WWI veteran has tombstone corrected, thanks to Captain Oliver Woodward’s diary

A soldier’s diary belonging to a 102-year-old woman has shed new light on the Battle of Hill 60, causing a man in the 1st Australian Tunnelling Company to receive new honours.

Australian tunnellers on the western front - Oliver Holmes Woodward pictured (unknown which man is him).

A rare book belonging to a 102-year-old Australian woman has shed new light on the Battle of Hill 60.

The Battle of Hill 60 was a dreadful campaign on the WWI western front, where Allied Forces miners were sent to tunnel under the enemy German forces and set explosives for the Battle of Messines Ridge.

Giru resident Ross Thomas first came across the story of Hill 60 when he was a mining engineer in Charters Towers, and has spent years digging up history on the Aussie tunnellers.

Mr Thomas said men were dying so quickly, their field promotions weren’t being recorded, but careful inspection of a soldier’s diary and handwritten notes belonging to 102-year-old Barbara Woodward has revealed incredibly rare evidence of field promotions not previously recognised.

The soldier’s diary was written by Barbara’s father, Captain Oliver Woodward, a mining manager by trade who served in the 1st Australian Tunnelling Company.

Barbara Woodward, 90, holding the original box her father used during WWI. On his box is his military cross with two bars - a very rare honour.

Cpt. Woodward worked for mines in Irvinebank, Charters Towers, Mount Morgan and Papua New Guinea before he enlisted in the Great War.

Fresh work by UK-based Great War historian Anthony Pearson has revealed evidence in Cpt Woodward’s unpublished, handwritten notes of an Australian soldier who was incorrectly identified on his tombstone.

Roy Richard Mason was recorded in history as a ‘sapper’ - a military term for a miner - but in Cpt. Woodward’s diaries he was referred to as a sergeant before he died in 2017 after coming under fire while inspecting a shaft being sunk by the 1st Australian tunnelling company.

The original Wallangarra Dugouts, built by the Oliver Woodward-led 1st Australian Tunnelling Company in Belgium during WWI.

Mr Thomas said he collected more evidence of Roy Richard Mason being a sergeant, and successfully lobbied to have the soldier’s tombstone in Belgium’s Menin Road South Military Cemetery changed.

“You need three sources of information to confirm a person has been promoted,” Mr Thomas said.

“In Woodward’s dairy, Anthony (the UK historian) discovered Mason was referred to as a Sergeant after a recent promotion, just before his death. Cross-referencing with other independent military records, Anthony confirmed this to be the case and reported the inconsistency to me.”

Mr Thomas then championed the case for the Australian, and successfully saw Sgt. Mason’s tombstone updated by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission (headquartered in France).

Sgt. Mason grew up in Newcastle - his service number was 5576.

The new grave of Roy Richard Mason. His title is spelt in the old military European way: Serjeant. His family inscription reads: ‘Dear brother we miss you sadly and trust to meet again’.

Mr Thomas said he and Mr Pearson will continue searching for more inaccurate tombstone inscriptions.

“One can only wonder what further discoveries are there in Woody’s war journal,” he said.

“I’ve never met (Mr Pearson), he lives in the UK, but he’s fallen in love with the dairies same as me. Anyone that reads them becomes obsessed.”

Cpt. Woodward published his life’s diaries as five volumes - and only a handful were ever created.

Mr Thomas currently has all volumes of the Woodward diaries, entrusted to him by Barbara Woodward.

“I’m forever grateful she’s allowed us to make a film from the books and use them for research,” Mr Thomas said.

“Only a few copies were ever printed. Woodward was no normal writer. He went down to the number of nails used in the construction of a bunker.”

The 2010 film Beneath Hill 60 was based on Woodward’s accounts of the war.

Mr Thomas was an executive producer on the movie, which was filmed around Townsville.

Hill 60 was a pivotal part of the western front, where soldiers worked in waterlogged conditions and encountered the first ever large-scale uses of lethal poison gas.

Originally published as WWI veteran has tombstone corrected, thanks to Captain Oliver Woodward’s diary