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Tunnellers Net
Gina Pickering | Editor
A couple of amateur researchers have embarked on a project to record the
life stories of a particular group of Australians linked to the First World War.
Tunnelling activities of
Australian units at war is
their passion, and their platform
is a website that details men and
missions of the Australian Mining
Corps, and the battlefield units
which evolved from it.
The website intends to record
the individual stories of the
members of A.I.F. who were, for
some part of their military service,
posted, assigned or allotted to
the Australian Mining Corps, an
Australian Tunnelling Company
or the Australian Electrical and
Mechanical Mining and Boring
Company, and to reproduce,
without comment, original
accounts of incidents involving
those units.
The team has so far identified
4,772 men associated with the
Tunnellers including 374 who
died in service and a further 252
who were individually decorated.
Amongst them is my grandfather
Clifford Braybon and my family
has been touched by the extent to
which research was undertaken on
his life for the project.
I am advised by the ‘Tunnellers
team’ that the story of the Australian
Tunnellers in World War I begins in
Scotland in about 1846 when 3664
2/Cpl George Paul was born and
that it ends in November 1995 with
the death of 5873 Spr James Joseph
Hallinan at the age of 99.
Men who served with the
Tunnellers also participated
in the Ashantee War (1873-74);
Isandhlwana (1877-79); Egypt
(1882-91); Boer War (1899-1902);
Russo-Jap War (1904-05); Balkan
War (1912); Afghan/Russia Border;
the punitive raid on Pancho Villa
(Mexico 1916); World War 1 (1914-
1920); Russian Relief (1919-20) and
World War II (1939-45).
Known National Trust connections to the Tunnellers:
Tunnellers
Lota House – QLD Heritage Register
Lt Edwin Marsden Tooth
Allan Slab Hut - QLD Heritage Register 5276 Sapper John Allan
Robin Boyd House - Vic Heritage Register 5 Sergeant Theodore Penleigh Boyd
Walkley House – SA Heritage Register 5 Sergeant Theodore Penleigh Boyd
Wooroloo Cemetery & Asylum
– WA Heritage Register 12 Tunnellers buried at this location
For more information visit: www.tunnellers.net
ABoVe right Sapper Clifford Braybon.
above Anzac Day march, Sydney, c. 1950s - photo courtesy Anne Mayoh, daughter of Lt. Karl Mayoh CdeG(Bel), 1ATC.
right The Tunnellers Net website.
Trust News Australia november 2012
20