The Anzac skull that tells a shocking and tragic story of battlefield violence | Paul Daley

Submitted by Paul Daley on Mon, 25/09/2017 - 4:27pm

The skull of an Australian soldier who was killed 100 years ago this week is on display in an American museum. But who is he, and why is he there?

Australia likes to refer to its battlefield dead, especially in the first and second world wars, as “the fallen” whose bodies, if found, were “laid to rest” in picturesque, peaceful cemeteries of blonde statuary and rosemary bush.

Our politicians invest significantly in commemorating them (some $600m-plus alone for first world war centenary events), and into finding, identifying and reburying those whose bodies the mud may surrender many decades later.

This Australian soldier’s skull has extensive damage caused by bullet wounds sustained in the Battle of Passchendale (or Third Ypres, Battle of Polygon Wood) in the First World War. He was shot on September 28, 1917. Most of the damage was caused by a lead bullet that entered the mouth and passed through the palate and right eye. Shrapnel destroyed the ascending ramus of the right jaw, and another bullet, visible here, struck the left frontal sinus.

Philadelphia opthalmologist and surgeon WT Shoemaker treated this soldier at a battlefield hospital in France. This soldier survived his initial injuries and treatments. But, five days after his injuries, blind and disoriented, he pulled out the bandage materials in his mouth that packed the wounds. He bled to death.