Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

Elwyn Samuel GOULD (1893-1917)

Elwyn Samuel GOULD was born the only son of Captain (later Major) Samuel Gould and Mrs Julia Gould, at Bowden in Adelaide on 13 July 1893.  Samuel Gould was a militia officer and his son Elwyn had joined the Cadets at age14, progressing into the ranks of the Citizens Forces where he was commissioned prior to the outbreak of war.

Elwyn studied as an architect completing his studies immediately prior to the outbreak of war. He was commissioned to the AIF from the Citizens Forces enlisting on on 13 April 1915.  He thus had no Service number allocated as was the practice at the time;  only enlisted personnel were thus identified.

His parents by this time were living at  213 Wattle Street MALVERN SA .  

Elwyn 's name is not listed on the embarkation roll for his initial deployment for reasons unknown. 

The 27th Battalion landed at Gallipoli in September 1915 with the rest of the Second Division.  Enteric fever was emerging as an issue as a result of hot weather and poor sanitation and it caused more casualties than enemy fire late in the campaign.  Elwyn became one of those casualties. He was evacuated with enteric fever initially to Malta and later repatriated to Australia on the ship “Ulysses”

He returned to France from Australia and the UK (an entry that IS recorded in another Embarkation Roll) as part of the 12th Reinforcements for the 27th Battalion, on the HMAT Aeneas embarking on the 11^th April 1916.

Elwyn re-joined the Battalion, by now a very different collection of faces and names to the one he had left behind at Gallipoli. The 27th Battalion took part in operations at Pozieres and Mouquet Farm in July - September 1916 sustaining heavy casualties in the process.  A brief period in Belgium followed before a return to the Somme just south east of Pozieres and a dreadful winter during the course of which the Battalion was engaged around Flers, in early November.  The troops in the field endured the coldest most severe winter in living memory.

1917 saw 2nd Division and the 7th Brigade of which the 27th was a part relocate further north near Arras to take part in the major British offensive of the same name.  Elwyn had been promoted Captain on the 4^th January vice Captain Elder.

He was not long in action before being seriously wounded by small arms fire near Frecourt on the 22^nd February1917, recorded as GSW (interchangeably ‘Gunshot Wound’- the most common use of the abbreviation - or ‘General Shrapnel Wound’, the charactersitics of which were sometimes indistinguishable from a gunshot wound).  His wounds required evacuation to the United Kingdom and admission at the 3^rd London General Hospital, Wandsworth.  It appears that he spent four months recuperating before temporary assignment to the 7^th Training Battalion on the Salisbury Plain.

He deployed again to France on the 4^th July 1917, and was taken back on strength by the 27^th Battalion on the 13^th of July.

The 27^th Battalion was shortly afterwards committed to the Third Ypres campaign, beginning with Menin Road and Polygon Wood and culminating in the fighting at Passchendaele.

Elwyn Gould was killed on the 9^th October 1917 in the preliminary stages of Passchendaele.  The Battalion at the time was located near Broodseinde, to the south of Passchendaele.

It is notable that Elwyn’s story closely parallels that of Reginald Bruce Coulter (warmemorial.erato.vm.e2.com.au), from Gallipoli to Ypres.

1914/15 Star: 25449

British War Medal: 36704

Victory Medal: 36419

Commemorative Medallion: 357345

Captain ELWYN SAMUEL GOULD, who was killed in action on the western front on October 9, was the only son of Major and Mrs. Samuel Gould, of Wattle-street, Malvern. Captain Gould. received his  primary education, at the State schools. and while at Unley was awarded a scholarship tenable at the School of Art and Design, where, and at the School of Mines, he succèssfully continued his studies, with a view to taking up the profession of an architect. He was subsequently articled to Mr. Alfred Wells, and was admitted as an associate of the Institute of Architects in November, 1914. He began his military career in the Cadets at the age of 12, and graduated through all ranks from private to lieutenant. At the time of his appointment as second lieutenant in the Australlan Imperial Forces early in  1916, he held a commission in the 74th (Boothby) Infantry. He sailed for the front in May, 1915; served in Egypt (where he received his second star), and Gallipoli, and was invalided back to Australia  owing to a severe attack of enteric. Leaving this State again with reinforcements for Egypt, he went to England as adjutant of the troopship, and was also for some time adjutant of a battalion at  Salisbury Plain. Procceding to France early in December, 1916, he received his captaincy; was severely wounded at Warlencourt on February 27, 1917, and incapacitated for 16 weeks, taking over his company again in France on his 24th birthday, on July 13. Of striking physique, and a fine, manly character, Captain Gould was highly esteemed. He was able to win the confidence and regard of his  men, of whom he was immensely proud. He was a member of the Malvern Methodist Church and Sunday school and of the I. O. of Rechabites. Many tributes of respect have been received by his parents.