by their sister Irene Burrows (first published in the 2003 edition newsletter)
Allan and John Maynard were my brothers. Although I was only thirteen at the time I can remember very clearly the day the dreaded telegram arrived.
We were all born at Mt Perry, Qld, Allan on 23 May 1918 and John, known as ‘Jack’ on 7 April 1920. They were the eldest children of Gus and Frances Maynard. Other members of their family are Jean Maynard (Biloela), Pat (deceased), Irene Burrows (Biloela) and Ron (deceased).
We lived at Mt Perry until 1932 when Gus won a block of land at Jambin, Central Queensland. There, Allan and Jack helped Dad with the dairy and grew cotton.
Allan and Jack enlisted from Jambin in October 1941. Allan was single. Jack was married and left a wife Frances and a daughter Beverley. They are both living in Brisbane today.
At some time the boys were on the “Oranje”, and later transferred to the “Centaur”. Jim Coulson was also on the ‘Centaur’. The three of them came from the small town of Jambin. Jim survived but has since passed away.
My memory of ‘the boys’ as they were always referred to: they were loving and happy men. It was a tragic loss to us all. They are sadly missed and remembered always.
Fran Gardner’s Story – widow of Pte John Maynard, sister-in-law of Pte Allan Maynard
As told to her daughter, Beverley Simmich.
When John and Allan Maynard first joined the Army, they were both in the 8th Division which went to Singapore. A few months later the 8th Division was captured by the Japanese. After some time in the 8th Division John and Allan decided to join the medical corps and were assigned to the Dutch hospital ship ‘Oranje’. They had a number of trips to Africa to bring wounded soldiers back to Australia.
They were given embarkation leave before their third trip and came back to spend this time with their family in the country. Unfortunately there were floods during this time home and they were stranded for three weeks. With letters from the local shire justifying their absence, they arrived back in Sydney only to find that the ‘Oranje’ had already left and they were told to report to the ‘Centaur’. The family was really pleased about their posting to the medical corps as hospital ships were supposed to be off limits. After a trip to New Guinea they came home for a week by which time our daughter Beverly was 6 months old. Little did we know that we would never see them again!
The brothers spent some time in Sydney while the ship was being prepared for the next voyage. In one of John’s letters he told me that they had decided to have separate postings in future so that both of them would not be lost to us if a disaster should happen. They must have thought about their decision a long time as they had never before been separated. This was going to happen after their next voyage!
We lived on a cattle property outside Biloela with no phone so we did not get the news until 10am Monday 17th when the telegram finally was delivered to us. It was pouring with rain at the time and Mum Maynard said “the heavens are weeping with us”. There were six children in the Maynard family, the two youngest Hec and Topsy were at school while Dad Maynard and third son Pat were working on the property so they had to be summoned home as soon as possible.
There is no need to say how devastated we all were. Dad Maynard was the most wonderful man I had ever known, sadly he never really recovered from the loss of his two eldest sons and died just a few years later.
I was so wrapped up in my own grief I never thought too much about anyone else. Things would have been much worse for us all if we had not had Beverley. She kept us all sane and we thanked God every day for her. Little did we know of the trauma we were to face two months later when Beverley became very ill and almost died. Mum Maynard’s faith never wavered as she said “God would not be so cruel as to take her from us”.
It is strange how fate plays such a part in all our lives.