PRIVATE THOMAS FRANCIS MARNEY
AUSTRALIAN INFANTRY
12TH OCTOBER 1917 AGE 19
BURIED: TYNE COT CEMETERY, BELGIUM
Not to be there when your nineteen-year-old son dies, not to see him dead, not to be at his burial must have been a cause of so much extra grief. And for Mr and Mrs Marney, ten thousand miles away in Ararat, Australia, they must have known that they would never be able to visit their son's grave. So, Mrs Marney will have spoken for many mothers when she composed his headstone inscription. Could they have stood beside his grave and seen him laid to rest it would have given them some sort of comfort, gained them some sort of closure.
Thomas Francis Marney was a farm labourer: his father described him as a drover on the circular for the Roll of Honour of Australia. He joined up in July 1916 when he was eighteen and was killed in action in Belgium fifteen months later.