5th draft April 2014 - A Nominal Roll of the Royal Australian Survey Corps 1910-1996 - 1 - - A NOMINAL ROLL OF – SURVEY SECTION ROYAL AUSTRALIAN ENGINEERS (PERMANENT) 1910 – 1915 AND 1920-1932, AUSTRALIAN SURVEY CORPS 1915 – 1948 AND ROYAL AUSTRALIAN SURVEY CORPS 1948 - 1996 NOTES AND COMMENTS BY THE AUTHOR - PETER JENSEN This is the fifth and final draft of a nominal roll of the Survey Section Royal Australian Engineers (Permanent) 1910 – 1915, the Australian Survey Corps 1915 – 1948, including the period of reversion to Survey Section Royal Australian Engineers (Permanent) 1920-1932, and the Royal Australian Survey Corps (RA Svy) 1948 – 1996. I do intend to publish the roll on the Survey Corps Association webpage in time for the Corps centenary on 1st July 2015, but I acknowledge that the roll will continue to be a ‘work in progress’ which I will update as information comes to hand. The roll is not an authoritative document but it is a collection of information from various sources both official and non-official. The sources are acknowledged in these notes, including those ex-members who have provided source information to me. The roll includes men and women who served in these Corps in any capacity and any form of service for any period. It includes members of the Australian Women’s Army Service who served with World War II Survey Corps units and members of the post-World War II Women’s Royal Australian Army Corps who served in Survey Corps related positions. It includes Citizen Military Force officers of the Australian Intelligence Corps, posted temporarily (on loan from State Lands Departments) as full-time Survey Officers to Military District Headquarters, under whose direction the work of the Survey Section RAE was conducted from 1910 to 1915. Included are all-Corps members of the 1st Australian Imperial Force 1st ANZAC Topographic Section (Sep/Oct 1917), although this section was not an Australian Survey Corps unit and did not include Survey Corps members at that time, but this unit is the first mainly Australian topographic survey unit in wartime and which proved the enhanced values for intelligence and operations of having topographic sections on formation headquarters. The roll also includes members of RAE field/topographic survey units in the early part of World War II. World War II entries include members of other Corps who served in Australian Survey Corps units. For post-World War II it is not intended to include members of other Corps who served in Corps units but not Corps positions, but in this draft some of those servicemen and women who served in Western Australia and South Australia and all era at Bendigo may be included. Some names who may be non-RA Svy members are highlighted in yellow colour. Assistance to identify non-Survey Corps members including personnel from other nations, or indeed confirmation of Survey Corps members, would be greatly appreciated. I thank all those who have provided to me comments on the four drafts since June 2010. All of these comments have been included in this fifth draft. For this draft I thank the eighteen people who provided to me comments/corrections on the fourth draft resulting in amendments, some additions and some deletions, to about 250 member records. I must note my special gratitude to Andrew McLeod for his very review of the roll for this draft. World War II still remains the problematic period. Anecdotally there were more than 5,000 members of the Australian Survey Corps during that war. I do not know how this number was arrived at, or how accurate it is, but it may have been estimated from the throughput of some units (about three times the establishment for the two Army Topographic Survey Companies) and extrapolating this to the end-of-war Corps establishment of around 1700. To Compiled by Peter Jensen [email protected] 5th draft April 2014 - A Nominal Roll of the Royal Australian Survey Corps 1910-1996 - 2 - - date I have identified 2,430 World War Two members. In this draft the enlist date of 22 Apr 40 is an arbitrary date used for some World War II enlistees. I have also noticed an apparent gap in official computerised summary lists for some ARA members who discharged about 1972 at the time when ARA personnel records were computerised. Unfortunately this draft does include unintended errors, omissions and duplications, for which I apologise. Page one of the roll includes the Colonel-in-Chief Royal Australian Survey Corps Her Royal Highness The Princess of Wales and the Roll of Honour of those who died in war and on other operational service outside Australia in support of military survey and mapping operations and who are commemorated in the Australian War Memorial Roll of Honour http://www.awm.gov.au/people/roll-search/roll_of_honour/. This includes 2LT K. Shoppee and FLTLT R.Taylor who were added to the Roll of Honour in 2013. The following notes relate to the fields (columns) in the main part of the roll and are intended to assist the reader to understand the content: • Service Number. Some members had more than one Service Number which was generally associated with different forms of service, for example – Permanent Military Force before, during and after World War I, 1st Australian Imperial Force, Citizen Military Force before and during World War II including a State/Territory prefix, 2nd Australian Imperial Force including a State/Territory prefix and X, Interim Army, Australian Regular Army, Regular Army Supplement, the Reserve in its various forms, National Service after World War II and service in one of the other armed services. • Rank. Rank is the highest worn rank of the member while serving in the Army or another Service. It includes temporary rank and it may be the rank worn in a Corps other than Survey Corps. Some ranks recorded as PTE should be SPR. • Retired Rank. This acknowledges those officers who were retired with a rank higher than the rank they held before retirement, or held honorary rank by appointment as a Colonel Commandant. • Surname. This is the last surname of the member during service. Names may have changed through marriage or deed poll. It may include more than one name, for example married name and maiden name. Names in bold were the nineteen foundation members of the Australian Survey Corps on 1 July 1915. • Other Names. Includes christian names (preferred) or initials if names are not known. • Honours and Awards (Military Division). This includes official honours and awards with respect to military service during wartime and peacetime and those mentioned in despatches in wartime, and allied Government awards during wartime. Included are those awards for which members are entitled to an official post-nominal (http://www.itsanhonour.gov.au ). It includes awards under the Military Division but not under the General Division. • Enlistment Date. Dates of service are the most problematic. This is intended to be the date of enlistment or appointment in the Army. For those members with more than one form of service, (eg Citizen Military Force and Australian Imperial Force) the date may only refer to the last form of service. Compiled by Peter Jensen [email protected] 5th draft April 2014 - A Nominal Roll of the Royal Australian Survey Corps 1910-1996 - 3 - - • Discharge Date. This is the date of final discharge from the Army. Periodic service is included and is meant to include all periods when the member has provided effective service to the Defence Force. It includes Corps transfers or transfers between different forms of service. For those former members of RA Svy who were still serving in April 2014, an open date means that the member is still serving in the ARA, ARES or providing effective Standby Reserve service. For members of the Standby Reserve the discharge date is meant to be the date of the last effective service and not the final date of discharge. It is possible that dates may not reflect a transfer to another form of service. • General. This includes those: o who died, from all causes, during wartime and are commemorated in the official Australian War Memorial Roll of Honour o who were wounded in action o who died while serving full-time or on Reserve duty o who were appointed Army or Land Headquarters Director of Survey o who were appointed RA Svy Colonel-Commandant. Biographical sketches. The Appendix is a collection of biographical sketches of the thirty men who worked on a full-time basis with the Survey Section RAE on the military survey of Australia in the period 11th April 1910 to 1st July 1915. All of these men had some part, big or small, in the formation of the Australian Survey Corps as a unit of the Permanent Military Forces on 1st July 1915. They are all worthy of note in this nominal roll. The names are simply in alphabetic order. Sources and References. The following sources and references include notes on research yet to be done: • Australian Regular Army RA Svy GSO, PSO and SSO Officers 5 Feb 96 (provided by Charlie Watson) • Army Engineer Museum records (not yet examined) • Australian Government Gazette, World War II Awards, number 43, 6 Mar 47 • Australian Government Honours and Awards http://www.itsanhonour.gov.au • Army Officer List 1965 (provided by Charlie Watson) • Australian Survey Corps Officer list 1945 • Australian War Memorial – World War I unit war diaries 1st ANZAC Topographical Section • Australian War Memorial – World War II unit war diaries including Headquarters with survey staff, and embarkation nominal rolls for 2/1 Aust Corps Fd Svy Coy - June 1941 with 2nd AIF