Thomas Richard Coward was born in 1862 in Glenelg, South Australia, the sixth of the seven surviving children of English immigrants Henry and Mary Coward. He was about one year old when his parents moved their family to Ballarat in the Victorian goldfields.

In 1884 Tom married Phoebe Elizabeth Dennis in a double ceremony with Phoebe's elder sister Eliza and her husband Henry Ware. Phoebe was Ballarat born and three years younger than Tom.

By the end of the 19th century Ballarat had grown into a small but prosperous city with grand buildings in the main street. Perhaps it was a sense of adventure that caused Phoebe's younger brother Alfred Dennis and his wife Adeline to move to the remote Murchison Region of Western Australia in 1897. About 1900 Tom and Phoebe also moved to "The Murchison", to the remote gold mining town of Cue. With them were their five children, Phoebe May (known as May) aged 13, Violet Mary aged 9, Thomas Roy (known as Roy) aged 4, Doris Adeline aged 1 and Flossie Veronica only a few months old. It is believed that Phoebe's doctor had recommended that they move to a dryer climate as she was suffering from cancer. By 1901 Phoebe's older brother Henry and her sister Eliza (with husband Henry Ware) were also there and Tom's unmarried brother Frederick James as well.

Phoebe took ill soon after their arrival in Western Australia and she died on 28th of January 1903. In April 1906 Fred Coward also died followed by Eliza Ware in May 1909.

After his brother's death, Tom took his family to Meekatharra about 100 miles from Cue where he purchased a grocer's shop.

In September 1914 Tom's only son Roy, aged 18 joined the Australian Imperial Expeditionary Force (A.I.F.) to fight for his King, his Country and the British Empire. Australia was in no danger of foreign invasion but such was the attachment of Australians to the Motherland that it was considered to be the right thing to do. In April 1915 Roy Coward landed on the Gallipoli Peninsula in Turkey with the 16th Battalion.

On the 31st August 1915, Tom received a telegram from Army Headquarters in Melbourne to say that Roy had been wounded. A month went by and he had heard no more, so on the 2nd October Tom sent a telegram back to Army H.Q. enquiring as to Roy's whereabouts. In reply he was told that "the matter is being investigated". Eventually, in April 1916 a Military Court of Enquiry was held at the Australian field headquarters in Egypt. Roy was found to have been Killed in Action on the 8th August the previous year. His body was never found.

After Roy's death, Tom Coward lived in several parts of Western Australia. He remained in touch with his daughters but had no family around him when he died in Wiluna on 7th January 1932.

For further reading on the life of Violet Mary Coward and other women in Western Australia in the early 20th century, see
Nothing to Spare by Jan Carter, published by Penguin Books in 1981.

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Modified 18th August 2003