Tom’s lockdown project uncovers heroism and tragedy of a lost uncle

If the last two years have taught us anything, it is that, out of every adversity, we all have opportunities to grow.

With Anzac Day reopening fully this year for the first time since 2019, Orange local Tom Edwards can reflect on the new meaning the commemoration now holds.

Being in lockdown for Anzac Day 2020 inspired him to chase up an old family story of which he had only been told small snippets of information.

Stuart Town born-and-bred, his journey of discovery turned up the tragic story of a great uncle — a war hero captured by the Japanese, who died in a POW camp in the last days of World War II.

His research has illuminated this shadowy figure from his family’s past, offering a new appreciation of the sacrifice made by former generations.

“It was in 2020 when the government said, ‘we’re not having Anzac Day’. Everyone did their Anzac Day in their driveways with the candles and bugles playing,” Tom recalls.

“I’d never been one for big Anzac Day things, going to the marches, the dawn services, but it was like, this year I was told I couldn’t, so I did the driveway thing at my place in Glasson Drive.”

This singular event, he said, touched off a flicker of curiosity that turned to a flame.

“It made me think about people in my family who’ve been to war… such as my grandmother’s brother, Sydney Walter Brown, who was my great uncle.

“I heard stories about him since I was a child, little stuff, on and off. So, with COVID, I decided to do some research on him as a lockdown project,” he explained.

Tom utilised his research skills from his time working for major Sydney law firms to find out everything that he could.

“I got most of the information from the Australian War Memorial archives and from my two aunties that live in Orange.

“His name is also on the memorial gates at the [Stuart Town] park, and he was in a couple of local history books in Stuart Town as well.”

It was then, that a picture of this previously ethereal character, began to take shape before his eyes.

“I did my research so that I could gather everything I knew in one spot. I ordered copies of his four service medals; we don’t know what happened to the originals.

“There were also copies of the letters he had written home but, as they were from the POW camp and heavily censored, they were only very basic; ‘I’m being treated alright’ that sort of thing,” Tom explained.

One of the fascinating facts he discovered, was that his great uncle did his basic training locally. “He was actually trained in Bathurst; I didn’t know they trained in Bathurst”.

With his 2/18th Infantry Battalion ordered for the defence of Singapore, the tragic mistakes of that campaign saw he and most of his colleagues surrendered to the Imperial Japanese Army in February, 1942.

Initially imprisoned in the infamous Changi POW camp, he survived for years the cruel abuse meted out by the Japanese to Allied prisoners.

“He was captured in 1942 and sent to the POW camp where he died a few weeks before the end of the war from malnutrition,” Tom said.

With all this material, Tom conceived of creating a permanent record of his great uncle for his family.

“I thought, ‘I need to be able to display this in something. I had an old cutlery box — his sisters.... my grandmother’s — which I lined with green velvet, the colour of his eyes, so that it could become like a family history of Sydney’s war service.

“Once all bound-up, I also made a copy for each of my aunties to keep,” he added.

With his newfound interest in his great uncle, Tom last year attended the Carinya Retirement Village Anzac Day Service with his Aunty Phyllis, who was proudly wearing copies of Sydney’s medals.

This all came about, he said, from the order for everyone to stay home during the first wave of the coronavirus.

“They told me I couldn’t do anything, and I thought ‘bugger this’ and I went off and did it anyway,” Tom concluded.