Harold Edwin WHITE

WHITE, Harold Edwin

Service Number: 566
Enlisted: Not yet discovered
Last Rank: Private
Last Unit: 44th Infantry Battalion
Born: Melbourne, Victoria, Australia , 30 November 1889
Home Town: Perth, Western Australia
Schooling: Not yet discovered
Occupation: Locomotive Driver
Died: Killed in Action, France, 2 January 1917, aged 27 years
Cemetery: Cite Bonjean Military Cemetery, Armentieres
Memorials: Australian War Memorial Roll of Honour, Kings Park Western Australia State War Memorial
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World War 1 Service

6 Jun 1916: Involvement Private, 566, 44th Infantry Battalion, --- :embarkation_roll: roll_number: '18' embarkation_place: Fremantle embarkation_ship: HMAT Suevic embarkation_ship_number: A29 public_note: ''
6 Jun 1916: Embarked Private, 566, 44th Infantry Battalion, HMAT Suevic, Fremantle
25 Nov 1916: Embarked AIF WW1, Private, 566, 44th Infantry Battalion, Proceeded overseas - France - from Southampton

Help us honour Harold Edwin White's service by contributing information, stories, and images so that they can be preserved for future generations.

Biography contributed by Cherilyn McMeekin

Harold was born in North Fitzroy, Victoria to Alfred and Sarah WHITE (nee WALKER). He moved to Western Australia and lived at Worsley and Holyoake, timber towns near Dwellingup.

Harold enlisted in the AIF in January 1916, aged 26. He married in March 1916 to Doris McMEEKIN, while in training at Blackboy Hill, and embarked overseas in June 1916. Sadly, it would be the last time Doris saw him, and he would never meet his son, Robert Harold WHITE, born in March 1917.

Harold was killed in action in the field on 2 January 1917, in France. Doris wrote to the officer in charge in February, seeking details of "the nature of his wounds, and if death was instantaneous". Sadly, no such details were forthcoming.

His effects were returned to Doris aboard Euripedes in November 1917, being a note wallet, post cards, letters, photos, a pipe, badge and 2 religious books.

A war widow at just 22 years of age, Doris went on to remarry and died in 1949 aged 51. 

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