On December 3, 1914 – almost 102 years ago – 22-year-old Hugh John Norman McWilliam of Brunswick West (later of Ballarat) sent his mother Catherine a letter from the First AIF camp at Broadmeadows.
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McWilliam was among the wave of young men who enlisted at the very outbreak of World War I – almost 60,000 – and who were sent ashore at Gallipoli on April 25, 1915, earning them the right to wear an ‘A’ patch on their uniforms afterwards. He’d been an army cadet and was a fitter by trade.
The letter described conditions at the camp, the training, and their excitement at what seemed a great adventure lying before them. A recollection of McWilliam’s first day, it’s a rare record of a young man’s very first impression of army life. Not a man among them had experienced combat beyond a few who had seen the skirmishes in Africa as Boer War veterans.
The soldiers did their preliminary training at the camp – a notoriously uncomfortable place that was maintained strictly at first but became unhygienic as the numbers there grew. The YMCA along with other social and religious groups maintained tents for the troops there, with facilities for, among other things, letter writing. It was from here that Hugh (known as Norman) wrote home.
David McMahon came into possession of the letter after his father took his children to look for stamps following a fire in the company archive in the 1970s.
“We were stamp collectors as kids and this was part of someone’s stamp collection. Because it was water-damaged, it had been taken care of by insurance, and was going to be thrown out. It’s a simple letter from a son to a mother.”
McWilliam’s mother became the secretary of the Australian League of Womenfolk, an auxiliary of the RSSAILA (later the RSL), and was responsible for Anzac Day becoming a day of observance.
McWilliam returned from the Western Front in 1916, suffering from ‘neurasthenia’ – now PTSD. He died in 1955, aged 55.
Mr McMahon believes McWilliam’s daughter Kathryn may still be alive and his granddaughter Beth Wilson purchased poppies from Ballarat High School in memory of him. Mr McMahon would like to return to the letter to the family.
If you have information email caleb.cluff@fairmaxmedia.com.au