Robert Neale JOHNSTON

JOHNSTON, Robert Neale

Service Number: 7608
Enlisted: Not yet discovered
Last Rank: Sapper
Last Unit: 3rd Divisional Signal Company
Born: New Zealand, 24 July 1893
Home Town: Not yet discovered
Schooling: Not yet discovered
Occupation: Merchant Seaman
Died: Suicide, Darlinghurst, Sydney, 19 November 1925, aged 32 years
Cemetery: Rookwood Cemetery & Crematorium
Memorials:
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World War 1 Service

9 Sep 1915: Involvement Sapper, 7608, 3rd Divisional Signal Company, --- :embarkation_roll: roll_number: '6' embarkation_place: Melbourne embarkation_ship: HMAT Ballarat embarkation_ship_number: A70 public_note: ''
9 Sep 1915: Embarked Sapper, 7608, 3rd Divisional Signal Company, HMAT Ballarat, Melbourne

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Biography

Spr R.N.Johnston served in the Middle East throughout 1916-18. Transferred to the 1st Signal Squadron, ANZAC Mounted Division. Served at the Battle of Romani. Returned to Australia in 1919, Committed suicide in Sydney 1925. Buried in Rookwood Necropolis. His elder brother Pvt Archibald Johnston served in the 6th Hauraki Coy. NZEF in Gallipoli and the Western Front. Wounded at Armentieres (GSW to head). Returned to NZ at the war's end. Committed suicide at Featherston Army Camp in 1919. Buried in the Featherston Camp Cemetery. Their younger sister Jean served on the Western Front around Ypres as a nurse. Returned to England temporarily incapacitated as a "Cot Case". Their Father Dr Daniel Johnston was present as company surgeon on the Parihaka Expedition (Taranaki, New Zealand) of 1881 with the Manchester Rifles militia. Their Grandfather Robert Johnson was a merchant ship captain in New Zealand, who commanded the commissariat bakery ship "Abundance" at Balaklava during the Crimean War (1853-56). While working for the NZ Marine Dept. he was responsibile for the positioning of many of the lighthouses around the New Zealand coastline and examination of Skippers and Mates. 

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