“She would be so honoured.”
Carol Miller was close to tears. She and her brother, Robert Williamson, came down from Sydney to witness their mother’s wartime service records being added to the National Archives of Australia digital collection.
It marks the end of a five-year, $10-million project to digitise the more than one million World War II service records kept by the archives.
“We’re just everyday people,” Carol told Region.
“Of all the people who served overseas or at home like our mother – she was just a small person supporting those who helped give freedom to our country, for which a lot gave their lives.
“We know she’d be so humbled.”
The National Archives collects Australian Government records to “preserve them, manage them and make them public”.
More than 45 million items are kept in storage facilities across the country, available on request, but there have been efforts in recent years to make digital copies available through the National Archives website.
In 2019, the National Archives was awarded $10 million from the government to digitise its WWII records.
These include enlistment forms (with personal details like age, medical conditions and next-of-kin), service and casualty forms, discharge forms, and negative photographs of the Australian men and women who served in the Army, Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) and Royal Australian Navy from 1939 to 1945.
Last month, the National Archives put out a call for the public to help locate the family of Margaret (or ‘Peggy’) Williamson, the subject of the last record to be digitised.
Margaret (or Peggy) Williamson. Photo: National Archives of Australia.
“Margaret’s service record represents the culmination of years of effort to digitise these paper records, but also an opportunity to honour the memory of the many individuals who served the country,” project director Rebecca Penna said.
Margaret was born Margaret McCredie in Paddington, NSW, in 1920. She went to Bankstown Domestic Science School and worked in the mail order department at David Jones on Market Street before enrolling on the Women’s Auxiliary Australian Air Force (WAAAF) at the age of 20.
During her time in the WAAAF, Margaret worked as a storekeeper and equipment assistant in various locations across Australia, including Robertson, Parkes, Point Cook, Laverton and Sydney.
You can read the full story in an article by James Coleman published in the the-riotact.com web site at: bit.ly/3YCRiNd web site.