David John MACLEOD

MACLEOD, David John

Service Number: 11329
Enlisted: 30 December 1914
Last Rank: Private
Last Unit: Unspecified British Units
Born: Queensland, Australia, 5 May 1888
Home Town: Not yet discovered
Schooling: Colonia Cosme Paraguay
Occupation: Not yet discovered
Died: Killed in Action, Belgium, 27 August 1917, aged 29 years
Cemetery: Coxyde Military Cemetery, Belgium
III. B. 34.
Memorials: Australian War Memorial Commemorative Roll
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World War 1 Service

30 Dec 1914: Enlisted British Forces (All Conflicts), Private, 11329, Unspecified British Units
Date unknown: Involvement Private, 11329, Unspecified British Units

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Biography contributed

Son of Allan Mann Macleod and Margaret Lilian Nolan Macleod, of Colonia Cosme, Paraguay, South America; husband of Rhoda Macleod, of Abbey Manse, Dunbar.

VOLUNTEER FROM COLONIA COSME, PARAGUAY

David John McLeod was born in Queensland in 1888 to parents Allan Milne and Margaret (née Nolan) McLeod. Allan, Margaret, and their three children David, Allan, and William moved from Australia to Paraguay to join the ‘New Australia’ colony in 1893.

New Australia was a socialist utopian settlement founded in Paraguay in 1893, by William Lane. The New Australia colony faced many problems, and split in two on 12 May 1894. The McLeod family became members of the newly formed Cosme colony. Cosme was ‘a co-operative settlement of English-speaking people, holding as principles communism, home-living, teetotalism’. Margaret McLeod died in the early 1900s leaving behind nine children. The eldest four children, including David, remained with their father and the younger five were adopted into other families.

At the outbreak of the war, men from the Paraguay colonies enlisted for service with the allied forces. McLeod, then aged 26, embarked from Buenos Aires, Argentina, on board the Amazon, disembarking at Liverpool, England, on 30 November 1914. He enlisted for service on 30 December 1914 and joined the 2nd Dragoons (Royal Scots Greys) with the rank of private. He was transferred to Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders in July 1915. While on leave in England, on 23 May 1916, McLeod married Rhoda Sinclair, a Red Cross nurse and daughter of Reverend George and Mrs Sinclair of Dunbar, Scotland.

On 27 August 1917, David John McLeod was killed in action in Belgium and was buried at Coxyde Military Cemetery, Belgium.

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