Australian Red Cross enquiry bureau. Her determined personality as much as her distinguished name opened doors. She was the youngest daughter of Deakin (Australian Prime Minister three times between 1904 and 1910). At the outbreak of war she had written to her father, “Why aren’t we women who have no real ties of duty standing at the Cannon’s mouth shoulder to shoulder with the men?” Her contribution to the war effort may not have been on the battlefield, but it was courageous, effective and at age twenty-five she was awarded the OBE. Soon after the war, Vera met and married an Australian airman, Captain Thomas White, who had escaped as a prisoner of the Turks after crashing his small plane on a mission to Baghdad. Tom was a pioneer aviator, among the first intake of the Australian Flying Corps at Point Cook. Tom and Vera became parents to four daughters. In the 1920s Tom embarked on a long political career in conservative interests, serving as a Federal Minister in the Lyons and later the Menzies Governments. At the approach of the Second World War, Vera resumed her active Australian Red Cross involvement, serving throughout as co-director of the Victorian Bureau for Wounded, Missing and Prisoners of War, and Divisional Commandant for the Victorian Red Cross. She later became national vice-chairman. In 1951 Tom became Australian High Commissioner in London, knighted as Sir Thomas White the following year. He died in 1957. Vera, now as Lady White, continued her considerable philanthropic work until her death in 1978. A proper appreciation of this life of service has become possible through the publication of a full biography, Vera Deakin and the Red Cross, by historian Carole Woods OAM. In launching the book at the Shrine of Remembrance last May, Her Excellency the Governor of Victoria, the Hon. Linda Dessau AC, spoke warmly of a truly remarkable Australian. The VRC remembers Vera Deakin today, and her pioneering work with Australian Red Cross.
12
Made with FlippingBook Digital Publishing Software