Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

Enlisted and served as Jack Noakes 

Jack NOAKES (Service Number 4552) was born in August or September 1894 at Broadwater, which is on the Richmond River, NSW.   He was allotted on enlistment to the 14th Reinforcements to the 2nd Australian Infantry Battalion and described himself on his Attestation Papers as a ‘Labourer’ . He was Per-Way worker  (track worker) for the Railways. He enlisted in NSW at Warwick Farm on 11th September 1915. He was unmarried, though engaged, and gave his father, Thomas Noakes, of Dalley Street Lidcombe as his next of kin. Jack Noakes younger brother Robert Seaver Noakes enlisted at the same time and they had consecutive regimental numbers. They served in the same Battalion throughout their careers. He was allotted to the 2nd Battalion, which embarked RMS ‘Osterley’ at Sydney on 15th January 1916. After a few weeks of further training in Egypt,  Noakes embarked ‘Transylvania’ at Alexandria on 29th March for passage to Marseilles and the British Expeditionary Force in France. He joined the 2nd Battalion on 14th May.

He was wounded in action between 22 and 25 July, with shrapnel injuries to his arm and back at Pozières. He was passed through the 2nd Field Ambulance, the 3rd Australian Casualty Clearing Station, the 16th Ambulance Train to the 8th General Hospital in Rouen. After a period in a Convalescent Depot he was taken in the strength of the 1st Australian Division Base Depot at Etaples on 30th July.
In November he was hospitalised with measles and then eythema. This resulted in another series of transfers through medical units to the 5th Convalescent Depot at Cayeux and eventually back to the 1st Australian Division Base Depot at Etaples on 14th December. On 10th January 1917 he was Absent Without Leave until he was found at the 5th Convalescent Depot the next day. For this offence he received 14 days Field Punishment No. 2, and the forfeiture of two days’ pay. He had also spent 35 days in confinement awaiting trial.
It was 6th March before he had completed his detention and could re-join the 2nd Battalion. Six weeks later, on 20th April 1917 he was killed in action. Pte D Monaghan (4308) reported:
‘I knew Pte. Jack Noakes and saw him killed by concussion a Hermies. It was our second time in, about 20 April 1917. His body was put over the back of the trench and would be taken and buried at a military graveyard about 3000 yards behind the trench at the Sunken Road. All our dead were taken there and buried. We held the ground.’
L/Cpl J. Cassidy (4153) stated:
‘He and a man called Cordell and another, were asleep in the trench when a shell lobbed right on top of the 3 of them killing them all outright. I was close by at the time, too close to be pleasant.’
The grave could not be later located and Noakes has no known grave. He is remembered on the Villers-Bretonneux Memorial, France.
Jack Noakes left his entire estate to Florence May Pashley, of Victor Street. Lidcombe. Letters from Florence Pashley are in Noakes file and they state that they were engaged, and that she had ‘been drawing his military pay which he left to support me.’ Florence applied for a pension using the relationship ‘intended wife’, but this was rejected as ‘claimant is not a dependant within the meaning of the Act.’
Robert Noakes survived the war. He was discharged from the AIF in June 1918 due to epilepsy.

- based on the Australian War Memorial Honour Rol and notes for the Great Sydney Central Station Honour Board