Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

I am the great grandson of Cyril Wilson and would like to share the information I have about a man I never knew but feel through his service to his country should have his personal story shared so he can be remembered by a grateful nation.

Cyril was born in Kings vale a small area between Young and Harden, New South Wales in Cherry growing countryside on the 13th July 1892 to parents George (a blacksmith) and Eliza (nee Barnes) Wilson.

Cyril enlisted on the 30th July 1916 with service No. 2662 to the 39th Battalion A.I.F a battalion that would see 405 men killed, while a further 1,637 were wounded according to the Australian War Memorial. Cyril embarked on HMAT Benalla A24 leaving the port of Melbourne bound for Britain where the battalion would ultimately see action on the Western Front of France from 1916-1917.

On return from active service Cyril married Grace Kemp in the year of 1924 in St Paul's Church of England. Cyril and Grace later went on to have five children and continued farming and latter established a goods carrying business in the Harden area.

Cyril once again saw service in WWII as a prison guard in Corwa NSW where Japanese prisoners of war where held.

After WWII Cyril worked for the Hydro-Electricity Scheme and continued on a quiet life.

Cyril passed away at home in Harden at the age of 77 in 1970 and Grace passed at the age of 82 in 1987 both are burried in the Murrumburrah Cemetry in New South Wales.

I would like to acknowledge the efforts of Keith T. Peck in the gathering of this information as part of his family history book published in 1993 "The Kemp Connection" of which the Wilson family shares, and are grateful for hard work he and others did to ensure family connections live on today.