Paris photo mystery solved
A young soldier’s picture sent on a postcard from Paris with love in March 1918 set Dalmally historians off on a fascinating journey of discovery.
The photograph that intrigued members of Dalmally Historical Association as they were trawling through their archives searching for anything to do with the First World War was sent to ‘Dear Mary Ann’ and signed from Emerson.
From the slouch hat perched on the chair on the photo of the young man, the village historians deduced he was Australian.
This was in 2014 when the historical association was preparing for that year’s Dalmally Show. The theme for its display was to be Dalmally and the Great War.
A few weeks later, the historians were at The Oban Times offices looking through copies of the war years editions when they chanced on two articles mentioning an Emerson Anderson who was on leave from the Western Front.
‘One article was dated March and the other November 1918. Emerson is not a common first name so could this be the same Emerson who wrote from Paris? If so, he was the nephew of John Anderson, who was the Dalmally postmaster until 1901,’ said Jess Dinning.
‘John had a son, also called John, who took over the post office from his father and ran it with the help of his two sisters, Betsy and Mary Ann.
‘So it seemed Emerson was their Australian cousin,’ she added.
Another trawl of the archives uncovered another postcard of British India steam ship Nevasa sent to Mrs M A Cameron (nee Anderson) in March 1919, four months after the end of the hostilities.
‘We now knew that Emerson had survived the war and ‘in splendid trim’ was on his way back home aboard a British India steam ship. How wonderful the sunshine must have felt after the icy rain, mud and horrors of the trenches! We were pleased to learn that the young Australian had got through the war and was able to make his way home.’
The historians thought they had reached a pleasing end to their archive tale until they got an email in January this year from a Neil Anderson.
He wanted to know if the history group knew anything about his great grand-uncle John Anderson who had been a Dalmally postmaster.
It turned out Neil Anderson’s great-grandfather Peter, a Glenorchy shepherd and younger brother of John, had emigrated to Australia in 1857 or 1858 to become a gold miner.
‘Neil was our Emerson’s grandson! We were able to send Neil copies of his grandfather’s postcards to cousin Mary Ann,’ said Mrs Dinning.
The history group also sent on other family photos of Emerson’s children sent by his sister to her Dalmally cousins. One of the photos of three boys and a girl with their grannie particularly delighted Mr Anderson because the eldest boy was his father John William.
‘Neil also told us that Emerson was awarded the Military Medal for conspicuous gallantry and devotion to duty in July 1918. Mary Ann’s cousin was a war hero,’ said Mrs Denning.
After Emerson returned to civilian life in Gloucester, New South Wales, he married and had seven children. With his brother and sister he ran refreshment rooms and organised the town’s sports teams. Later he and his family moved to Sydney where he owned an estate agents and a post office. He died in 1949 at the age of 62.
Mr Anderson described his grandfather Emerson as ‘a remarkable man’ who had ‘been through and achieved a lot during his lifetime’.
Mrs Dinning said: ‘We have so many photos of people and don’t know who they are so when I got the phone call from Neil four years after we found the photo sent from Paris, it was lovely to know who he was talking about,’ she added.