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Stanley Gordon Strack (1933-2019) - Son of ship’s cook just wants to visit tragic place (The West Australian , Monday, December 21, 2009)
Son of ship’s cook just wants to visit tragic place
Gabrielle Knowles
Stan Strack can still remember the moment his distraught mother told him his father had died when the hospital ship Centaur was sunk by a Japanese torpedo.
The then-10-year-old had walked home from school and was confronted by his mum, Florence, opening their front door in tears.
“All she said to me was, ‘the Japs killed your dad’,” Mr Strack said.
Mr Strack, 76, said yesterday he was happy the ship had been found and hoped to go out on a boat to visit his father’s final resting place.
“It would be nice just to stand there,” he said.
Mr Strack’s father, Stanley Louis Strack, 35, was a cook aboard the Centaur when a Japanese submarine torpedoed it. As a merchant seaman, Mr Strack spent a lot of time away from home in the years before his death. After the tragedy, his young son helped look after his two younger sisters.
Mr Strack said his mother had lost her father in World War I.
Sally Nicholl, of Hyden, is also delighted the Centaur has been found. Her mother’s cousin, Sarah Anne Jewell, was the ship’s matron and died when it was sunk.
Ms Nicholl was born two years after the ship sank but said Anne, as she was known to the family, had often been mentioned.
Matron Jewell celebrated her 39th birthday the night before the tragedy when other staff organised a surprise party. Ms Nicholl said one survivor had said the party saved his life because he had to get up in the middle of the night.
Jewell House, a former nurses’ residence next to Royal Perth Hospital, was named after the dedicated matron. |
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Norwegian
1933 - 2019 (85 år) Has ingen aner men 15 etterkommere i Familietreet.
Eva Joan Homme, f. 4 Jun 1931, Perth, Western Australia, Australia 
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