Bill Moroney
William [Bill] Moroney: desert rat, jungle fighter, hero, and good Samaritan. Moroney enlisted in the Second Australian Imperial Force on December 5th, 1940. He trained in Australia and the Middle East. He was one of the famous ‘Rats of Tobruk’, the Australian-led garrison that held the port of Tobruk in Libya against Rommel’s Afrika Corps.
Bill Maroney next served in New Guinea against the advancing Japanese Army, was wounded and lost many of his fellow soldiers in the 2/10 Battalion. Bill was discharged in November 1944. He returned to Broken Hill where he married and started working underground on the South Mine. He was soon Vice President of the Broken Hill branch of the Worker’s Industrial Union and, for the rest of his life, worked for the union movement and the community.
Of the many committees he sat on, Bill Moroney also started the Mines Widows Committee and supported Legacy, another widows’ charity. He commanded a volunteer army of good Samaritans known as ‘The Weird Mob’, who had assorted skills ranging from plumbing to household repairs to raising money for charity – always prepared to step in and help where there was need within the community. Bill convinced the mining companies to provide materials, and the Weird Mob supplied the labour.
Even after he retired to Menindee with his family, Bill continued to support the community through tireless involvement in charities and fund-raising until he died in 2006.