Lyall Howard

Lyall Falconer Howard (1896 – 30 November 1955) was a World War I veteran, engineer and business owner, and the father of the former Australian prime minister, John Howard. He was born and raised near Maclean in the Clarence River region of northern New South Wales. His hand-written war diary penned on the battlefields of the Western Front in 1916 is used by historians to retrace the experiences of Australian soldiers in World War I.

During World War I, Lyall Howard was known as a proud patriot. On 16 January 1916, at age 19, he signed up to the Australian Imperial Force. As regimental number 802, he was assigned to the 3rd Pioneer Battalion, earning a wage of eight shillings per day. Records show he had attempted to sign up on a previous occasion, but was rejected because his height of 157 cm was deemed too short. Private Lyall Howard left Port Melbourne aboard the HMAT Wandilla on 6 June 1916, and was shipped to the Western Front. He was assigned to work on the roads and bridges leading into the village of Cléry, France.

In the book, The Great War, author Les Carlyon details the experiences of Lyall Howard on the front line, captured by the handwritten notes in Lyall's war diary. The entries were always brief: "Shoved in old barn", "Inoculated again", "First day in trenches". One laconic entry underscored the horrors the soldiers faced: "Will wounded and dies". Will was Lyall's best friend.

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