Help: Court Martialled & Missing in UK, Capt: Albert Edward Harrison AIF

[jds1949]

Ian and Roger,

I went to Kew today - but as I had a mass of my own stuff to do I was not able to spare much time on AEH. However, I did look again at the officer file for Alfred Ernest H - and I am now convinced that he was who he said he was and had nothing to do with AEH. Amongst other things in his file was his birth certificate and his original attestation in the ranks, as well as masses of other evidence. I shall email you both with one or two photos which will give you chapter and verse.

I'm beginning to become more and more convinced that the AEH with the ink blot from WO 338 is our man - despite the wrong birth year. If he was only in the British Army for a short period, which is looking increasingly likely, then it would have been a thin file and very likely to have been weeded out of existence - especially if the British Authorities thought that AEH had returned to Australia, which is what I am also beginning to believe.

jds1949 

[Craven-Harrison]

Dear Roger,

I'm glad you agree with the recently held theories regarding the "form of Commission" , "for transmission to him" and the "return of receipt" issues. They have plagued me for years and more recently you guys have harangued me about it, particularly JDS who rightfully challenged the logic of the whole thing in "PM"

It does seem to be a more logical outcome. When this alternate view arose, I had just worked two night shifts and was quite "jet lagged" I closed down the computer and went outside to continue painting the house. My son quipped "whats up dad? you don't seem to be with it"...! I was absolutely away with the fairies.

Not having a logical reason for any of this Commission business was always a bugging me and to have something logical was a real shift and I had to really get my head around it. It's interesting how your mind can make something illogical become almost plausible.

This new approach to the Commission business is plausible (I agree, not prooven).

I understand your insistence on the dates, I will go back to the Discharge date on all future research. I began the task of transcribing all the London Gazette "Harrison's form August 28th 1918 until Dec 31 1919. I'm at 30 so far and have left out a few that just couldn't be AEH.

I was so wrong about doing all the "LG" 2L/t and T2L/t's within the above dates, there are "bl#%dy"  thousands, its enough to do the Harrison's. In light of our recent assertion that he has kept his name, it would seem to be useless to do this task, however the LG searches are at the mercy of the OCR scanning software and subsequent accuracy or not. So for all the sensible reasons of diligent research and leaving no stone unturned, I will continue as I had previously agreed to do. It is amazing what turns up with the LG searches, when you think you have everything another result surfaces. It's a really padantic search engine...!

Regarding birth dates, I hold the belief of AEH changing his birth year as a confirmed yes, very strongly. However, his day and month will remain accurate I believe. If you had buggered up everything in your life and all semblance of honesty and integrity was up for grabs, I just think that you would hold onto some childhood memories of a birthday party on August 28th. His service records confirm this pattern of changing his age and or the year but not the day and month.

Thanks

Ian

[Finley 1]

I did try to follow this thread   in its early stages....  but I lost track.. so when you do have it sorted .. can you send me a pm with a short synopsis.. its so intriquing..

Who is going to write the book??

Xin

ps I am not trying to make light of all the hard work that is going in to discovering the truth about all this...

[Craven-Harrison]

Dear Dee and Scintilla,

thanks to all you folk this story and search continues. Without this Forum the process would be at the mercy of my research shortcomings, the tyranny of distance and the limitations of a single or myopic approach to some difficult research issues.

Bouncing ideas off others is invaluable, this mechanism provides the means to put together like-minded people's thoughts together and we can see the effects of that here.

I'm glad you're along on the journey with me, I hope AEH is worth the trouble.

There a couple of blokes doing the lion's share of the real work and I am indebted to them for this work.


"I'm just the Digger in the trench"

Cheers

Ian

[Colin Cruddace]

I'm sorry if this is a stupid suggestion but the thought just keeps niggling away at me.

It concerns the mention of a Suspense List on his MIC. Is this a physical list, and has it been archived? If so, it might have much more than just his name and rank.

Regards,
Colin

[Craven-Harrison]

Dear Xin,

When I go back into the thread for reference it does amaze me how anybody can follow all of this. It's on my mind all the time, so its relatively easy for me , albeit I am forgetting things that I've said and have to return to the thread archives to remind me where I'm at

So your comment  "I did try to follow this thread in its early stages....  but I lost track" is absolutely understandable, this about thoughts and clues, not really very much concrete evidence yet..!

As for "Who is going to write the book?? " well at the moment it would be about Casper the Ghost.  Without the prime witness we have nothing to write about but a really good hunt for a bloke that didn't want anybody to find him.

Interestingly the more I research this man the more I realise that there were so many men doing similar things. They were strange times. In today's world "big brother" knows every move we make, our tax file number is linked to everything, not officially, but all the Government data-bases link together now.

Rest assured whatever happens in the hunt for AEH will be placed onto this thread

Thanks

Ian

[Craven-Harrison]

G'day Colin,

No at all stupid, I've had the same thoughts about this list..!

I'm guessing it's a list of men who weren't supposed to receive Medals due to numerous reasons

What is on the list and whether it still exists is a good question.

I'll have a go at getting an answer and if anybody else knows here please let us all know.

I have seen it on other MIC's so it isn't unique to AEH. I should have taken down where else I've seen it, so we could draw some conclusions as to what sort of issues were associated with the people who were on the list.

I'm guessing bad and nasty stuff. Bad boys don't get gold  stars on their school work. The kid who sat next to me in 5th grade got them all the time. He became a Police Inspector...!

Thanks Col, I'll do some searching and get back..!

Cheers

Ian

[Colin Cruddace]

Phew! That was a relief, Ian.

As I said before, I am no expert, but getting a flavour of how things worked, I have the impression that if such a list exists, it will be something like Name, Rank, Service Number and Unit and a reference to some file or other that contains official records. This could explain missing records in AEH's files (if I remember rightly).

Fingers crossed for your search.

G'Night 
Colin

[DeeBoneham]

As for "Who is going to write the book?? " well at the moment it would be about Casper the Ghost.  Without the prime witness we have nothing to write about but a really good hunt for a bloke that didn't want anybody to find him.

Ian

I think you are wrong I think people would be interested in the hunt... Do they do an Australian version of the BBCs Who Do You Think You Are?  It would be great to get the full power Australian Broadcasting Company and its money behind your search.  As you say there are many people who are on the same sort of hunt and it would be good for them to see where and what research people have looked into..

Perhaps a pamphlet if you dont think a book? I am sure the Aussie Archive people would stock it!!!

Dee