WWI messages in a bottle found on beach after a century
Message in a bottle found after more than a century
- A message in a bottle, written by two First World War soldiers, was discovered on Wharton Beach in Western Australia more than a century after it was cast into the sea.
- The bottle, containing cheerful letters dated 15 August 1916, was found by the Brown family on 9 October while clearing rubbish from the beach.
- Privates Malcolm Neville, 27, and William Harley, 37, penned the notes while aboard the troop ship HMAT A70 Ballarat, en route from Adelaide to the Western Front.
- Neville was killed in action a year later, while Harley survived the war but died in 1934 from a war-related illness.
- The discovery, believed to have been dislodged from sand dunes by recent erosion, allowed the Brown family to contact the soldiers' relatives, who expressed profound emotion and surprise.