Regimental number | 773 |
Place of birth | Wallsend, New South Wales |
School | Wallsend Public School, New South Wales |
Religion | Church of England |
Occupation | Cordial bottler |
Address | Cardiff Road, Wallsend, New South Wales |
Marital status | Single |
Age at embarkation | 18 |
Height | 5' 9.25" |
Weight | 121 lbs |
Next of kin | Father, Charles Foulkes, Cardiff Road, Wallsend, New South Wales |
Previous military service | Served in the Senior Cadets (Compulsory Military Training scheme). |
Enlistment date | |
Place of enlistment | Newcastle, New South Wales |
Rank on enlistment | Private |
Unit name | 35th Battalion, C Company |
AWM Embarkation Roll number | 23/52/1 |
Embarkation details | Unit embarked from Sydney, New South Wales, on board HMAT A24 Benalla on |
Rank from Nominal Roll | Sergeant |
Unit from Nominal Roll | 35th Battalion |
Fate | Killed in Action |
Place of death or wounding | Passchendaele, Ypres, Belgium |
Age at death | 19.10 |
Place of burial | No known grave |
Commemoration details | The Ypres (Menin Gate) Memorial (Panel 25), Belgium The Menin Gate Memorial (so named because the road led to the town of Menin) was constructed on the site of a gateway in the eastern walls of the old Flemish town of Ypres, Belgium, where hundreds of thousands of allied troops passed on their way to the front, the Ypres salient, the site from April 1915 to the end of the war of some of the fiercest fighting of the war. The Memorial was conceived as a monument to the 350,000 men of the British Empire who fought in the campaign. Inside the arch, on tablets of Portland stone, are inscribed the names of 56,000 men, including 6,178 Australians, who served in the Ypres campaign and who have no known grave. The opening of the Menin Gate Memorial on 24 July 1927 so moved the Australian artist Will Longstaff that he painted 'The Menin Gate at Midnight', which portrays a ghostly army of the dead marching past the Menin Gate. The painting now hangs in the Australian War Memorial, Canberra, at the entrance of which are two medieval stone lions presented to the Memorial by the City of Ypres in 1936. Since the 1930s, with the brief interval of the German occupation in the Second World War, the City of Ypres has conducted a ceremony at the Memorial at dusk each evening to commemorate those who died in the Ypres campaign. |
Panel number, Roll of Honour, Australian War Memorial | 125 |
Miscellaneous information from cemetery records | Parents: Charles and Elizabeth FOULKES. Native of Wallsend, New South Wales |
Other details |
War service: Western Front Embarked Sydney, 1 May 1916; disembarked Plymouth, England, 9 July 1916. Promoted Corporal to complete establishment, 4 September 1916. Proceeded overseas to France, 21 November 1916. Admitted to 10th Field Ambulance, 2 February 1917 (scabies); transferred to Divisional Rest Station, 3 February 1917; to 11th Field Ambulance, 3 February 1917; to Casualty Clearing Station, 13 February 1917; discharged to duty and rejoined Bn, in the field, 16 February 1917. Wounded in action, 7 June 1917 (gun shot wound, right thigh), and admitted to 9th Australian Field Ambulance; transferred to No 1 Canadian General Hospital, Etaples, 8 June 1917; to England, 10 June 1917, and admitted to 1st Southern General Hospital, Birmingham, 12 June 1917; discharged on furlough, 21 July 1917, to report to No 3 Command Depot, Hurdcott, 4 August 1917. Marched out to Overseas Training Brigade, 16 August 1917. Proceeded overseas to France, 5 September 1917; rejoined 35th Bn, in the field, 17 September 1917. Promoted Sergeant, 21 September 1917. Reported missing in action, 12 October 1917. Court of Enquiry, 15 May 1918, concluded: 'Killed in action, 12 October 1917.' Sytatement, Red Cross File No 10910071, 6634 Pte L.R. SUTTON, 35th Bn (patient, No 4 Australian General Hospital, Randwick, New South Wales), 16 April 1918: 'During the attack at Passchendaele Ridge on the 13.10.1917 I saw Foulkes lying on the ground badly wounded. We carried in as many as we could, but I do not know whether Foulkes was brought in or not.' Second statement, 3494 Corporal W.H. LEWIS, C Company, 35th Bn, 27 February 1918; 'Foulkes and [880 H.E.] Parkinson were both Sgts. of C. Coy. S/M McFadden at No 1 Command Depot Sutton Veny told me that they and Lieut. Elliott were taken prisoner of war.' Note on file: 'No trace Germany. Cert. by Capt. Mills 10-10-19.' Medals: British War Medal, Victory Medal |
Sources | NAA: B2455, FOULKES William
Red Cross File No 10910071 |