HUGHES, Gordon Dallinger
| Service Number: | 2686 |
|---|---|
| Enlisted: | 11 August 1915, Enlisted at Warwick Farm |
| Last Rank: | Private |
| Last Unit: | 20th Infantry Battalion |
| Born: | Sackville Ridge, New South Wales, Australia, 2 October 1886 |
| Home Town: | Kogarah, Sydney, New South Wales |
| Schooling: | Not yet discovered |
| Occupation: | Railway Electrical Worker (Arc Lamp Trimmer) |
| Died: | Killed in Action, France, 14 November 1916, aged 30 years |
| Cemetery: |
No known grave - "Known Unto God" Villers-Bretonneux Memorial, Villers-Bretonneux, Picardie, France |
| Memorials: | Australian War Memorial Roll of Honour, Haymarket NSW Government Railway and Tramway Honour Board, Villers-Bretonneux Memorial (Australian National Memorial - France), Yass Methodist Church Honour Roll |
World War 1 Service
| 11 Aug 1915: | Enlisted AIF WW1, Private, 2686, 20th Infantry Battalion, Enlisted at Warwick Farm | |
|---|---|---|
| 2 Nov 1915: | Involvement Private, 2686, 20th Infantry Battalion, --- :embarkation_roll: roll_number: '13' embarkation_place: Sydney embarkation_ship: HMAT Euripides embarkation_ship_number: A14 public_note: '' | |
| 2 Nov 1915: | Embarked Private, 2686, 20th Infantry Battalion, HMAT Euripides, Sydney | |
| 14 Nov 1916: | Involvement AIF WW1, Private, 2686, 20th Infantry Battalion, 'The Winter Offensive' - Flers/Gueudecourt winter of 1916/17 |
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Add my storyBiography contributed by John Oakes
Gordon Dallenger HUGHES (Service Number 2686) was born on 2nd December 1886 at Sackville Ridge on the Nepean River near Sydney. He worked for the NSW Tramways as a general labourer on the electric trams in Sydney from January 1911. He transferred to the Electrical Branch of the Railways at Clyde in June 1913. It was from this position that he was released on 24th July 1915 to join the Expeditionary Forces. He enlisted at Warwick Farm on 11th August, giving his ‘trade or calling’ as an ‘Arc Lamp Trimmer’ His sister as his next of kin because he was unmarried and his parents had died.
He was allotted to the 6th Reinforcements to the 20th Battalion and left Australia from Sydney aboard HMAT ‘Euripides’ on 2nd November 1915. He had reached Egypt by early February and was taken on the strength of his Battalion. On 18th March 1916 he embarked at Alexandria for passage through Marseilles to the Western Front. In July he was convicted of ‘Disobedience to Battalion Orders in that he was out of his Billet after Lights Out, at 12.30am’. He was penalised with seven day’s Field Punishment No. 2.
He was killed in action in France on 14th November 1916. He has no known grave and he is remembered on the Villers-Bretonneux Memorial, Picardie, France.
Although Hughes had named his sister, Clarinza Marx of Kogarah as his next of kin, he did in fact have an ex-nuptial daughter, Elvy May Catt, for whom he had paid maintenance and who had been awarded a pension in view of her father’s war service. When the time came to distribute service medals and other mementoes, Clarinza claimed them as she had acted as mother to Hughes and was his next of kin, while Mrs Linda May Ivers (née Catt, but by then married) claimed them for her (and Hughes’) daughter.
The decision of the authorities was that:
· The 1914/1915 Star, Victory Medal and Memorial Scroll be handed over in trust for Hughes’ daughter.
· The British War Medal with Clasps, the Memorial Plaque and the brochure ‘Where the Australians Rest’ be handed over to his sister.
- based on the Australian War Memorial Honour Roll and notes for the Great Sydney Central Station Honour Board.
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