DUNCAN, Alexander
| Service Number: | SX2479 |
|---|---|
| Enlisted: | 23 April 1940 |
| Last Rank: | Private |
| Last Unit: | Not yet discovered |
| Born: | Leith, Scotland, 14 November 1901 |
| Home Town: | Gladstone, Northern Areas, South Australia |
| Schooling: | Edinburgh , Scotland |
| Occupation: | First Class Guard SAR |
| Died: | Natural Causes, Hobart Tasmania , 21 June 1997, aged 95 years |
| Cemetery: |
Cornelian Bay Cemetery and Crematorium, Tasmania |
| Memorials: | Gladstone Town Hall WW2 Roll of Honour |
World War 2 Service
| 23 Apr 1940: | Involvement Private, SX2479 | |
|---|---|---|
| 23 Apr 1940: | Enlisted Adelaide, SA | |
| 23 Apr 1940: | Enlisted Australian Military Forces (WW2) , Private, SX2479 | |
| 18 Nov 1944: | Discharged |
Brief history
Alexander Duncan enlisted from Gladstone SA where he worked for the Sth Australian Railways as a guard. He trained at Cheltenham Army Camp and sailed from Australia on 17th November 1940 to Palestine with the 2/10th Battalion. He served in Tobruk with the 2/12th Battalion, then up to Aleppo in Syria, and then fought with the 2/15th at the Battle of El Alamein. Many of the 2/12th came back to fight in New Guinea but Alex had medical problems with his feet and the Army may have felt the tropics unsuitable for him. He returned to Australia in January 1943 and served as a nurse orderly in the Rocky Road Hospital in the Atherton Tablelands. He was demobilised in 1944 and returned to work for the SAR as a train guard until his retirement in 1966. He lived a long life, dying in 1997 at age 96. He had put his age back 4 years on enlistment as his true birthdate was 14/11/1901 in Leith, Edinburgh.
Submitted 12 December 2022 by Robert Burgess
Brief history
Alexander Duncan enlisted from Gladstone SA where he worked for the Sth Australian Railways as a guard. He trained at Cheltenham Army Camp and sailed from Australia on 17th November 1940 to Palestine with the 2/10th Battalion. He served in Tobruk with the 2/12th Battalion, then up to Aleppo in Syria, and then fought with the 2/15th at the Battle of El Alamein. Many of the 2/12th came back to fight in New Guinea but Alex had medical problems with his feet and the Army may have felt the tropics unsuitable for him. He returned to Australia in January 1943 and served as a nurse orderly in the Rocky Road Hospital in the Atherton Tablelands. He was demobilised in 1944 and returned to work for the SAR as a train guard until his retirement in 1966. He lived a long life, dying in 1997 at age 96. He had put his age back 4 years on enlistment as his true birthdate was 14/11/1901 in Leith, Edinburgh.
Submitted 12 December 2022 by Robert Burgess
Brief history
Alexander Duncan enlisted from Gladstone SA where he worked for the Sth Australian Railways as a guard. He trained at Cheltenham Army Camp and sailed from Australia on 17th November 1940 to Palestine with the 2/10th Battalion. He served in Tobruk with the 2/12th Battalion, then up to Aleppo in Syria, and then fought with the 2/15th at the Battle of El Alamein. Many of the 2/12th came back to fight in New Guinea but Alex had medical problems with his feet and the Army may have felt the tropics unsuitable for him. He returned to Australia in January 1943 and served as a nurse orderly in the Rocky Road Hospital in the Atherton Tablelands. He was demobilised in 1944 and returned to work for the SAR as a train guard until his retirement in 1966. He lived a long life, dying in 1997 at age 96. He had put his age back 4 years on enlistment as his true birthdate was 14/11/1901 in Leith, Edinburgh.
Submitted 12 December 2022 by Robert Burgess
Biography contributed by Robert Burgess
Alexander Duncan was born in Leith Edinburgh and went to school there. He worked for the Railways in Scotland and moved to Australia in about 1926. He joined the Army to get "a free trip back home " to see his family (the first AIF group went to the UK for training) He changed his birthdate from 1901 to 1905 to seem younger but was very strong and fit from loading supplies as a train guard with the South Australian Railways. He trained at Cheltenham Army Camp and then at Woodside, and sailed from Port Adelaide on 17/11/40to the Middle East and trained in the Army camps in Palestine after an early hospitalisation with renal stones. He served in Tobruk with the 2/12th Battalion and attributed his survival to his decision "not to be a hero." His unit later served in northern Syria in Aleppo and he stayed on in the desert with the 2/15th Battalion to fight in the battle of El Alamein. He returned to Australia in January 1943 and worked as an orderly in the Rocky Road Hospital until he was demobilised on 18/11/1944. He returned to the SAR to work as a guard and eventually got his trip back home to Scotland in 1953 on the "Strathmore ". He married in 1954 but his wife died of cancer. He remarried in 1962, to my mother Freida Burgess and lived in Woodville South. He retired from the Railways in 1966 at 65, and worked part time as a storeman at Astra Housewares on the Port Road. He maintained a strong connection with the Freemason Lodge for many years, and loved gardening, often in his cast off guard trousers with the green stripe. He broke his hip while shopping at 92 and required nursing home care, eventually coming to Tasmania where I am based and dying in June 1997 aged 96. He is buried in the Cornelian Bay Cemetery.
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