BOURKE, Francis Richard
| Service Number: | 1665 |
|---|---|
| Enlisted: | Not yet discovered |
| Last Rank: | Private |
| Last Unit: | 17th Infantry Battalion |
| Born: | Not yet discovered |
| Home Town: | Not yet discovered |
| Schooling: | Not yet discovered |
| Occupation: | Not yet discovered |
| Died: | Killed in Action, France, 3 May 1917, age not yet discovered |
| Cemetery: |
No known grave - "Known Unto God" Villers-Bretonneux Memorial, Villers-Bretonneux, Picardie, France |
| Memorials: | Australian War Memorial Roll of Honour, Haymarket NSW Government Railway and Tramway Honour Board, Villers-Bretonneux Memorial (Australian National Memorial - France) |
World War 1 Service
| 28 Jul 1915: | Involvement Private, 1665, 17th Infantry Battalion, --- :embarkation_roll: roll_number: '12' embarkation_place: Sydney embarkation_ship: HMAT Suffolk embarkation_ship_number: A23 public_note: '' | |
|---|---|---|
| 28 Jul 1915: | Embarked Private, 1665, 17th Infantry Battalion, HMAT Suffolk, Sydney |
Great Sydney Central Station Honour Board
Francis Richard BOURKE, (Service Number 1665) was born on 16 June 1896 at Maitland. He commenced working for the NSW Railways as a junior porter in the Sydney District in July 1911 at the age of 15. He progressed through the pay increments and clerically at least became an adult porter on his 21st birthday in 1917. However, he had been granted leave to join the Expeditionary Forces on 29 May 1915 and was in fact killed in action six weeks before he became an adult.
He left Australia on 28 July 1915 on HMAT ‘Suffolk’. In Egypt he joined the 17th Battalion and was fighting on the Gallipoli Peninsula by the middle of September. He was wounded in action with a bullet wound to his right arm and transferred to hospital in Malta, By December he was discharged from hospital and returned to his unit, now in Egypt after being evacuated from Gallipoli. He was transferred to France in July 1916 where he served for nearly a year before he became missing in action.
He was killed at Bullecourt on 3 May 1917. One of his mates, Sergeant-Major Colin Campbell reported: -
‘He was 4 or 5 paces from me on my right. I saw him shot, and he fell forward. I went over and caught him by the hand and said “Get up Frank.” He was dead and never moved.’
Since his body was never recovered and the place of his burial lost, his name is recorded on the Villers-Bretonneux Memorial, Villers-Bretonneux, Picardie, France.
(NAA B2455-3100753)
Submitted 11 May 2023 by John Oakes