Gillian Lewis
Resume
Gillian Lewis has a Diploma of Science from Sydney University and joined the Australian National Maritime Museum as a volunteer guide in 2008 when she retired from a successful sales career in the commercial building industry and has been a member of the Museum’s Speakers since 2014. Gillian comes from a family with a history in the merchant and Royal Australian Navies. She has a special interest in the loss with all hands of HMAS Sydney (II) in November 1941 after a battle with a German raider. For several years she volunteered her time to search genealogical data bases for living relatives of Sydney crew to be DNA tested to assist in identifying the unknown serviceman (a body of a crew member found in a raft 2 months after Sydney was sunk). Gillian recently completed a 9 year volunteer project obtaining permission and funding for a grave monument to a Polish-Australian pilot and recipient of the Distinguished Flying Cross during the Battle of Britain who was in an unmarked grave in Sydney for over 70 years. She is also interested in WW1 history, particularly the Western front theatre of war and is a passionate traveler having visited over 120 countries so far.