ROCKSTROW, Augustus Isidor
| Service Number: | 474 |
|---|---|
| Enlisted: | 3 July 1916, Townsville, Qld. |
| Last Rank: | Private |
| Last Unit: | 3rd Machine Gun Company |
| Born: | Foxton, New Zealand, 1878 |
| Home Town: | Townsville, Townsville, Queensland |
| Schooling: | New Zealand |
| Occupation: | Engineer |
| Died: | Wounds, Belgium, 25 September 1917 |
| Cemetery: |
Lijssenthoek Military Cemetery Plot XIX, Row C, Grave No. 19A) |
| Memorials: | Australian War Memorial Roll of Honour |
World War 1 Service
| 3 Jul 1916: | Enlisted AIF WW1, Private, 474, 3rd Machine Gun Company, Townsville, Qld. | |
|---|---|---|
| 25 Oct 1916: | Involvement Private, 474, 3rd Machine Gun Company, --- :embarkation_roll: roll_number: '21' embarkation_place: Melbourne embarkation_ship: HMAT Ulysses embarkation_ship_number: A38 public_note: '' | |
| 25 Oct 1916: | Embarked Private, 474, 3rd Machine Gun Company, HMAT Ulysses, Melbourne |
Help us honour Augustus Isidor Rockstrow's service by contributing information, stories, and images so that they can be preserved for future generations.
Add my storyBiography contributed by Faithe Jones
Son of John and Ann ROCKSTROW
AROHA (Aroha is a Māori word meaning "love", cognate with the Hawaiian term aloha
Commemorated on Terrace End School Swimming Pool Memorial, Manawatu, New Zealand.
Augustus Isidor Rockstrow was born in 1878 to Dr John and Anna Rockstrow in Foxton, New Zealand. Augustus was an engineer by trade having completed a five year apprenticeship with W. Cable and Co Engineers, Wellington, New Zealand. He is believed to have left New Zealand at the turn of the century for Liverpool, England. In July 1904, Augustus left Liverpool for New York, United States of America and then by 1912 he had moved to Townsville, Queensland. In 1913 he had moved to Yarraman, Queensland where he was employed as a foreman.
Before enlisting in the Great War, Augustus moved back to North Queensland to a small town just outside of Townsville, called Oolbun. Augustus enlisted into the Australian Imperial Forces at the recruitment office in Townsville on the 3rd of July 1916, in the 3rd Machine Gun Company. Leaving Australia via the port in Melbourne on the 25th of October 1916 and arriving in England just over two months later for training. On completion of training Private Rockstrow was re-deployed to France in late April 1917. While fighting on the Western Front in Belgium, Augustus sustained multiple gunshot wounds and was omitted to hospital on the 20th of August 1917, he succumbed to his wounds nine days later dying on the 29th of August 1917, he is buried at Lijssenthoek Military Cemetery, Lijssenthoek, Flanders, Belgium. His next of kin was his brother Captain John Rockstrow of the New Zealand Army, a veteran of the Boer War and served in New Zealand during the Great War.
References –
Rockstrow family - Manawatū Heritage (pncc.govt.nz)
Augustus Isidor ROCKSTROW (masonicgreatwarproject.org.uk)
AWM Website
NAA Website
Trove NLA Website
Samual Cox, PM, December 2023
Click images to start slideshow.