Thomas Welsby Clark

Thomas Welsby Clark
Clark in 1940, as an Ordinary Seaman on HMAS St Giles
Born	(1920-01-28)28 January 1920 Brisbane, Queensland, Australia
Died	c. 19 November 1941(1941-11-19) (aged 21) HMAS Sydney, Indian Ocean
Cause of death	Killed in action
Body discovered	6 February 1942, off Christmas Island
Occupation	Sailor
Known for	Only body recovered from sinking of HMAS Sydney; previously unidentified decedent

Thomas Welsby Clark was a sailor in the Royal Australian Navy (RAN), whose body was found on a life raft in the Indian Ocean, off Christmas Island, on 6 February 1942.

Before his body was identified, he was widely believed to originate from the RAN cruiser

Clark was born on 28 January 1920, in Brisbane. He enlisted in the Royal Australian Navy on 23 August 1940, and was trained as a submarine detector at HMAS Cerberus and HMAS St Giles. Clark joined Sydney's crew on 19 August 1941, and was promoted to Able Seaman several days later. He was newly engaged at the time of Sydney's sinking.^[1][2]

His body was found on 6 February 1942. It is reported that an inquest was held on

Witnesses on Christmas Island believed that the float and sailor had come from Sydney.[3] A post-war investigation by the RAN, including attempts to reconstruct the lost records by those who wrote them, determined that the body could possibly be a member of the service.^[4] Christmas Island's assistant harbour master at the time, Captain E. Craig, stated that "the Carley float was typical of those in service with the RN and RAN".^[4] A government inquiry concluded "on the balance of probability, that the body and the carley float ... were most likely from HMAS Sydney."^[5]

An archaeological team commissioned by the RAN recovered the body in 2006. A

During the late afternoon of 6 February 1942, lookouts on Christmas Island spotted an object out at sea.^[10] Initially thought to be a Japanese submarine, closer inspection from a pilot boat found it was a Carley float with a dead person inside and the float was towed ashore.^[10] With the island at risk of invasion, the deceased was quickly examined by the harbour master, the medical officer and the man in charge of the radio station, then the body was buried in an unmarked grave near Flying Fish Cove.^[11][12] The examiners wrote reports but these were destroyed when Japanese forces occupied Christmas Island and later recreated from memory.^[12][13] An inquest was not convened until mid-February and had not concluded when evacuation began on 17 February, Japanese forces occupying the island on 23 March. It is unknown if the doctor on Christmas Island had performed an autopsy; if so it was never found.^[14]

Initial investigations and research

A preliminary examination in 1942 by the island's medical officer, Dr J. Scott Clark, found that the deceased was reported to have been a young adult male

A shoe was found beside the body, which Clark did not believe belonged to the dead man.[10] Later recollections of the shoe varied; Clark stated that it was "probably branded "CROWN BRAND PTY 4", although he had some doubts about "CROWN" and "4". Captain Smith recalled a canvas shoe of a brand named "McCOWAN PTY" or "McEWAN PTY", which carried symbols representing a crown and/or a broad arrow. A sergeant with the party who recovered the raft later contradicted the finding of a shoe, stating that a 'pair of boots' were found on the raft.^[17]

In Smith's opinion, the life raft was a naval Carley float, which had come from Sydney.^[3] The wooden decking was manufactured and branded with the word "PATENT" while the metal framework was branded "LYSAGHT DUA-ANNEAL ZINC. MADE IN AUSTRALIA" inside.^[18] The float had been damaged by gun or shellfire, with shrapnel embedded in the outer covering, and the underside was covered with barnacles and other marine growth, indicating that it had been at sea for some time.^[3]

On 23 April 1949, the Director of Naval Intelligence wrote to the Director of Victualling (DNV) with regard to whether the uniform worn by the dead man and the Carley float were consistent with the crew and equipment of Sydney. With regard to the uniform, the DNV stated, in a hand-written note that, while boilersuits with press studs had not been issued by the RAN at the time, officers could purchase their own boilersuits, usually white or brown, with press studs. (Navy issue boilersuits worn by ratings were blue, but did not have press studs.) The shoes could "definitely" have been of RAN issue, especially if they were leather (not canvas). There is no record of a reply regarding the Carley float.^[19]

Controversy regarding raft

The RAN claimed that the covering of the Carley float did not match those used by Australian warships and thus could not have come from Sydney. The historian Tom Frame was also sceptical about the raft and believed that its connections to Sydney were no more than circumstantial. For many years, other authors, like the historian Barbara Winter (1984) and independent researcher Wes Olson (2000), disputed the official view put forward by the RAN. According to Olson, it was unclear how the RAN decided that the float cover was anomalous, as contemporary accounts of the float were often vague and/or contradictory.^[4] Olson said that the only detail of the covering in witness descriptions appeared to be that it was grey.^[20] Winter suggested that the currents of the Indian Ocean would have propelled a Carley float, launched at the location and time of the battle, to the vicinity of Christmas Island, at around the time of its discovery.^[11] According to Olson, the rope used on the float and markings on the float were of naval origin and the descriptions of marine growth on the float matched the period that a float from Sydney would have been in the water.^[21] In 2000, Olson claimed that evidence presented at the 1998 inquiry had changed Frame's mind.^[13][4]

Investigations since 1998

Recovery of the body

The 1998

Brain trauma caused by a shell fragment of German origin was identified as the cause of death.^[28][29] Bruce Billson (the Minister Assisting the Minister for Defence) reported that a piece of shrapnel struck the front of the skull and lodged in the left forehead. On first examination, it was thought that the fragment might have been a bullet, although this hypothesis was later rejected. In addition to this injury, the pathologist identified a second major skull injury, with bone loss on the left side, above and behind the left earhole, which is also believed to have occurred around the time of death. The analysis also identified multiple rib fractures, but it is unknown whether these occurred around the time of death or long after death with the settling of the grave. No other shrapnel or projectiles have been found elsewhere in the remains.^[29]

The fragment was found embedded in the man's skull during an autopsy in 2006. Anatomical analysis indicated that the unknown sailor was aged between 22 and 31 when he died, was right-handed, had size 11 feet and was tall for his generation, between 168.2 and 187.8 centimetres (5 ft 6.2 in and 6 ft 1.9 in). Bone

• in a rural area of Australia;
• amongst members of an ethnic group in which squatting was more common than sitting (such as people from Asia or Eastern Europe) and/or
• involved in a sporting or similar activity that required the ankles to be flexed towards the back of the thighs for prolonged periods.[30]

Attempts to extract a DNA profile from the remains began around 2009, although the results were not published before the Cole Inquiry.

The boilersuit and shoe found with the body were, according to evidence provided by the Australian War Memorial, available to ship's officers, commissioned warrant officers and warrant officers senior enough to have a watch keeping certificate.^[6] Tests on the remains of the boilersuit showed that the fabric had never been dyed, was probably white and the press studs were of a type manufactured by Carr Australia Pty Ltd in the 1930s and 1940s. RAN Dress Regulations published in the Navy List of December 1940 do not mention white boilersuits. There is evidence that during the period, boilersuits were a popular working dress among RAN personnel. Many RAN engineer officers wore white boilersuits most of the time and other officers, commissioned warrant officers and warrant officers also wore them. Two former RAN officers recalled being issued with a white boilersuit twice a year, that these were fastened with four or five press studs and that some had press studs at the wrist, while others did not. Dress regulations for December 1940 state that RAN personnel on "foreign" (tropical) stations were issued with a pair of white canvas shoes to be worn only on those stations. While veterans did not recall being issued with them or seeing them worn, photographs of RAN personnel from the period show some of them wearing white canvas shoes.

By 2014, the identity of the unknown sailor had been narrowed down to 50 members of the crew of Sydney.^[7] It had previously been reported (in 2007) that the unknown sailor was most likely one of three engineering officers.^[32]

Erroneous identification

In August 2019, it was reported – but not confirmed officially – by media outlets including Channel 7 News and The West Australian, that the Sydney crew member most likely to have been buried on Christmas Island was Norman Douglas Foster.

Foster's service record describes him as 5 ft 83⁄4 in. (174 cm) tall, with auburn hair, blue eyes and a fair complexion. He had joined the RAN on 2 September 1939 (the day before the war began); following training at HMAS Cerberus, Foster had joined the crew of Sydney on 20 February 1941.^[33]

Formal identification

In 2021, DNA testing identified the remains as those of 21-year-old Able Seaman Thomas Welsby Clark. The identity was revealed at the Australian War Memorial on 19 November 2021, the 80th anniversary of the battle.^[1][34][35]

After the announcement of the body's identity, Minister for Veterans' Affairs Andrew Gee noted that Clark is believed to be the only member of Sydney's crew who managed to reach a life raft after the cruiser sank.^[1]

See also

• List of solved missing person cases
• List of people who disappeared mysteriously at sea

Citations

References

• Billson, Bruce (12 February 2007). "Further Results in Relation to Christmas Island Remains". Press Release by the Minister Assisting the Minister for Defence).
• Chase, Katharina (November 2006). "Unravelling a World War II mystery". Defence Magazine.
• Cole, Terence (July 2009). The Loss of HMAS Sydney II (3 volumes). Canberra: Department of Defence.
  OCLC 432200965
  . Retrieved 9 November 2009.
• OCLC 32234178
  .
• Joint Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade (JCFADT) (22 March 1999). Report on the Loss of HMAS Sydney. Canberra: The Parliament of the Commonwealth of Australia.
  OCLC 42768622. Archived from the original
  on 3 October 2009. Retrieved 9 November 2009.
• OCLC 301679923
  .
• OCLC 45722719
  .
• Winter, Barbara (1984). H.M.A.S. Sydney: Fact, Fantasy and Fraud. Spring Hill, QLD: Boolarong Publications.
  OCLC 11783441
  .