My mother Gwen Gardiner did not qualify as a war widow for pension purposes however, she was the wife of a WW2 veteran who she divorced in 1968 due time his long term alcoholism. My parents married in 1946 and met a few years before when my father was in leave in Melbourne. He had served with the RAAF in New Guinea and came back with malaria and psychological damage.
They were very much in love when they married and my father stayed in the RAAF until about 1947. My mother then supported him financially while my father did a law degree . I was born in 1949 and he graduated around 1950. My father had a chequered career as a lawyer as he had a serious problem with alcohol. He got jobs and lost them and we travelled each time he had a new job. I had three younger siblings all born in different towns. My father sought treatment for alcoholism and each time we had hope it would last but it didn’t. They separated many times and reconciled and my mother was never eligible for government assistance. She worked in many different jobs, cooking, cleaning, retail and brought up four children with little assistance from my father.
She was always hoping he would change but he was a committed alcoholic and she did not divorce him until 1968 when I was 18. That divorce meant she lost any entitlement to a war widows pension despite many years of a troubled marriage and four children. My father died in 1975 aged 54. He had not worked as a lawyer since 1958 and died leaving nothing. I don’t know if he ever received a government pension as a veteran but I know that his wife and children received no assistance and that my mother was never considered a war widows.
I’m sure that this is not an unusual story. Many men were damaged by war service and their families suffered but divorce meant all entitlements were lost. Maybe it is different today, I don’t know, but I do know that my mother worked hard until aged 60 when she was entitled to the age pension. She made a good life for herself and brought up four children. My mother died aged 83, she never re-married.