29337
HOLMES, Osmond William
| Service Number: | 74 |
|---|---|
| Enlisted: | 15 January 1916, in Adelaide |
| Last Rank: | Lance Corporal |
| Last Unit: | 43rd Infantry Battalion |
| Born: | Moonta, South Australia, June 1890 |
| Home Town: | Kadina, Copper Coast, South Australia |
| Schooling: | Not yet discovered |
| Occupation: | Labourer |
| Died: | Circumstances of death not yet discovered |
| Cemetery: |
AIF Cemetery, West Terrace Cemetery, Adelaide, South Australia Section: KO, Road: 15A, Site No: 3 |
| Memorials: |
World War 1 Service
| 15 Jan 1916: | Enlisted AIF WW1, Private, 74, 43rd Infantry Battalion, in Adelaide | |
|---|---|---|
| 9 Jun 1916: | Involvement Private, 74, 43rd Infantry Battalion, --- :embarkation_roll: roll_number: '18' embarkation_place: Adelaide embarkation_ship: HMAT Afric embarkation_ship_number: A19 public_note: '' | |
| 9 Jun 1916: | Embarked Private, 74, 43rd Infantry Battalion, HMAT Afric, Adelaide | |
| 31 Jul 1917: | Wounded AIF WW1, Lance Corporal, 74, 43rd Infantry Battalion, Warneton, Shell shock | |
| 11 Nov 1918: | Involvement Lance Corporal, 74, 43rd Infantry Battalion |
Help us honour Osmond William Holmes's service by contributing information, stories, and images so that they can be preserved for future generations.
Add my storyBiography contributed by Saint Ignatius' College
Osmond William Holmes was soldier in World War 1 with the service number of 74. He was born in Moonta, South Australia in June of 1890. He was a labourer before joining the war effort. Holmes was 25 years old when enlisting, his paper included some of his physical features such as his height (5’3), his weight (130lbs), his eye colour (Blue) and his hair colour (Light Brown).
Holmes enlisted to the army on the 15th of January 1916. He embarked on the HMAT Afric to Great Britain on the 9th of June 1916. He would have gone to Britain to be in one of training camps based there as the new soldiers joining the war aren’t ready for battle straight away. He embarked for France on 25th of November 1916.
Holmes was away without leave from the 7th of August 1916 to 8th of August 1916 and was punished with 3 days imprisonment and 2 days without pay. This means that he left the camp that the battalion was at without notifying the commanding officer so Holmes was punished ccordingly.
Holmes was part of the Battle of Messines (1917). This battle was located in Mesen, Belgium and it went for only 1 week, a very short battle. It started on the 7th of June 1917 and ended on the 14th of June 1917. The battle was a successful British assault on the Messines-Wytschaete Ridge, which was a strongly held strategic position on the Western Front, that had been held by the Germans since late 1914.
Holmes was wounded in action during the Battle of Warneton on 31 July 1917, suffering from shell shock. He was out from the 31st of July 1917 to the 23rd of October 1917. So, the wound would have been bad but not bad enough to end his time as a soldier.
On the 21st of March 1918 Osmond William Holmes was promoted from a Private to a Lance Corporal. Private is the first/lowest rank in the army and Lance corporal is a rank higher than Private. Holmes got sick many times during the war, along with many of the other soldiers. The main illness that he got was Laryngitis and that ended his time as a soldier in the war. This was because they did not have as advanced medicine as we do now, and illnesses that would be able to be cured easily now, could have been deadly. He also got influenza in 1918.
Osmond William Holmes survived through the war and returned home to Australia on the 8th of January 1919. At the start of the war, he was not married and his next of kin was his father William Holmes. Osmond William Holmes returned to his home in Kadina, South Australia after the war.
Click images to start slideshow.