ANZ LitLovers LitBlog

There has been such a plethora of military history books published during the WW1 centenary years that my eyes have started to glaze over when I come across another one, so readers with WW1-fatigue could be forgiven if they feel the same way about Young Digger.  But I was intrigued by the blurb even before I saw the cover with its engaging photo of a little kid in WW1 army uniform:

A small boy, an orphan of the First World War, wanders into the Australian airmen’s mess in Germany, on Christmas day in 1918. A strange boy, with an uncertain past and an extra-ordinary future, he became a mascot for the air squadron and was affectionately named ‘Young Digger’. And in one of the mot unusual incidents ever to emerge from the battlefields of Europe after the Great War, this solitary boy was smuggled back to Australia by air mechanic Tim Tovell, a man who cared for the boy so much that he was determined, however risky, to provide Young Digger with a new family and a new life in a new country, far from home.

It’s a book which I read with an uneasy mixture of interest and concern.  Written with admiration and respect for his subjects, Anthony Hill has obviously thoroughly researched the story of this boy, Henri Heremene Tovell, to create a poignant, often amusing story of his short life.  (Henri was killed in a motorcycle accident when he was only about 18).  It’s quite amazing to read about how this orphan wandered into the life of 4 Squadron Australia Flying Corps at Cologne because he liked the Aussie food better than the British, became its mascot, and was smuggled on and off ships as the men returned to Australia after the war.  But at the same time there’s a sense of unease, firstly because the values we have today would not countenance taking a child away from his own nationality and culture in such a cavalier way, and secondly because our sad awareness of sexual abuse raises alarm bells in any situation where a small boy is vulnerable amongst a company of men.  There is an innocence about this tale that sweeps these concerns under the carpet, and the author’s admiration for the soldiers who found ways to subvert the rules to get the boy to Australia is in the tradition of the ‘digger’ thumbing his nose at authority, though in this case it’s the French and British authorities because the Australian senior officers knew about it and turned a blind eye.  Still, I couldn’t help feeling doubtful about the entire episode.

(This sense of doubt was reinforced by a passage about new procedures for the voyage home that were put in place to prevent any reccurrence of the discreditable behaviour of Australian troops in Egypt when they were en route to Gallipoli.  These procedures were mocked by the author with these words: The nanny brigade was out in force.  I can well understand Australian men saying something like that in 1919.  I find the remark distasteful and dishonest when made in the light of knowledge about what that discreditable behaviour entailed in Cairo).

It would be giving the wrong impression to suggest that efforts were not made to reunite the boy with some family, and it is probably true that in the chaos of war, the destiny of most orphans lay with French nuns in an orphanage.  But according to Hill’s account there was a French woman who had lost her only son in the war and pleaded with them to let her have Henri and they refused.  In a way, it was understandable: Tim Tovell’s own son had died of polio while he was away, and he had taken Henri to his heart.  Throughout the account Hill reimagines conversations that must have taken place, and Young Digger implores the men to take him with them whenever there is a prospect that they might not.  But he was very young to make any such decision.  (He told Tovell that he was eleven, but he apparently looked more like a nine-year-old).

Most of the book is taken up with the story of escapades in France and the embarkation period in Britain, and it seems that little is known about how well Henri adapted to life in rural Queensland.  Though his accent flattened out he had occasional teasing about it and he had difficulty with written English.  It is sad to see him use the words that he had become a burden to the Tovells (times were tough during the Depression years) but there are some indications from RAAF records that he had a difficult adolescence while he was doing an apprenticeship in Melbourne.  When he was older there were administrative difficulties in establishing his age in order to achieve naturalisation (citizenship) and that impacted on his enlistment in the RAAF.   And sadly, because of the irregular circumstances of his family life, authorities were offhand about notifying the Tovell family after Henri died.

Eventually Tim Tovell, no writer himself, told his story to his neighbour Professor Cumbrae-Stewart of Queensland University, and these recollections were written up and later used as a basis for other accounts, along with newspaper feature articles from the time.  But apart from the summary in his application for naturalisation, (included in the Appendix) there is no account of Henri’s life in his own words.

Today when Australians exert themselves to research their family history with such enthusiasm, it is interesting to speculate on how a mature Henri Tovell might have reconciled his identity.

©Lisa Hill

Author: Anthony Hill (no relation)
Title: Young Digger
Publisher: Viking, an imprint of Penguin Random House, new edition 2016, first published 2002
ISBN: 9780670079292
Review copy courtesy of Penguin Random House

Available from Fishpond: Young Digger