Captain Elliot Pflaum’s sacred duty before returning home

Before returning to Australia in 1919, Captain Elliot ‘Tab’ Pflaum attended to an important personal matter.

He journeyed beyond the wrecked village of Poperinghe in Belgium to a vast cemetery that contained an endless vista of white crosses.

He walked along the rows until he found his brother, Theo’s grave. Tab stood behind the cross while a caretaker snapped a photograph.

Tab hoped this photograph would provide his mother Mary Jane some solace, after she had suffered the loss of her son Theo in 1917.

Yet Tab also knew there was no comfort for the unresolved grief that Mary Jane harboured for her other son, Ray, who had disappeared without trace at Fromelles in 1916.

Tab, who had departed Australia with his beloved ‘little’ brothers in 1915, returned home alone in May 1919.

As he walked up the family homestead’s winding drive and past the spreading oaks, he saw the empire flag that fluttered from the flagpole.

It was the same flag that Ray had asked to remain up until they all returned home.

Tab married Ellie Drabsch in 1920. They built a grand house that overlooked the Murray River.

Tab had seen the dark shadow of war, and undoubtedly wanted to leave it behind.

Perhaps that’s why when acquaintances asked him about his experiences as a pilot over the skies of Europe, he always declined to answer.

The family’s search for answers about Ray’s burial location would continue long after the war ended.

For the ‘devastated’ Mary Jane the mystery was never resolved: she passed away in 1926 never knowing where her son was buried.

And it was an all-too familiar experience for thousands of other Australian families. Of the 62,000 Anzac soldiers who died in the Great War, over one-third are still listed as ‘missing.’

Excerpt from ‘The Nameless Names: recovering the missing ANZACs’

Paperback version released 3 April 2024.

Author signed pre-orders available via my website (AU$39.99 plus postage):

https://scottbennettwriter.com/shop/

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