Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

GODLEE Theodore MBE MB BS

1906-1975

Theodore (Tim) Godlee was born, on 27th October 1906, in College Park, SA.  He was the son of Theodore Godlee, an accountant and alderman on the St Peter’s Council, and Charlotte Louisa, nee Hobbs. Godlee’s father died of pneumonia, in 1908, when he was two years old. He was educated at Prince Alfred College and studied medicine at the University of Adelaide, graduating MB BS in 1932.  Godlee undertook his resident year at the Royal Perth Hospital, WA. He married Enid Cynthia Millicent Dunman, a nurse, on 3rd August 1933, in Perth, WA, and they were to have two sons.  She was the elder daughter of Robert Leslie Dunman and Enid Louisa, nee Lovegrove.  After his marriage, Godlee went into general practice in Northampton, a small town north of Geraldton in the mid-west region of WA.

Godlee enlisted on Anzac Day 1941 and was initially posted as a reinforcement to 2/13 FdAmb Sent to the Middle East he was posted as RMO to 2/3rd Machine Gun Battery. He returned to Australia, and by March 1942 he was serving in Java and was captured by the Japanese. As a POW he was placed in Dunlop Force, with the renowned Lieutenant Colonel Weary Dunlop; this force included 900 POWs.  Dunlop Force was sent to Thailand, in January 1943, to the area now known as Hellfire Pass, and the medical officers were dispatched to camps at Hintok Mountain, Hintok river and Konyu. Godlee was sent to Kinsayok, a large camp for about 5000 POWs, in March 1943, and he was forced to perform manual labour on the Thai/Burma railway, as well as his duties as a medical officer. He remained there for about a year and then was sent to Tamuan where he had to select prisoners for the Japan Party. The Japan Party was a propaganda exercise, by the Japanese, consisting of about 2000 POWs sent to Korea under terrible deprivation to encourage the Koreans to remain loyal to Japan and show the weakness of the Allied Forces. Godlee was then sent back up the line to Konkoita, in 1944. He was eventually evacuated with his fellow POWs and, in 1945, Lieutenant Colonel Ted Lyneham, CO of 2/3rd Machine Gun Battery, said: - Captain Godlee had the care of 1,000 Australians in an isolated camp on Java and fought the Japanese with sheer determination…  Godlee was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire, in 1947, for meritorious service as a POW.  The citation said: - Captain Godlee saved many lives in a Prison camp in Java despite shortness of drugs and lack of assistance.  Subsequently, from 1943 to the end of hostilities the low rate of mortality in remote jungle camps in Thailand was a supreme tribute to his skill.

Following the war, Godlee established a general practice in Big Bell, which covered an extensive region in central WA.  He moved to Perth after his wife, Cynthia, became ill and then died in December 1951. Godlee remarried Joan, in 1953, and took up an appointment as a medical officer in the Cocos Islands, where he met Her Majesty the Queen on her maiden visit to Australia.  Godlee returned to Australia and took up several senior medical officer positions in the Repatriation Department in Hobart, Sydney, Brisbane and lastly Adelaide, where he remained for the rest of his life. Godlee suffered several health conditions including cancer and took early retirement.  Theodore Godlee died from cancer on 5th September 1975, and is interred in Centennial Park Cemetery, Pasadena. His second wife and two sons John and Rick survived him.

Source

Blood, Sweat and Fears III: Medical Practitioners South Australia, who Served in World War 2. 

Swain, Jelly, Verco, Summers. Open Books Howden, Adelaide 2019. 

Uploaded by Annette Summers AO RFD