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Reginald William Winchester Wilmot (21 June 1911 – 10 January 1954) was an Australian
war correspondent who reported for the
BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC
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...
and the
ABC during the
Second World War
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposi ...
. After the war he continued to work as a broadcast reporter, and wrote a well-appreciated book about the liberation of Europe. He was killed in
the crash of a BOAC Comet (''Yoke Peter'') over the
Mediterranean Sea
The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean Basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Western and Southern Europe and Anatolia, on the south by North Africa, and on the ...
.
Early life
Wilmot was born in
Brighton, a suburb of
Melbourne
Melbourne ( ; Boonwurrung/Woiwurrung: ''Narrm'' or ''Naarm'') is the capital and most populous city of the Australian state of Victoria, and the second-most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Its name generally refers to a met ...
; he was the son of
Reginald Wilmot, a sports journalist, and grandson of surveyor
JGW Wilmot. He attended
Melbourne Grammar School
(Pray and Work)
, established = 1849 (on present site since 1858 - the celebrated date of foundation)
, type = Independent, co-educational primary, single-sex boys secondary, day and boarding
, denomination ...
and then studied history, politics and law under Sir
Ernest Scott
Sir Ernest Scott (21 June 1867 – 6 December 1939) was an Australian historian and professor of history at the University of Melbourne from 1913 to 1936.
Early life
Scott was born in Northampton, England, on 21 June 1867, the son of Hannah ...
at the
University of Melbourne
The University of Melbourne is a public research university located in Melbourne, Australia. Founded in 1853, it is Australia's second oldest university and the oldest in Victoria. Its main campus is located in Parkville, an inner suburb no ...
, where he resided at
Trinity College and became interested in
debating
Debate is a process that involves formal discourse on a particular topic, often including a moderator and audience. In a debate, arguments are put forward for often opposing viewpoints. Debates have historically occurred in public meetings, a ...
; after he graduated in 1936, he went on an international debating tour. One of the stops was in
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...
where he went to a
Nuremberg Rally
The Nuremberg Rallies (officially ', meaning ''Reich Party Congress'') refer to a series of celebratory events coordinated by the Nazi Party in Germany. The first rally held took place in 1923. This rally was not particularly large or impactful; ...
. Wilmot began to work as a legal clerk in 1939.
War reporter
After working as a law clerk for only a few months, the outbreak of the Second World War led Wilmot to join the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. He was sent to the Middle East in 1940 and reported from
North Africa
North Africa, or Northern Africa is a region encompassing the northern portion of the African continent. There is no singularly accepted scope for the region, and it is sometimes defined as stretching from the Atlantic shores of Mauritania in ...
,
Greece
Greece,, or , romanized: ', officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the southern tip of the Balkans, and is located at the crossroads of Europe, Asia, and Africa. Greece shares land borders ...
and
Syria; he was in
Tobruk
Tobruk or Tobruck (; grc, Ἀντίπυργος, ''Antipyrgos''; la, Antipyrgus; it, Tobruch; ar, طبرق, Tubruq ''Ṭubruq''; also transliterated as ''Tobruch'' and ''Tubruk'') is a port city on Libya's eastern Mediterranean coast, near ...
during the
siege of 1941. When
Japan entered the war, Wilmot returned to Australia, then went out to cover the
war in the Pacific
The Pacific War, sometimes called the Asia–Pacific War, was the theater of World War II that was fought in Asia, the Pacific Ocean, the Indian Ocean, and Oceania. It was geographically the largest theater of the war, including the vast ...
. He reported from
Papua during the Japanese invasion in 1942, including the
Kokoda Track campaign
The Kokoda Track campaign or Kokoda Trail campaign was part of the Pacific War of World War II. The campaign consisted of a series of battles fought between July and November 1942 in what was then the Australian Territory of Papua. It was primar ...
, where he walked up to the forward area, around Abuari and Isurava, with fellow war correspondent
Osmar White and cinematographer
Damien Parer
Damien Peter Parer (1 August 1912 – 17 September 1944) was an Australian war photographer. He became famous for his war photography of the Second World War, and was killed by Japanese machine-gun fire at Peleliu, Palau. He was cinematographer ...
. Wilmot regarded General Sir
Thomas Blamey
Field marshal (Australia), Field Marshal Sir Thomas Albert Blamey, (24 January 1884 – 27 May 1951) was an Australian general of the First World War, First and Second World Wars, and the only Australian to attain the rank of field marshal.
Bl ...
as incompetent and protested at his sacking of Lieutenant General
Sydney Rowell.
Blamey cancelled Wilmot's accreditation as a
war correspondent in October 1942 for spreading a false rumour that Blamey was taking payments from the laundry contractor at
Puckapunyal
Puckapunyal (more formally the Puckapunyal Military Area, but also known as the Puckapunyal Camp or Puckapunyal Army Base, and colloquially as "Pucka") is an Australian Army training facility and base 10 km west of Seymour, in central Vic ...
. Wilmot was reinstated, but on 1 November 1942, Blamey again terminated Wilmot's accreditation, this time for good.
BBC work
There Wilmot wrote a book about his experiences in Tobruk, and narrated a documentary film called ''Sons of the
ANZAC
The Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC) was a First World War army corps of the Mediterranean Expeditionary Force. It was formed in Egypt in December 1914, and operated during the Gallipoli campaign. General William Birdwood comm ...
s''. In 1944 Wilmot transferred to the BBC where he was one of the principal reporters for
D-Day, flying in a glider with the
6th Airborne Division. He was present at and reported from the field for most of the actions during the
liberation of Europe. When the German high command
surrendered, Wilmot was present to report on it.
Military historian
After the end of the war Wilmot remained in England, where he wrote articles on the recent war as well as a book about World War II, ''
The Struggle for Europe''. When it appeared in 1952, the book was favourably reviewed, and it is well regarded by military historians (
John Keegan
Sir John Desmond Patrick Keegan (15 May 1934 – 2 August 2012) was an English military historian, lecturer, author and journalist. He wrote many published works on the nature of combat between prehistory and the 21st century, covering land, ...
wrote, "Wilmot effectively invented the modern method of writing contemporary military history"). One of his articles criticizing the Allied plan to occupy Germany appeared in ''
Life
Life is a quality that distinguishes matter that has biological processes, such as Cell signaling, signaling and self-sustaining processes, from that which does not, and is defined by the capacity for Cell growth, growth, reaction to Stimu ...
'' magazine.
[Wilmot, Chester, ''Allies Handed Stalin His Victory'', Life Magazine, 10 March 1952]
Wilmot intended to write a volume on the
Siege of Tobruk and
Battle of El Alamein
There were two battles of El Alamein in World War II, both fought in 1942. The Battles occurred in North Africa, in Egypt, in and around an area named after a railway stop called El Alamein.
* First Battle of El Alamein: 1–27 July 1942
* Secon ...
for the Australian official history of the war, but was killed in the Comet crash; see
Australia in the War of 1939–1945
''Australia in the War of 1939–1945'' is a 22-volume official history series covering Australian involvement in the Second World War. The series was published by the Australian War Memorial between 1952 and 1977, most of the volumes being edi ...
.
Broadcaster
Wilmot was part of the television commentary team for the coronation of
Queen Elizabeth II. For Christmas 1953, Wilmot was sent by the BBC to Australia to participate in a round-the-world broadcast on Christmas Day, where he narrated ''The Queen's Journey'', telling the story of recent royal visits. The Queen herself was in
New Zealand
New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...
for Christmas.
Death
Wilmot was en route back to Britain from that assignment on
BOAC Flight 781
BOAC Flight 781 was a scheduled British Overseas Airways Corporation (BOAC) passenger flight from Singapore to London. On 10 January 1954, a de Havilland Comet passenger jet operating the flight suffered an explosive decompression at altitude an ...
when his plane, a
Comet 1, broke up following
explosive decompression over the Mediterranean Sea; all aboard were killed.
Books
*''Tobruk 1941, Capture - Siege - Relief'', Angus & Robertson Ltd, 1945.
*''The Struggle For Europe'' (written in part by Christopher Daniel McDevitt), 1952. Reissue: Wordsworth Editions Ltd, Ware, Hertfordshire, 1997. .
Notes
References
Australian Dictionary of National BiographyBiographyat the Australian War Memorial
*Obituary, ''
The Times
''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper '' The Sunday Times'' (f ...
'', 13 January 1954.
*
*
Further reading
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Wilmot, Chester
1911 births
1954 deaths
People educated at Trinity College (University of Melbourne)
Australian military historians
Victims of aviation accidents or incidents in Italy
Journalists from Melbourne
Australian expatriates in the United Kingdom
Australian war correspondents
20th-century Australian historians
Victims of aviation accidents or incidents in 1954
People from Brighton, Victoria