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Percy Wellesley CHAPMAN was born in Glen Innes, New South Wales in 1886

His parents were Archibald Wellesley CHAPMAN & Gertrude Elizaeth SPASSHATT who married in NSW in 1884 (registered in Armidale)

He was killed in action in France on 12th March, 1917 and is buried in the Bernafay Wood British Cemetery and his name is memorialised on the Australian War Memorial

Inscription on his headstone reads "OUR BELOVED SON"

PERCEY WELLESLEY CHAPMAN (28.11.1686 — 12.3.1917)
Called Bob
Born Glen Innes and lived at Orange. His father was AM. Chapman. year from July:1903 to June 1904. 1st XI, Private in Cadets, Form V Maths Prize After leaving school he went to Hawkesbury  Agricultural College from July 1904 to December 1906. There he obtained a Certificate for “best on piggery" 1905 and also "received recognition from the Water Supply Board for services rendered in  saving their property from bush fires". In August 1910 The Hawkesbury Agricultural College Journal recorded he was at Crecy Farm of 400 acres at Forbes. "It is not a model farm yet, but has hopes to  make it so in a few years. Eighty acres are being cropped while another eighty are under fallow. He has been batching most of the time since leaving the College and has mastered the art of cooking;  an art which produces many leathery dampers before it is acquired” In 1911 he was with AE. Bigg at "Thalgarrah", Armidale.

Enlisted at Goulburn 9.3.1915

Served in the 12th Reinforcement, Australian Light Horse and 55th Battalion A.I.F. and became a Captain. He was awarded the M.C. "On the occasion when he was awarded Military Cross, he is  officially spoken of as having shown great calm and great gallantry, and undaunted spirit and as having saved many casualties”. The official citation for his M.C. Is "For conspicuous gallantry during an  action. He repeatedly led bombing attacks along the enemy's trenches and fought them back long enough to enable many of our wounded to reach safety." He wrote from Egypt after returning from  Gallipoli "I will never forget my birthday on Gallipoli. I started out on patrol work in the early morning at about half—past 12 o'clock and got back at dawn. There was a cut in my boot and the snow got in and made my foot throb for some days. I was one of the lucky eight picked out of our squadron to stay in the trench after the rest had evacuated”. C.E.W. Bean calls him "one of the gentlest of men" and tells how he and Capt Gibbins helped a German “dreadfully wounded, bathed in blood and almost senseless. They led him, but when Chapman let go one of his hands the poor-mangled brute got  up on his knees and started to pray” (Vol. 3 p.431n). Bill Gammage quotes this and 2 other entries from Chapman’s diary including this entry on 7.12.1916 "I really don't know why I want so much to  get back to the Front. When I think of the slush and cold over there I shiver, and yet I am a jolly side happier over there than here ... what I really want to carry about with me is a clear conscience -  that I have found Is better than a cosy billet and a warn fire". Killed in France aged 30. The circumstances of his death were that "he was leading his men at the time, having stepped into the place of  his senior officer, who was killed in the same charge."
Buried France 400 Bernafay Wood British Cemetery Montauban.

Obituary: "The remarks made by the officers who had to do with him, show him to have been a most exceptional officer, very much beloved by all he came into contact with.” Memorial His name is on  the fountain in Armidale Central Park, in the Armidale Memorial Library and in the Memorial Hall at Hawkesbury Agricultural College.