S36161
FYFE, Harold Talbot
| Service Number: | 2647 |
|---|---|
| Enlisted: | Not yet discovered |
| Last Rank: | Lance Corporal |
| Last Unit: | 10th Infantry Battalion |
| Born: | Adelaide, South Australia, Australia, March 1895 |
| Home Town: | Mile End, City of West Torrens, South Australia |
| Schooling: | Not yet discovered |
| Occupation: | Electrician |
| Died: | Nailsworth, South Australia, Australia, 27 November 1956, cause of death not yet discovered |
| Cemetery: |
West Terrace Cemetery (AIF Section) Section: KO, Road: 23, Site No: 0C |
| Memorials: |
World War 1 Service
| 27 Oct 1915: | Involvement Private, 2647, 27th Infantry Battalion, --- :embarkation_roll: roll_number: '15' embarkation_place: Adelaide embarkation_ship: HMAT Benalla embarkation_ship_number: A24 public_note: '' | |
|---|---|---|
| 27 Oct 1915: | Embarked Private, 2647, 27th Infantry Battalion, HMAT Benalla, Adelaide | |
| 22 Aug 1916: | Wounded AIF WW1, Private, 2647, 10th Infantry Battalion, Battle for Pozières , Shell shock | |
| 5 May 1917: | Wounded AIF WW1, Private, 2647, 10th Infantry Battalion, Bullecourt (Second), GSW face | |
| 18 Sep 1918: | Wounded AIF WW1, Lance Corporal, 2647, 10th Infantry Battalion, "The Last Hundred Days", GSW both legs, right arm | |
| 21 Oct 1918: | Honoured Military Medal, Merris (France), In the operations against enemy posts at MONT DE MERRIS near STRAZEELE on night 29th/30th May, 1918, Private FYFE was runner for the support platoon of a company in the attach. Several times he carried messages through heavy snipers' and machine gun fire and brought back S.A.A. and bombs on each occasion. His good work was responsible for communication being maintained with Company Headquarters, and was of the utmost value. | |
| 11 Nov 1918: | Involvement Lance Corporal, 2647, 10th Infantry Battalion |
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Add my storyBiography contributed by St Ignatius' College
Background
Harold Fyfe was a soldier during the First World War. He was born in Adelaide, South Australia. His date of birth is unknown but at the time he enlisted he was twenty years and four months, so he was born sometime around March 1895. Before the war, he was an electrician. Harold was five foot five and a quarter inches with brown hair and blue eyes and weighed 148lbs which is around 67 kilograms.
Enlistment
Harold enlisted on the 23rd of July 1915 in Keswick Barracks in Adelaide South Australia and was assigned to the 27th Battalion. He spent around 3 months in training before embarking in October 1915 on the Benalla. After arriving in Egypt, on the 28th of February 1916, he moved battalions to the 10th Battalion. All this moving could mean that the commanding officer(s) didn’t like Harold and he would get up to mischief or disobey them or that he was needed all around the battlefield. Barely a month later he was in France. On the 22nd of August 1916, at Pozières, Harold was wounded with shell shock. On the 8th of November 1916, he became ill with an unknown diagnosis. He then returned to service at the Western Front on the 25th of December 1916 (Christmas Day). Then on the 5th of May 1917, at Bullecourt, he was wounded for the second time and this time, it was a more serious injury to the face. He was out of action for about a month, returning to his battalion on the 2nd of June 1916. Then his service records state that he became sick again on the 29th of October 1917 and while he was sick, he was admitted to the 9th Casualty Clearing Station in France on the 29th of October 1917. Then he came back into service on the 11th of December 1917. He was sick for a third time on the 21st of June 1918. On the 29th of June 1918, he was admitted to the Line of Communications Hospital which then directed him to a hospital in France, which is not detailed in his service records. We don’t know the diagnosis exactly, but we can infer that an illness was getting worse and he could have had something like pneumonia or typhoid and needed to go to hospital for treatment. He returned to service on the 10th of August 1918. He was promoted from Private to Lance Corporal on the 20th of August 1918.
Harold was wounded in action for the third time on 18th September 1918 and on this occasion, it was very serious with both his legs and right arm fractured and he was moved to the United Kingdom at the 3rd Field General Hospital in Oxford on the 28th of September 1918. He left England in January 1919 and was discharged from service on the 4th of May 1919.
Harold was awarded the Military Medal on 21 October 1918. This was because of his actions at Merris at the end of May:
In the operations against enemy posts at MONT DE MERRIS near STRAZEELE on night 29th/30th May, 1918, Private FYFE was runner for the support platoon of a company in the attach. Several times he carried messages through heavy snipers' and machine gun fire and brought back S.A.A. and bombs on each occasion. His good work was responsible for communication being maintained with Company Headquarters, and was of the utmost value.
Summary
Most of Harold’s time as a soldier was characterised by sickness or being wounded. While he spent some time being treated for an infection, he would have also had to battle some of the conditions like trench foot and some diseases which may have been spread by vermin such as rats and lice. Initially, when a doctor did the first inspection to see if he was fit for service, he would have looked for external things which could be seen like flat feet or bad teeth, not internal conditions like a weak immune system. His service records give no more information than his hospitalisation after which he was discharged. There are two further pieces of information, the first being that he died on the 27th of November 1956 and was buried at West Terrace Cemetery in Adelaide, South Australia. The second is that his mother who was his next of kin moved to Melbourne on the 5th of October 1916. This is interesting, as when Harold came back, he could have moved back to Melbourne with his mother or stayed in Adelaide.
Harold died at Nailsworth on 26th November 1956 and is buried in the AIF Cemetery on West Terrace in Adelaide.
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