Private Garry Willoughby – Vietnam
RSL Victoria remembers the sacrifice of Private Garry Willoughby who lost his life in service of his country during the Vietnam War.
Gary was born on 25 October 1947, at the Queen Victoria Hospital in Melbourne, the eldest of four children born to Cecil and Yvonne Willoughby.
His early years were spent at Coburg before his family moved to Inverness Road, Mt Evelyn, where his parents had bought a very basic Bungalow on an acre of bushy land. Life was difficult for Garry and his family in a house with no electricity, telephone and an outdoor toilet.
His father had developed a problem with alcohol which left little money and resulted in Garry’s parents having a tumultuous relationship.
“Garry became the man of the house at an early age,” his sister Alison remembers. “My parents broke up and got back together again but had an unhappy marriage. We could have been reasonably well off, but my father drank it all.”
Garry went to the local primary and high school, and his mother tried to make ends meet working at a shoe factory in Lilydale.
“Garry was determined to be a better person than his father,” Alison said. “He had a love of cars growing up but he had a real sense of responsibility to his family and a desire to make something of himself.”
Garry left school at the end of year 11 and took up a job in a clothing store in Lilydale. His father finally left for good soon after the birth of Garry’s younger brother Stuart. No one heard from Garry’s father again and Garry became a father figure to his younger brother. He started a course in accounting at Stott’s College in the hope of making a better life for his family.
He bought a property in nearby Montrose with a small a bungalow on it, but he had dreams of building his own house on the land once he had saved enough money.
His birthday was drawn in the conscription lottery but because he was enrolled in an accounting degree, he was able to have his call up to the Army deferred while he studied. Unfortunately, the combination of working full time, studying and helping raise his infant brother was too much for Garry and he failed a semester of his accounting degree and was forced to enlist in the Army.
With a choice between prison and the Army Garry went to Puckapunyal for training. Before departing for overseas service, he got engaged to his girlfriend with the hope of seeing out his service and returning to marry and build their dream home.
Garry departed for Vietnam in June 1970 and was posted to the 2nd Battalion Royal Australian Army. He joined his battalion at the Australian camp in Nui Dat as it attempted to create a more secure climate in the south of Vietnam in the face of the ongoing guerilla campaign by North Vietnamese elements.
Garry took part in search and destroy missions, seeking out enemy bases and attempting to prevent the enemy accessing civilian areas of the country. He wrote home regularly, telling his family that he arrived in a kind of hell on earth. In addition to the danger of encountering Viet Cong on patrol was the constant heat and difficult living conditions. In one letter he wrote that even when he put his boots away in a cupboard, he would take them out the next day to find them full of mould.
On 8 October 1970 Garry would pay the ultimate price for his service.
While taking part in Operation Cung Chung his patrol was following the tracks of a large enemy group when they encountered a small group of Viet Cong and an extensive bunker system. Shortly afterwards they were ambushed by the enemy who fired small arms and rocket propelled grenades from inside a thick bamboo screen.
Garry was hit and killed. He was 22 years of age.
His sister, Alison, was studying at Monash University when the news came through.
“I called my mother to tell I was going to stay back and study and she said no, you have to come home now. I managed to get a ride with someone to our home in Mt Evelyn and when I got there mum told me Garry had been killed.”
For his mother, Yvonne, it was the start of a heart break that would last for the rest of her life. She received a small pension and asked that he should be buried on her property in Mt Evelyn.
“They told us that he would receive a full military funeral and be buried at Lilydale cemetery,” Alison said. “We did not want a military funeral because we were against the war and felt they had taken him from us. They said we accept it or we would have to pay for his return ourselves.”
His sister had trouble coming to terms with his loss.
“He had hoped to be home by Christmas,” she said. “When he wasn’t I took a job interstate so I would not be there to miss him. It didn’t feel real. I felt if I wasn’t there for Christmas I wouldn’t miss his absence.”
Alison met her husband as she completed her degree at Monash University. She married in 1974 and her mother let her move in to Garry’s property in Montrose. It became the base for her family and a lasting legacy of her brother’s role as a stand in father to his siblings.
“Over the years we built a new house and had three kids all of whom went to university and became professionals. We still live in the house today.”
Garry had been the light of his mother’s life, and she still grieved for him when she passed away in 2006. In 2025 her remaining children planted a tree in her memory on Garry’s Montrose property and scattered her ashes at its base.
“We had wanted to bury her with Garry,” Alison said. “But we were not allowed to do it. By scattering her ashes on the land he owned, we hope brings them together again.”
RSL Victoria pays tribute to Private Garry Willoughby, his family and all those who have sacrificed in the service of their country.
Lest we forget.
