To mark the 75th anniversary of the end of the Second World War on 15 August, a special commemorative medallion was made available to every living Second World War veteran to say ‘thank you for your service.’
Federal Member for Forde said while we could never repay the debt we owe to those who fought for our freedoms, we can honour and thank them in this simple but memorable way.
Medals were recently presented to the following three men who live in the Logan area:
Bert Cox
Warrant Officer Bert Cox of the Royal Australian Air Force was born in Murwillumbah in June 1924 and enlisted in the RAAF on the 8th of October 1942 and served until the 2nd of January 1946.
Mr Cox undertook wireless training, gunnery training and we to Navigation School in Pyree. He was posted to New Guinea and served as a Flight Sargent, Wireless Operator and flew liberators out of Darwin & Morotai.
James Skelton
Mr Skelton was born in 1926 and was in the Royal Australian Airforce in the Ground Equipment Maintenance Section also known as ‘GEMS.’
He was serving at an air base repair depot near Charters Towards towards the end of WWII, Darwin from 1948-49 and Malaya from 1950-51.
His son Jim Skelton Jnr says he was also involved in the Malaysian Confrontation and also saw combat during that time.
Claude Ryan
Mr Ryan enlisted in the Army in 1941 and served in Darwin.
He was involved in building gun positions to protect our borders and served during the Darwin Bombings.
Mr Ryan was called back to his family farm in 1944 as his father had fallen ill.
