Searching for Victor B
Right before I set off for Israel I had a little conversation with my then 96 year old Grandmother. It turned out that her real father, Victor fought and died in the Great War. To me this was fantastic news. I had always had a fascination and love for the Great War. I grew up around RSL clubs and studied WW1 for an entire year when on exchange at Lancaster University. My professor. Alan Warburton, was a real character, his enthusiasm was incredible and he made it impossible not to fall in love with it even more. Incidentally, my final essay on the Australia's involvement in the war earned me great results, and promise from the professor that he would include the ANZACs more often in his teaching.
Back to Victor, I remembered being shown, by a volunteer at the Shrine of Remembrance, how to search for a soldier on the AWM data base. So after talking to Nan, I went home and started searching. There are not many Victor Bodsworths around, and I found him first go. By the end of the afternoon, I had found out where he was buried in France and had booked a side trip to France before I left for Israel.
Victor left for England in 1917, just over a year later he had died, hopefully alongside his mates, just outside Villers-Bretonneux in 1918. The end of the war was only 3 months away. Today he rests in Heath Cemetery, and visiting him there was one of the greatest things I have ever done. I just wish I had asked my Nan about him sooner.
Back to Victor, I remembered being shown, by a volunteer at the Shrine of Remembrance, how to search for a soldier on the AWM data base. So after talking to Nan, I went home and started searching. There are not many Victor Bodsworths around, and I found him first go. By the end of the afternoon, I had found out where he was buried in France and had booked a side trip to France before I left for Israel.
Victor left for England in 1917, just over a year later he had died, hopefully alongside his mates, just outside Villers-Bretonneux in 1918. The end of the war was only 3 months away. Today he rests in Heath Cemetery, and visiting him there was one of the greatest things I have ever done. I just wish I had asked my Nan about him sooner.