PARR, Frank Gordon
| Service Number: | 3100 |
|---|---|
| Enlisted: | Not yet discovered |
| Last Rank: | Private |
| Last Unit: | 34th Infantry Battalion |
| Born: | Broken Hill, New South Wales, Australia, 11 January 1895 |
| Home Town: | Armidale, Armidale Dumaresq, New South Wales |
| Schooling: | De La Salle College, Armidale, New South Wales, Australia |
| Occupation: | Draftsman in Railway Construction. |
| Died: | Died of wounds, France, 20 August 1918, aged 23 years |
| Cemetery: |
Villers-Bretonneux Military Cemetery IX. E. 2. |
| Memorials: | Armidale Memorial Fountain, Armidale Methodist Church Honor Roll, Australian War Memorial Roll of Honour, Haymarket NSW Government Railway and Tramway Honour Board |
World War 1 Service
| 10 May 1917: | Involvement Private, 3100, 36th Infantry Battalion, --- :embarkation_roll: roll_number: '17' embarkation_place: Sydney embarkation_ship: HMAT Benalla embarkation_ship_number: A24 public_note: '' | |
|---|---|---|
| 10 May 1917: | Embarked Private, 3100, 36th Infantry Battalion, HMAT Benalla, Sydney | |
| 20 Aug 1918: | Involvement Private, 3100, 34th Infantry Battalion, --- :awm_ww1_roll_of_honour_import: awm_service_number: 3100 awm_unit: 34th Australian Infantry Battalion awm_rank: Private awm_died_date: 1918-08-20 |
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Add my storyBiography contributed by John Oakes
Frank Gordon PARR (Service Number 3100) was born in Broken Hill on 11th January 1895.
‘He was a particularly brilliant student of De La Salle College, Armidale, and won the gold medal in connection with the Junior Examination of 1912, and in the same year passed the Senior Examination, winning the University silver medal as first prize in inorganic chemistry. He passed the examination for cadet draftsman in the Works Department, [joined as such in August 1915] and was employed in that Department in Sydney when he enlisted about Christmas 1916’: Armidale Chronicle, 7/9/1918.
He had enlisted in Sydney on 20th December 1916. He was transferred ‘on paper’ to the newly-formed Railway Construction Branch of the NSW Government Railways, which on 1/1/1917 took over the construction of new railways from the Public Works Department. He was formally ‘released from duties’ there on 2nd January 1917. On 9th January 1917 he was allotted by the military authorities to the 3rd Depot Battalion, Liverpool. He embarked from Sydney with reinforcements in May 1917. He landed in England in July. After basic training, he was sent to a Signalling School in December 1917, and in May 1918 transferred to the 33rd Battalion, then to the 34th, was ‘taken on strength’ by them, and sent to France at the end of the month. ‘He had only been some six months in the signallers, and writing [on 23rd June] said that he was then living in the remnant of a village a mile or so behind the firing line. He reported several narrow escapes, and hoped that his good fortune would still follow him when either side took the offensive’: Armidale Chronicle.
He was wounded in action on 20th August 1918 (shell wound right thigh) and died of his wounds the same day at an Advanced Dressing Station of the 10th Australian Field Ambulance. He was buried in Vaux-sur-Somme Communal Cemetery Extension, 1¾ miles ENE of Corbie, but after the war his remains were exhumed and re-interred in Villers-Bretonneux Military Cemetery, 1½ miles SW of Corbie.
‘We know the story of the late offensive, happily so successful for the Allied arms, but the fall of Signaller Parr and many another like him, is part of the price we have to pay for success in war. He was a lad in the Sunday school of the Methodist Church, and bore a fine reputation as a clean living, high principled youth, the type of man that the community can honestly mourn’: Armidale Chronicle.
- based on the Australian War Memorial Honour Roll and notes for the Great Sydney Central Station Honour Board