The search is on for a missing treasure

Volume 48, No. 12, July 13, 2006

MISSING: Gabrielle Johnson with the items she hand-made in the name of Sister Verdun Sheah in 1964.

A SPECIAL treasure hunt is underway to recover a valuable part of Air Force history.

A number of hand-embroidered items presented to the Air Force in the name of Sister Verdun Sheah, an Air Force nurse tragically killed in an aircraft crash in New Guinea, are missing.

A bookmark for the Bible and sets of burse and veil for the chalice were embroidered by Sister Sheah’s younger sister, Gabrielle Johnson (nee Sheah). She presented them, protected in a wooden box adorned with a plaque, to the Protestant Church at RAAF Base Laverton during a service on July 22, 1964.

According to a small news story in AIR FORCE News at the time: “The bookmark was worked on material imported from France and embroidered in white silk, shaded in mauve. It is outlined in silver and fringed at each end.”

Gabrielle had won more than 1000 prizes with her needlework, including three first and two second prizes in the 1963 Melbourne Show.

Sister Sheah was one of 28 people who lost their lives when a RAAF transport aircraft crashed into a mountain peak during a short flight from Jacquinot Bay to Rabaul in New Guinea in November 1945.

It is said that Sister Sheah, a flying nurse, offered to stand in for a colleague who was rostered for the flight and reported in sick.

Anyone with information on the whereabouts of the items are urged to contact Bob Piper by calling (02) 6254 8376 or writing to PO Box 4077, Hawker, ACT 2614 .

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