CROOK , Charles Ernest
| Service Number: | 609 |
|---|---|
| Enlisted: | 14 September 1915 |
| Last Rank: | Lance Corporal |
| Last Unit: | 13th Light Horse Regiment |
| Born: | St Arnaud, Victoria, Australia, 1896 |
| Home Town: | Bacchus Marsh, Moorabool, Victoria |
| Schooling: | Not yet discovered |
| Occupation: | Bank Clerk |
| Died: | Cobden, Victoria, Australia, 16 July 1973, cause of death not yet discovered |
| Cemetery: |
Cobden Cemetery |
| Memorials: |
World War 1 Service
| 22 Dec 1914: | Involvement Private, 609, 4th Light Horse Regiment, --- :embarkation_roll: roll_number: '2' embarkation_place: Melbourne embarkation_ship: HMAT Barunga embarkation_ship_number: A43 public_note: '' | |
|---|---|---|
| 22 Dec 1914: | Embarked Private, 609, 4th Light Horse Regiment, HMAT Barunga, Melbourne | |
| 14 Sep 1915: | Enlisted AIF WW1, Private, 609, 4th Light Horse Regiment | |
| 11 Jan 1919: | Embarked AIF WW1, Lance Corporal, 609, 13th Light Horse Regiment, ex England on board HT Osterley with his wife | |
| 25 Apr 1919: | Discharged AIF WW1, Lance Corporal, 609, 13th Light Horse Regiment |
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Add my storyBiography contributed by Chris Buckley
Lance Corporal Charles Ernest Crook (Service No:609) enlisted in the AIF on 15 September 1914 - his mother had written giving permission for him to 'go to the Front to assist the Empire in her hour of need" (National Archives Australia). Embarking on 21 December 1914 on board HMAT A43 Barunga for Egypt, Private Crook was attached to 4th Light Horse Regiment, 1st Reinforcements. He served at Anzac, Lemnos and Mudros and was at the Convalescent Home in Woodcote Park, Surrey, England in December 1915 when he wrote home 'Saw the Zeppelin raid last Wednesday night. It was a wonderful sight. One of them went right over the hospital and it looked just like a huge cigar when the searchlights were playing on it', (Bacchus Marsh Express; 11 December 1915). Private Crook returned to Egypt on 25 March 1916 on board the Minnetonka, and on 10 June 1916 embarked from Alexandria for Marseilles, France. On 12 January 1918 he was appointed Lance Corporal - having served with 2nd Anzac Mounted Regiment and 22nd Light Horse Regiment. Lance Corporal Crook was detached for duty with the New Zealand Division before transferring to 13th Light Horse Regiment and embarking from England for Australia on board HT Osterley on 11 January 1919. Lance Corporal Crook was Discharged on 25 April 1919.
Born in 1896 in St Arnaud in Victoria, Charles was the seventh of nine children of Francis (Frank) Harbottle Crook (b1855 in Hobart, Tasmania) and first wife Harriet Elizabeth McCausland (b1859 at Kilfern Station in Benalla, Victoria). Frank (a Stock and Station Agent) and Harriet married in 1882 in Bacchus Marsh, Victoria where they settled and raised their family. Frank was an Auctioneer, Farmer, Clerk of Petty Sessions, Secretary of the Mechanics Institute and Free Library, and of Bacchus Marsh Racing Club.
A Bank Clerk in Bacchus Marsh when he enlisted in 1914, Charles was on leave in 1918 in London, England when he married Edith Agnes Barnes (aka Agnes; b1895 in Woolwich, London) and they returned to Australia together in 1919 on board HT Osterley.
Charles returned to work as a Bank Clerk/Official and he and Agnes lived in Melbourne before settling in Cobden, Victoria in the 1930s. Agnes died in 1972 and Charles in 1973.
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