A project to digitally compile a comprehensive list of war heroes from the Riverina has helped unearth long-forgotten tales of heroism from a century ago.
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Since 2014, the members of the Wagga Wagga & District Family History Society have travelled extensively to photograph honour rolls and cenotaphs within a 100km radius of Wagga.
"We had the idea to begin in the centenary [of World War I] and it took us until 2018 to finish it," said society secretary Jan Hurcum.
"Checking each name to make sure it was spelt correctly took the longest time. Sometimes there were double-ups, they might have lived in one town and gone to school in another so they're on two monuments."
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Before digitisation, the records filled six binder folders and included 1600 pages of names. The database now includes some 64,000 different names of people from all over the region.
"Some of the towns now don't even exist any more. They're just monuments that have ended up in the middle of someone's paddock," said Noela Fox, one of the society's oldest volunteers.
While compiling the list, Ms Fox was re-acquainted with her family's wartime history through the memory of her family from Urana.
"My uncle, Tresaylde Fox, went to the First World War and he was killed in action and buried in a shell hole," the 92-year-old said.
"But he didn't die. Someone found him in the shell hole. He was still alive and he came home."
He had been sent to fight with the 46th Infantry Battalion at the Somme. Owing to the confusion, he appeared on some records as having been killed in action, and in others as having survived the war.
"He did survive. After his injury he was sent home as [medically] unfit for the war," Ms Fox said.
"He was given a soldier's settlement at Hillston but he was so injured after what he'd been through, he really couldn't work it."
Treysalde wasn't the only Fox to have paid a huge price at the Somme. A cousin on Ms Fox's paternal side survived Gallipoli only to be sent to the Somme where he died within two weeks of arriving.
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Historic society research officer Leanne Diessel was also introduced to the stories of her husband's family.
His grandmother's brothers, the Hounsell twins from Urana were killed together during World War II when a torpedo sunk their boat in the South China Sea.
"They were born on the same day and they died on the same day, what a tragedy," Ms Diessel said.
The story of the Hounsell twins was known to Ms Fox too.
"The last they saw of those boys was their blonde heads bobbing in the water. I remember that distinctly. My father was so upset hearing about it," Ms Fox said.
One of the smallest memorials documented in the project was that of the Union Jack School in Tumbarumba, which lists a few former students who were killed during World War I.
Among the names is Arthur Diessel who was the half-brother of Ms Diessel's husband's grandfather. He too was killed at the Somme.
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