WHITE, Frederick Arthur
| Service Number: | 1745 |
|---|---|
| Enlisted: | 17 January 1916 |
| Last Rank: | Private |
| Last Unit: | 51st Infantry Battalion (WW1) |
| Born: | Kilburn, London, England, 1889 |
| Home Town: | Kalgoorlie, Kalgoorlie/Boulder, Western Australia |
| Schooling: | Board School, London, England |
| Occupation: | Labourer |
| Died: | Killed in action, Mouquet Farm, France, 3 September 1916 |
| Cemetery: |
No known grave - "Known Unto God" Villers-Bretonneux Memorial, Villers-Bretonneux, Picardie, France |
| Memorials: | Australian War Memorial Roll of Honour, Villers-Bretonneux Memorial (Australian National Memorial - France) |
World War 1 Service
| 17 Jan 1916: | Enlisted AIF WW1, Private, 1745, 51st Infantry Battalion (WW1) | |
|---|---|---|
| 17 Apr 1916: | Involvement Private, 1745, 51st Infantry Battalion (WW1), Battle for Pozières , --- :embarkation_roll: roll_number: '19' embarkation_place: Fremantle embarkation_ship: HMAT Aeneas embarkation_ship_number: A60 public_note: '' | |
| 17 Apr 1916: | Embarked Private, 1745, 51st Infantry Battalion (WW1), HMAT Aeneas, Fremantle |
Help us honour Frederick Arthur White's service by contributing information, stories, and images so that they can be preserved for future generations.
Add my storyBiography contributed by Stephen Brooks
Frederick Charles White was born in England and came out to Australia around 1909. He only joined the 51st Battalion two weeks before they made a large attack on Mouquet Farm, a fierce engagement on a very formidable German stronghold. He was reported in his Red Cross file to have been killed by shell splinters some days after the attack, when still trapped in No Man’s Land. According to the witness several men were trapped, wounded, in a shell hole, for days after the attack, until rescued by Canadian stretcher bearers. Whilst there Frederick White was killed, and the witness stated he took White’s paybook into his possession.
Frederick was listed as wounded and missing for many months until he was adjudged killed in action by a Board of Enquiry in March 1917. His parents in England were in touch with the Red Cross in the hope that he may turn up somewhere, either in hospital or as a prisoner of war.
In late 1919 the Red Cross operation to find wounded and missing men was closing down, and Mrs. Charlotte White wrote to them, her letter epitomising the thoughts of many mothers of the missing,
“Dear Miss Wybrow, thank you very much for your kind letter to me in letting me know that your office is closing down. I am sure I cannot know how to thank you enough for trying to do all you can for me in searching for my dear son, Pte. Fred White 1745, it has been a long dreary many, many months not to know the real whereabouts of him but let us hope I shall know sometime. I know I am not the only one by thousands but the true saying every mother for her own child. I am sure when mothers has told me the lost of their dear sons I have said to them you ought to go down on your knees and thank our Heavenly Father for taken them as they do know the real end. Here I am I can’t get to know nothing of my dear boy. I am sure I again thank you dear Miss Whybrow for all your kindness, I am truly Mrs. White. Hoping to hear some time some news of my dear son.”
Frederick’s remains were never found and he remembered on the Villers Bretonneux Memorial.