governor at all the fancy occasions ,’ John Todd explains .
‘ I suspect that period between recovering and then moving up in the military is where he learned a lot of his diplomatic skills , which then led him to move into diplomatic service .’
Bev Todd ' s first diplomatic appointment was to London , before being appointed Trade Commissioner to Trinidad in 1953 .
John Todd remembers an idyllic Caribbean childhood of sea , sand and boats , of having a cook , a gardener and a chauffeur . But he remembers too that his dad had begun to experience tremors . ‘ I guess luckily for us , the Australian Government agreed that being caught in the explosion , that the shock of all that might have triggered his Parkinson ' s ,’ John Todd says .
The Todds were dispatched to the Australian Embassy in Washington where Bev Todd could receive still-experimental treatment at the Johns Hopkins Hospital . ‘ In those days it was very crude – they just killed off a section of the brain which was thought to cause Parkinson ' s . Apparently , it did reduce the tremor , which was getting quite bad , but it also led to some loss of memory and speech , but it can ' t have been too bad because my sister and I as kids , we didn ' t notice .’
The family eventually returned to Melbourne in 1959 where Bev Todd ' s health deteriorated further . He developed bowel cancer , dying in March 1964 , aged 49 , leaving two children who knew very little of their father ' s war service .
Bev Todd , like many of his generation , hadn ' t been one to much burden those around him with what he ' d experienced in war . What John Todd and his younger sister Sue have pieced together about their dad is from what their mother Enid and family told them , and from public records .
Sue Todd was only 14 when her dad died . ‘ I felt I did not properly know the man who was my father , but like John I ' ve spent many hours looking at dad ' s war files , his medical records , as well as what I have been able to find on Trove ,’ Sue said .
‘ I have a strong sense of dad being a gentle , thoughtful , courageous , intelligent man with a great sense of humour and a love of TV shows about the Wild West . Our Mum died young too – she was 61 and had her own significant struggles with health , so
ABOVE : MAJOR BEV TODD ( THIRD FROM RIGHT ) STANDS BEHIND VICTORIAN GOVERNOR SIR WINSTON DUGAN AS HE ACKNOWLEDGES RETURNING TROOPS OF THE 17TH BRIGADE , AIF , IN FRONT OF THE MELBOURNE TOWN HALL IN 1944 .
BELOW : BEV TODD (’ 31 – LEFT ) IN EGYPT WITH FELLOW OFFICERS .
I feel I didn ' t know her all that well either .
‘ A few months before dad died he asked me what I wanted to do with my life . Whatever it was I said , he said to me that it sounded like being a psychologist . I recently retired after more than 40 years of being a psychologist . I was blessed that he offered me that option in a time when girls became nurses or teachers .’
Bev Todd lived a short life , even by the standards of the post-war years , but a full one . And from what Sue remembers , he had a touch of modernity rushing through his veins . He ' d been bright , ambitious and an up-and-comer in every field he ' d thrown himself at .
It may have been blighted by an Italian bomb in the last hours of Australia ' s first major battle of World War II , but his extraordinary life can be remembered again , thanks to a dog called Calypso .
The authour of this article , ANDREW PROBYN (' 88 ) is National Affairs Editor for Nine News , based in Canberra . He has twice been named Press Gallery Journalist of the Year , is a winner of the Melbourne Press Club Gold Quill and a three-time Walkley Awards finalist .
This article is reproduced by courtesy of The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald .
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