'Had a spot of bad luck to get into this but I am not alone': Gunner Jack Shoveller

At prisoner-of-war camp PG57 Grupignano, in North-Eastern Italy, Gunner Jack Shoveller received unexpected news. Puzzled authorities informed Jack that, according to records, he had died of wounds in battle at Ruin Ridge, Alamein, months earlier, on 27 July 1942. Jack certainly had survived, but had not forgotten his fellow soldiers of 2/3 Anti-Tank Regiment who were killed in action that night. From that perspective, he was lucky to be biding time as a prisoner of war. Jack's thoughts, however, were to shift to his family in Sutherland, a southern suburb of Sydney. What official communications had arrived to their door? Would the Shoveller family have received a dreaded telegram to advise that he had been killed in action?