COCKS, Edmund Clarence
| Service Number: | 17507 |
|---|---|
| Enlisted: | 16 August 1916, Melbourne, Vic. |
| Last Rank: | Corporal |
| Last Unit: | 1st Cavalry Division |
| Born: | Korumburra, Victoria, Australia, January 1898 |
| Home Town: | Albert Park, Port Phillip, Victoria |
| Schooling: | Not yet discovered |
| Occupation: | Railway Porter |
| Died: | Heat illness, Iraq, 5 August 1917 |
| Cemetery: |
Baghdad (North Gate) War Cemetery |
| Memorials: | Australian War Memorial Roll of Honour, Korumburra War Memorial, South Melbourne Great War Roll of Honor |
World War 1 Service
| 16 Aug 1916: | Enlisted AIF WW1, Corporal, 17507, 1st Cavalry Division, Melbourne, Vic. | |
|---|---|---|
| 9 May 1917: | Involvement Corporal, 17507, 1st Cavalry Division, Third Ypres, --- :embarkation_roll: roll_number: '6' embarkation_place: Sydney embarkation_ship: HMAT Port Sydney embarkation_ship_number: A15 public_note: '' | |
| 9 May 1917: | Embarked Corporal, 17507, 1st Cavalry Division, HMAT Port Sydney, Sydney | |
| 5 Aug 1917: | Involvement Corporal, 17507, Third Ypres, --- :awm_ww1_roll_of_honour_import: awm_service_number: 17507 awm_unit: Cavalry Division Signal Squadron Australian Engineers awm_rank: Corporal awm_died_date: 1917-08-05 |
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Add my storyBiography contributed by NIgel Bellette
Edmund Clarence Cocks was born in January 1898 in Korumburra Victoria. His father was William Cocks and his Mother Louisa had already died by the time he enlisted. His father lived at Albert park, Victoria.
Trained as a carpenter but working as a railway porter, Edmund had served in the 51st Infantry (Cadets) prior to enlisting on the 16th of August 1916. Upon enlistment Edmund was described as ‘Five feet five and three quarters inches tall with a fair complexion, blue eyes, and fair hair. As he was only 18 he needed his father’s consent to enlist, William provided this consent.
He was posted to the Wireless Signals School at Broadmeadows to train as a signaller. He had a slight brush with military justice when he was absent from roll call on the 4th of September 1916 and was fined a day’s pay. On the 3rd of October 1916 Edmund was posted to the Wireless Reinforcements at the Engineer Depot, Moore Park, Sydney. He was promoted to Corporal on the 8th of March 1917.
Edmund embarked from Sydney with his Unit of three Officers and 46 Other Ranks on the 9th of May 1917 aboard HMAT A15 Port of Sydney. They stopped briefly at Freemantle in Western Australia but were not permitted shore leave. The party arrived at Colombo on the 4th of June 1917 and spent four days ashore exploring before departure on the 8th of June 1917.
The unit then disembarked at Madras and travelled by train for Bombay where they re-embarked on HMAT Elephanta for Basra, Mesopotamia (Iraq) arriving on the 25th of June 1917.
Edmund and the remaining three Officers and 33 men (some had fallen ill already) were allocated to the Cavalry Division Signals Squadron operating in and around Baghdad. Edmund had qualified as a motorcycle dispatch rider and would have been delivering signals all throughout the Baghdad region.
Mesopotamia (Iraq) in the months from May to September is and extremely hot place to reside with temperatures regularly exceeding 50 degrees centigrade. Edmund found himself working and living in one of the harshest environments on Earth at a time when the effects of heat illness and injury were not something one worried about. Records show that Edmund was admitted to hospital in Baghdad on 13th of July 1917.
A telegram sent to William Cocks on the 31st of July 1917 described Edmund as ‘Dangerously ill, suffering from the effects of heat’. A second telegram from the 4th of August 1917 reported he was ‘Still dangerously ill’.
Unfortunately for Edmund the effects of heat injury can be fatal and he died in hospital on the 5th of August 1917. It is likely that Edmund had developed a heat-injury such as heat stroke and had seriously damaged his internal organs, from which there is not much hope of recovery.
He was buried with honour in the North Gate Cemetery.
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