Book Review - Fromelles the Final Chapters: How the Buried Diggers were Identified and Their Lives Reclaimed

Fromelles the Final Chapters: How the Buried Diggers were Identified and Their Lives Reclaimed

Written by: Tim Lycett and Sandra Playle,

Penguin Australia, 2013,

ISBN 9780670075362, 288pp

Reviewed by: Brian Manns

I began reading this book with great interest, keen to know how Tim Lycett and Sandra Playle planned to tell the story of ‘how the buried diggers’ recovered from several mass graves near Fromelles in France were identified. The process of exhumation and identification was so complex that I doubted they were equipped to tell the complete story, particularly as their involvement in the Fromelles Project had remained on the periphery.

From 2008 to 2010 the joint Australian and British Fromelles Project investigated, recovered, recorded and reburied the human remains of 250 Australian and British soldiers from several mass graves near the tiny French town of Fromelles. The remains were those of soldiers killed during the Battle of Fromelles (19–20 July 1916) and buried by the German Army near a small wood (Pheasant Wood) on the outskirts of Fromelles. The bodies were reburied in the newest Commonwealth War Graves Commission cemetery, the Fromelles (Pheasant Wood) Military Cemetery, in 2010. The battle represents the largest single loss of Australian lives in any war with over 5000 men killed.

In my position as Manager, Unrecovered War Casualties – Army, I have been responsible for the Australian contribution to the joint project since August 2010, with most of the work focused on the ongoing identification of the Australian soldiers. The joint nature of the project will conclude in July 2014 with the Australian Army then ‘going it alone’ until every opportunity to identify the remaining Australians is exhausted. I was also a member of the expert panel convened in 2005 to consider the evidence presented by Lambis Englezos and his team.

So, I was eager to read how Lycett and Playle would tell the story of the identification process. Not surprisingly, they have not explained the entire identification process but have provided an interesting insight into how genealogy contributed, in no small way, to the overall success of identification. To date, 124 Australian soldiers have been identified by name.

This book is not intended to provide the definitive account of the Battle of Fromelles, although it does include an outline of the battle. Nor does it attempt, as its sub-title might suggest, to explain the various aspects of the identification process employed by the project team, although it does explain how the project unfolded. What it does is to provide the reader an insight into the passion of both writers for the stories of Australians and the Great War. It is clear throughout the book that both authors have spent years researching the subject and that they have employed their interests in military history and genealogy to full effect to provide insightful accounts of the lives (and deaths) of a number of Australian soldiers who served in that dreadful war.

The book assists the reader to understand the important role that historical research and genealogy played in locating the relatives of Australians who were listed as — and remain — missing in the Battle of Fromelles. Locating relatives and identifying those who are most suitable for DNA matching with a recovered soldier is the first step in establishing a soldier’s identification. When a DNA match is supported by post mortem and ante mortem, artefact and historical evidence an individual identification may be established.

Tim Lycett and Sandra Playle provide their readers a fascinating insight into the world of genealogy heightened by their passion for their work. The book also assists the reader to become acquainted with many of the brave Australians who answered the call and who gave their lives during the Great War.