Charles Albert FRY

FRY, Charles Albert

Service Number: 5336
Enlisted: 6 April 1916, 14th Reinforcements
Last Rank: Private
Last Unit: 25th Infantry Battalion
Born: Brisbane, Queensland, Australia, 17 June 1895
Home Town: Brisbane, Brisbane, Queensland
Schooling: Windsor State School, Queensland, Australia
Occupation: Wood Machinist
Died: Brisbane, Queensland, Australia, 19 July 1975, aged 80 years, cause of death not yet discovered
Cemetery: Pinnaroo Lawn Cemetery & Crematorium, Brisbane
Memorials: Windsor State School Honour Board
Show Relationships

World War 1 Service

6 Apr 1916: Enlisted AIF WW1, Private, 5336, 25th Infantry Battalion, 14th Reinforcements
8 Aug 1916: Involvement Private, 5336, 25th Infantry Battalion, --- :embarkation_roll: roll_number: '15' embarkation_place: Brisbane embarkation_ship: HMAT Itonus embarkation_ship_number: A50 public_note: ''
8 Aug 1916: Embarked Private, 5336, 25th Infantry Battalion, HMAT Itonus, Brisbane
26 Mar 1917: Wounded AIF WW1, Private, 5336, 25th Infantry Battalion, France
10 Oct 1917: Wounded AIF WW1, Private, 5336, 25th Infantry Battalion, France - GSW thigh
3 Oct 1918: Wounded AIF WW1, Private, 5336, 25th Infantry Battalion, GSW - Jaw
24 Dec 1918: Embarked AIF WW1, Private, 5336, 25th Infantry Battalion, per Takata
18 May 1919: Discharged AIF WW1, Private, 5336, 25th Infantry Battalion

Help us honour Charles Albert Fry's service by contributing information, stories, and images so that they can be preserved for future generations.

Biography contributed by Chris Buckley

Charles was the third of five children of Frederick William Fry (born 1862 in Gladstone, QLD) and Annie Smith Douglas Brown (born 1871 in Scotland). Frederick and Annie married in 1890 in Toowoomba, QLD and settled in Brisbane where Frederick was a Carpenter. Annie died in 1900, shortly after the birth of her youngest son, and Frederick remarried in 1904 to Louise Pauline Keefer (born 1872 in Germany). Frederick and Louise had three children together.

Charles, five years of age when his mother Annie died, was raised in Brisbane by his father Frederick and step mother Louisa. In 1908, when Charles was 13 years of age, his father arranged an apprenticship as a Wood Planer/Machinist at James Campbell and Sons mill at Albion in Brisbane - which is where Frederick was employed. They both worked there until the mill burned down in 1959. Charles operated a planing machine known as 'The Berlin' - steam driven before conversion to elecrticity in the 1950s.

In February 1916 Charles enlisted in the AIF, serving with 25th and 26th Infantry Battalions as a Private (Service No: 5336) in France, where he was wounded on three occasions - the last occasion was severe, with half his jaw blown away and lacerations to his throat. He underwent  bone and skin grafts to reconstruct his jaw (which was broken in a motor vehicle accident in 1960). Brother-in-Law Alfred Ernest Johnson served as a Private (Service No:5923) with 26 Infantry Battalion, and half brother Wilfred Irwin was a Craftsman (Service No: Q149488) with the ACMF in WWII.

Discharged in May 1919, Charles returned to Brisbane and work with James Campbell and Sons as a Wood Planer/Machinist. He was at Bribie Island in QLD when he met Annie Cecilia Joyce (born 1904 at Rosewood on the Darling Downs in QLD) and they married in 1930 in Brisbane, QLD.

Charles died in Brisbane in 1975, and Annie in 1981.

Read more...