TOM MCWILLIAMS.

Auckland Star, Volume LX, Issue 90, 17 April 1929, Page 10

TOM MCWILLIAMS.

HIS EARLY HISTORY. LOST PARENTS WHEN YOUNG NAMED CONFUSED WITH BROTHER'S. (I'y Telesriipli.— Own Corresitumilrnt.) HAMILTON, this day. Mr. T. IT. McWilliams, radio operator of the .Southern Cross, has a brother. Mr. Charles Bailey McW illiams, at Frankton, and a lister, Mrs. Roy Murdoch, in the Kawakawa district, North Auckland.

Owing to the death of their pan-iits when quite young tin; three became separated and seldom saw or communicated with each other. The two boys, as infants at Thames, where they received their schooling, somehow got their Christian names mixed, and Tom became known as Charles and Charles as Tom; in fact, it was not until a comparatively short time ago, when Tom required a birth certificate for some purpome, that he discovered he was really

Tom and not CTiarles. iTis surname is McWilliams, not McWilliam, as it is generally printed. i

When quite young the Southern Cross hero worked for a time on his uncle's farm at Eureka. Later he became employed at Grigg's bakehouse in Hamilton. Hits brother states that Tom was always a steady and studiously inclined fellow*. Wireless had a special fascination for him as a youngster and lie was for ever dabbling in it and studying it up. He was also keenly interested in military work and while in Hamilton lie was a sergeant-major in the senior cadets. He left Hamilton with the 10th Reinforcements and while in camp earned a corporal's stripes. He returned about two and a-half years later, with a shrapnel wound in his foot. For -i t,ime he was an inmate of the Waikato Hospital, and while lying there he took up the serious study of wireless with a view to making it his profession. After Tom was discharged from hospital his brother did not hear from him for about ten years, until he read thatl

lie had In-come a membc'" of the Sout hern < ros-, crew. Charles at that tine- lie-i lieved hi- brother to lie in San Franci-co.I As recently as three weeks ago Charles (who. by the way. i- still gcneially known as Tom) received a telegram Irom liase Records asking for the piv-eiit address of " 12/.'!7<i.~> -Charles Ilarri-on McWilliams," for whom a valuable package is held. Apparently Base Records did not connect the addressee with the member of the Southern ' ro--crew.