25/04/2026
This is Bill, my grandad — William Harry Adams, born in 1918.
He came home from the war and met my grandmother, Beverley Moore, who had been waiting for her betrothed, Henry, who tragically never returned. Life has a strange way of unfolding — and in many ways, if there had been no war, many of us simply wouldn’t be here today. Out of loss and heartbreak, new lives and families were formed, and ours is one of those stories.
Bill served as a rear gunner in a Lancaster bomber during the war, one of the most dangerous roles imaginable. The odds were never in their favor, and survival was never guaranteed. He went on to become the last surviving rear gunner from his Lancaster crew before he passed away in 2018 in Christchurch, New Zealand — a quiet but powerful reminder of a generation that is slowly fading from living memory.
He was the middle child of three boys. When he returned home, he found his mother carrying a heavy burden of fear and worry, with all three of her sons caught up in the war. That kind of strain on a family is hard to imagine now — every day filled with uncertainty, every letter or knock at the door carrying the weight of possibility.
At some point, Bill made the decision to leave the Air Force and join the Army to find his brothers. He was deployed to the Solomon Islands, where the conditions were harsh, unpredictable, and often brutal. He would later tell stories of those times — stories that hinted at just how dangerous it really was. He once said that every second man in the tents didn’t make it. He said the enemy killed every second man in the tent while sleeping. He was the one that survived. Whether that was literal or the way memory shaped trauma, it speaks volumes about what he lived through.
One of his stories that always stood out was how he escaped through crocodile-infested waters. Even when telling it, he always made us remember how lucky we were to live now. He was the most loving, courageous and ptsd wasn’t known when he came home. The rsl clubs rsa clubs in New Zealand saved a lot of diggers. I was so upset to see appalling booing today!!
