But what if one never was? A beach landing never made, a figure gone before given the chance to carry out the acts for which they are most remembered?

"1942 was the worst year for us," military historian Dr Tom Lewis OAM said over the phone. "Obviously we'd been in the war since 1939, but then the United States enters the war in 1941 and that means the Pacific is much more involved."

For a world war, the year was a particularly busy time for Australia. For Edward "Teddy" Sheean, it was about also about the time he entered it.

LASTING LEGACY: WORLD WAR II, 80 YEARS ON

Born in 1923 to James and Mary Sheean in Lower Barrington, Sheean is one of the most well-known wartime servicemen in Tasmania - Australia, too. He was the 14^th child born into the family, which later moved to nearby Latrobe where Sheean completed his schooling.

Details of his life are widely published across Australian War Memorial and Navy records, in books - including one written by Lewis - and taught in schools.

At age 18, having worked as a casual labourer on farms around the region, Sheean joined the Royal Australian Navy Reserve in Hobart on April 21, 1941. Five of his brothers had already enlisted - four in the Army, one in the Navy.

In February 1942, after initial training, Sheean was sent to Flinders Naval Depot in Westernport, Victoria, for further instruction. In May, he was posted to Garden Island, where he was accommodated on HMAS Kuttabul.

In the months, weeks and days leading to and surrounding this, HMAS Sydney had been sunk by a German cruiser off the coast of Western Australia. Japanese aircraft had bombed Darwin. Australian and American forces fought the Japanese in the Coral Sea.

Sheean returned to Tasmania on home leave.

Through Lewis' research, from what he can figure, this was the last time Sheean made it back to the state. It was also the time, in secret, he became engaged.

"He bought her a ring and she wore it around her neck, actually," Lewis said. "They were obviously trying to keep it secret for a while - people would think they were too young, or something."

On the night of May 31, with Sheean still in Tasmania, Japanese submarines entered the largely unprotected Sydney Harbour and sank Kuttabul. Twenty-one of Sheean's shipmates were killed.

[Sheean's VC recommendation headed to federal government]

"We lost quite a few lives at that time [in 1942]," Lewis said. "So if you're Teddy Sheean and you're going south in May to have a bit of a holiday, it's sort of looking all gloomy."

"Apart from being winter in Tasmania, it was looking pretty wintry for Australia. The news is all bad. So for a lot of Australians, I think they're thinking 1942 is the year we go out - the year we lose."

Eleven days later Sheean returned to Sydney and the newly commissioned corvette, HMAS Armidale, on which he worked as a loader for one of the three Oerlikon anti-aircraft guns.

Initially, the vessel carried out escort duties on Australia's east and northern coasts, before deploying to Darwin. Armidale arrived at the northern hub on November 7.

Three weeks later, the crew headed toward Japanese-occupied Timor on a resupply and evacuation mission, to support Allied troops and move refugees to Australia.

On the afternoon of December 1, 1942, HMAS Armidale was attacked by Japanese aircraft. What followed is the stuff of Sheean's legend - the push of posthumous recognition campaigns and the subject of Defence awards tribunal inquiries.

Recollections from shipmates suggest Sheean stayed at his post, wounded, as the ship sunk. Firing at the enemy as he disappeared below the water's surface.

Ninety-nine others died in the attack and at-sea ordeal to follow.

Sheean was given a Mention in Dispatches soon after his death. Later, he was immortalised in a painting, still held by the Australian War Memorial.

A Collins Class submarine was named after him in 1999 - the only vessel in the Royal Australian Navy to bear the name of an ordinary seaman.

Regardless of the stories that stick in our collective memory, history has a way of reminding us that the present could have easily been that much different.

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