records indicate John and his family remained in Victoria.

John died in 1985 and included on an Ancestry tree belonging to Phil G. Phil had recently accessed his account so I fired of a message explaining why I was looking to contact John's family. It was through this connection that I was able to speak to John's son Peter this morning. Peter is a National Serviceman and understands that the medals are easily identifiable as his father's. I'll post these medals to Peter in the very near future.

Thank you to Lauren for sending me these medals and to Phil for the information which was so helpful in finalising this research.

The returned medal tally is now 2950.