Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

Frederick Leslie Jeffery was born at Nevertire Central NSW around May 1890. His Mother was Alice Jeffery who later moved to Bondi NSW. 

He was working as a stockman when he enlisted into the 1st AIF on 27 August 1915. He was described on his attestation papers as being 25 years and 3 months old, 5 feet 9 1/2 inches tall (177cm). Frederick had a fair complexion with light brown hair and blue eyes. 

He was allocated to the 12th Reinforcements of the 1st Australian Light Horse Regiment. This group of men embarked from Australia on 09 November 1915 and disembarked in Egypt on 11 December 1915. 

Frederick was transferred to Kantara (El Qantara) in Egypt, followed by Moascar (Ismailia) where he transferred to the Imperial Camel Corps on 15 November 1916.

During this time Frederick has a slight brush with the military justice system forfeiting 1 days’ pay for being absent without leave at the 0630 roll call on 14 November 1916.

On 25 November 1916 he was marched in to the number 2 Company of the Imperial Camel Corps at Abbassia (El Abaseya) and embarked from Alexandria for Sollum near what is now the Egyptian-Libyan Border. 

It seems Frederick remained with Number 2 Company of the Imperial Camel Corps which eventually was attached as part of East Force into Syria. Around mid  April 1917 he was reported missing near Gaza in Syria in particularly heavy fighting during the second battle for Gaza.  He was then reported and confirmed a Prisoner of the Turks on 19 April 1917.  

Records of Prisoners of War in Turkey generally rely on eyewitness accounts of the fate of the prisoners and in the case of Frederick Jeffery it was reported after the war that he had died in the Nidge Hospital, Turkey of Dysentery or Malarial fever on about 23 October 1917.

His body was buried in an unmarked grave, possibly with other men, in the Cemetery at Nidge. Eyewitnesses reported him being wrapped in a simple shroud without any identifying objects. These reports came from a number of men interviewed by the Red Cross and military officials.

In the late 1920's the Imperial War Graves Commission consolidated the various smaller cemeteries in Turkey and other areas of the Middle East into the North Gate Cemetery in Baghdad, Iraq. 

Problems arose in identifying the remains of individual, and sometimes multiple, men in unmarked graves and as such when the bodies were reinterred the memorial headstone was inscribed with 'Buried near this spot'. A letter to Frederick's Mother Alice from the Imperial War Graves Commission in 1927 reads, in part:

‘With further reference to the report of the regrettable loss of your son, the late No. 1630 Private F.L. Jeffery, Imperial Camel Corps ...........I am now in receipt of advice that the remains of this soldier with those of his comrades buried in Nidge Cemetery, Asia Minor, have been exhumed and re-interred with every measure of care and reverence in BAGHDAD (NORTH GATE) WAR CEMETERY, IRAQ. 

Unfortunately, in the absence of proper means of identification it was found impossible to distinguish between individual graves and the Commission has accordingly arranged for separate permanent Headstones to be erected in the Cemetery........ The Commission very much regrets that more definite information cannot be furnished regarding the actual site of this soldier's final resting place, but in view of the difficulties arising it is felt that you will realise that the action taken to perpetuate his memory and that of his comrades is the most appropriate in the circumstances....... ‘

All information sourced from NAA items B2455, JEFFERY FREDERICK LESLIE, and AWM Collections