PAXTON, Robert
| Service Number: | 4202 |
|---|---|
| Enlisted: | Not yet discovered |
| Last Rank: | Private |
| Last Unit: | 19th Infantry Battalion |
| Born: | Glasgow, Scotland, United Kingdom, 22 September 1893 |
| Home Town: | Glebe, New South Wales |
| Schooling: | Not yet discovered |
| Occupation: | Locomotive Cleaner |
| Died: | Killed in Action, France, 14 November 1916, aged 23 years |
| Cemetery: |
No known grave - "Known Unto God" Villers-Bretonneux Memorial, Villers-Bretonneux, Picardie, France |
| Memorials: | Australian War Memorial Roll of Honour, Haymarket NSW Government Railway and Tramway Honour Board, Villers-Bretonneux Memorial |
World War 1 Service
| 11 Mar 1916: | Involvement Private, 4202, 19th Infantry Battalion, --- :embarkation_roll: roll_number: '13' embarkation_place: Sydney embarkation_ship: HMAT Orsova embarkation_ship_number: A67 public_note: '' | |
|---|---|---|
| 11 Mar 1916: | Embarked Private, 4202, 19th Infantry Battalion, HMAT Orsova, Sydney |
Help us honour Robert Paxton's service by contributing information, stories, and images so that they can be preserved for future generations.
Add my storyBiography contributed by John Oakes
Robert PAXTON, (Service Number 4202) also known as Robert Paxton Thompson, was ‘a ruddy fair-haired Scot, who had not been very long in Australia’ before the War. He was born in Glasgow on 22nd September 1893.
He joined the NSW Government Railways as a cleaner (first step on the career path of an engineman) at the Bathurst locomotive depot in March 1914. In July 1915 he was transferred to Penrith.
In December 1915, he enlisted in the AIF at Casula, stating his ‘trade or calling’ as ‘Engine Cleaner’, and giving as his next of kin his mother, Mrs Harriet Morrison’, living in Glebe.
He was allotted to the 10th Reinforcements of the 19th Battalion. He was embarked from Sydney in March 1916 and, after training in Egypt, was sent to France in May. He was ‘taken on strength’ by the 19th Battalion in August. In October he spent three days at ‘Pigeon School’.
He was killed in action on 14th November 1916 at Flers. One eyewitness later told the Red Cross:
‘Pte. R. Paxton was killed on the spot, in a trench where we were standing, 7 of us altogether side by side, waiting to go over, a shell came and broke into the middle of us. Paxton was killed and in falling he threw his arms around my neck and we fell down in the trench together, he was quite dead. I was obliged to leave him in the trench when we went over, it was about 7am. I doubt he was buried.’
His remains could not be located after the war, but he is remembered with honour on the Villers-Bretonneux Memorial.
A war pension was granted by the authorities to his mother.
- based on the Australian War Memorial Honour Roll and notes for the Great Sydney Central Station Honour Board.
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