Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

Kenneth Woodfull Holmes was the youngest child of John Patterson and Cecilia Lucy (nee Woodfull) Holmes. He was born in 1889 in Prahran, Victoria in the family home “Holmwood” at 29 Grandview Grove, Prahran. He had four brothers: Henry, the eldest, Mervyn, Cecil and Edward (Ted) and one sister Bessie who was the second eldest of the family. His mother died in 1906 and his father in 1915.

Kenneth graduated from Trinity College, Melbourne University as a civil engineer in 1912 and in 1913 and 1914 worked in that capacity on the railways in western Victoria. He was based at Noradjuha (approximately 20 kilometres south west of Horsham) and Crowlands (approximately 20 kilometres north east of Ararat) in 1913 and at Hamilton in 1914.

At that stage branch lines were being constructed in country Victoria. Noradjuha Station, built in 1887, was the first stop south of Natimuk. The line extended to Toolondo in 1912 and to Kanagulk in 1917 and eventually to Hamilton but has now closed. So presumably Kenneth was involved in the construction of the Toolondo-Kanagulk section in 1913. Crowlands was the first station on the (now closed) Navarre Railway line which was officially opened on 26 May 1914.

Kenneth enlisted in the Australian Imperial Force on 7 June 1915 when he was 25 years and eleven months old. He was the first of the four youngest Holmes brothers to join the AIF. His eldest brother Henry, who had gone to Bengal, India with the Church Missionary Society in 1905, also served in WW1 in the British Army as part of the Indian Expeditionary Force.

Kenneth left Australia on 23 November 1915 for Egypt on His Majesty’s Australian Transport Ceramic which sailed from Melbourne to Port Suez, arriving in December 1915. He served initially as corporal in the 5th Field Company of Engineers at Tel el Kebir. On 16 March 1916, he was transferred to the 4th Pioneers Battalion, 4th Division AIF at Tel el Kebir. He was promoted to Second Lieutenant on 24 March 1916 and to Lieutenant on 24 June 1916. The 4th Pioneers left Alexandria on 5 June 1916 and landed in Marseille on 11 June. They travelled by train to Bailleul and then marched to Armentieres.

The 4th Pioneers Battalion arrived at Albert on the Somme on the 27 July and was in action constructing trenches at the battle of Pozieres and subsequently at the battle of Monquet Farm during August and early September 1916. The AIF lost some 23,000 men at Pozières and Mouquet Farm and the corps was withdrawn to a quiet sector around Ypres during September and October 1916, before returning to the Somme in November 1916 to take part in the Flers–Gueudecourt offensive. In this offensive, the 4th Pioneers were based behind the battle area, engaged in unloading supplies and tramway, road and trench construction, maintenance and improvements.

The 4th Australian Division remained on the Somme during the winter of 1916–1917, enduring extreme cold and appalling conditions. In January and February 1917, the 4th Pioneers Battalion was engaged in construction of the Decauville tramway as well as general construction, maintenance and improvement activities around Longueval and Bazentin.

Kenneth was detached temporarily from the 4th Pioneers Battalion to the 4th Division Salvage Company from 16 February to 18 April 1917. The Salvage Corps' role was to recover equipment from the battlefield, thus reducing waste and saving valuable shipping space.

On 23 April 1917, Kenneth was selected for training as an observer in the Australian Flying Corps (AFC) and joined No.1 School of Instruction, Reading, UK. He was transferred from the 4th Pioneers to the AFC on 17 June 1917 and the next day he was detached to the (British) Royal Flying Corps (RFC), serving in the 22nd Squadron after a training period of less than two months.

Kenneth was attached to the RFC 22nd Squadron when they were at Flez, east of Amiens. In July and August 1917, Kenneth with the 22nd Squadron moved base in a northerly direction from Flez, to Warloy and then to Izel-les-Hameaux as the offensive focus for the British-led ground forces moved northward from the Somme toward Ypres and Passchendaele in Flanders. 

Kenneth’s died on 11th August 1917 while flying in a Bristol Fighter as observer along with the pilot Lieutenant Edward Arthur Hunter Ward. It was concluded that the plane on which he was an observer crashed in a fight behind enemy lines and that Kenneth and Edward were badly wounded. Presumably they died of their wounds soon after. He was subsequently awarded the Victory Medal after the war as well as a memorial scroll with King’s message.  He is buried in the Noyelles-Godalt Communal Cemetery in France. Kenneth is remembered on the University of Melbourne Trinity College WW1 Memorial.

Kenneth left a will which was drawn up by solicitors Secomb and Woodfull. Alfred Holmes Woodfull, one of the partners was his mother’s, Cecilia’s, youngest brother and was named as executor. Kenneth left money to his nephews and nieces for their education, £500 to St Mathews in High St, Prahran for a memorial for his father who died in January 1915 and the remainder of his estate to Irene McKay of the Methodist Parsonage, Charlton, Victoria. St Mathews was the church at which his sister, Bessie’s husband, Arthur Wade, was a rector from 1904-1909. Whether or not the memorial survives is not known. A fire in 1982 destroyed the interior.

It is likely that Irene McKay was Kenneth’s sweetheart. She was born on 15 May 1893 in Warracknabeal, Victoria, although her birth was registered in Rochester Victoria. She was second eldest child of the Rev. Alexander McKay (1862-1922) and Ada Jane Hicks (1868 -1941). She attended Methodist Ladies College (MLC) in Kew from 1907 to 1909, being a school prefect in 1909. Her father was a methodist minister in country Victoria. During her time at MLC, the school records show that he was based at Kilmore and then Kaniva. One of her sisters was born at Noradjuha, Victoria in 1912, it was possible that she met Kenneth when he was stationed there in 1913 when she was 20.

After Kenneth’s joined the AIF in June 1915, voter records indicate that she was a music teacher, in Creswick in 1916 and 1917. After his death her address was listed as MLC from 1919 to 1927. She taught music at MLC for over 30 years.

In 1928, she is listed as living at 336 Glenferrie Road, Malvern. This is the address of Stonnington Mansion the home of the Governor of Victoria from 1901 till 1931. In 1928, the Governor was Arthur Herbert Tennyson Somers who is reported to have had a special interest in music, among other things. There is no record of the capacity in which she lived there. In 1931-1934, Irene lived at 117 Riversdale Road, Hawthorn.

In 1935, in an article in the Australian Woman’s Weekly (14 December 1935) she was described as a well-known Melbourne musician, that she was on the staff of MLC, trained the Tintern School Choir and that she was sailing to spend a year abroad with Miss Marguerite Watt, planning to listen to as many recitals, concerts and lectures on music as possible and to visit the Oxford School of Music and attend the Mozart festival at Salzberg.

Newspaper articles indicate she played piano in a 1935 performance by the Tintern Dramatic Club at the Camberwell Town Hall and in performances by the Folk Song and Dance Society in 1934 and 1938. In 1942-1954 she lived at 6 Riversdale Road, Hawthorn.

TIrene did not marry. She died in Hawthorn on 8 September in 1955 after a long and painful illness aged 62 and is remembered at Geelong Eastern Cemetery with her name inscribed on a headstone with her father, mother and other relatives. In the 1956 MLC school magazine she was remembered as a loyal and devoted member of staff.