Ronald Holt writes of the family struggle to find his second cousin Noble Stephenson MIA at Gallipoli

A NEWSPAPER clipping gave a family a shred of hope as they tried to track down their missing son in WWI. Now their story is finally being told in Missing Anzac.

Ronald Holt of Warner with a photo of his Grandfather in WWI

Warner’s Ronald Holt has a fascinating Anzac tale about his second cousin, Noble Stephenson, who was missing in action at Gallipoli on April 29, 1915.

THE story of Noble Stephenson’s family in Australia, who now reside in Pine Rivers shows courage is needed back home as well as on the front lines.

Private Stephenson went missing in action at Gallipoli on April 29, 1915.

A n18-year-old coalminer, Stephenson was living with his parents and siblings in Lithgow, NSW, when war broke out.

Ron Holt has written his second cousin’s story for this year’s Arana Writers’ Group anthology, a tribute to the Anzac centenary called Missing Anzac.

To commemorate 100 years since the Anzac landing at Gallipoli, and recognise the sacrifices of those men and women who have served out country since WWI, Quest Community Newspapers will publish one story each day online in the lead-up to Anzac Day.

“Many WW1 soldiers, like Noble Stephenson, have no graves,” Mr Holt writes. On the afternoon of April 25, 1915, Noble Stephenson was among the 13th Battalion soldiers who landed under enemy fire on Anzac Cove. The last letter he had sent to his family was dated a week earlier, April 18.

It was not until June that another mother’s son sent a letter unofficially mentioning Noble had been shot in April and evacuated afterwards.

Noble’s family contacted their local newspaper and Member of Parliament and the Army responded, confirming the unofficial report.

After the evacuation of Gallipoli, Courts of Inquiry into the missing soldiers accepted that Noble had been killed in action on April 29.

But it was disputed over the next two years by other Lithgow soldiers, with one saying Noble occupied a hospital bed next to him.

On April 28, 1917, a newspaper photo of an unidentified soldier suffering memory loss convinced Noble’s grieving parents he was alive.

Ronald Holt of Warner with a photo of his Grandfather in WWI.

After writing to the army pleading to have their amnesiac son sent home, the Stephensons were notified to meet the unidentified soldier at a Sydney wharf in January 1918. “It only took a few seconds to come down the gangplank but to the Stephensons who had suffered so much over the past three years it seemed like a lifetime,” Mr Holt said.

According to Mr Holt, Noble’s mother Maggie looked into the soldier’s eyes and shook her head sadly.

In 1921 the family received a letter from the Commonwealth Graves Commission that they had not been able to locate the remains of Noble at Gallipoli.

Originally published as Ronald Holt writes of the family struggle to find his second cousin Noble Stephenson MIA at Gallipoli