The AIF Project

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.

War service: Egypt, Gallipoli, Western Front

Embarked from Alexandria to join the Mediterranean Expeditionary Force, Gallipoli, 2 March 1915. Wounded in action, 25 April 1915. Admitted to 2nd General Hospital, Cairo, 1 May 1915; transferred to Convalescent Depot, Zeitoun, 3 May 1915; rejoined unit at Gallipoli, 26 May 1915. Appointed Lance Corporal, 3 July 1915; reverted to ranks at own request, 10 September 1915. Admitted to 1st Australian Casualty Clearing Station, 22 September 1915; transferred by HS 'Dunluce Castle' to Malta, 27 September 1915, and admitted to St Patrick's Hospital (dyspepsia). Discharged to Ghain Taffreha Camp, 3 November 1915. Admitted to St Peter's Hospital, 16 January 1916 (jaundice); transferred to Alexandria, 16 January 1916; arrived, 21 January 1916; transferred to 3rd Auxiliary Hospital, Cairo, 21 January 1916; to 4th Auxiliary Hospital, and discharged to duty, 29 February 1916.Rejoined 3rd Bn, 6 March 1916.

Proceeded from Alexandria to join the British Expeditionary Force, 27 March 1916; disembarked Marseilles, 3 April 1916. Promoted Temporary Corporal.

Wounded in action, 22 August 1916 (shell wound, face); reverted to Lance Corporal on being evacuated); admitted to No. 1 Canadian General Hospital, Etaples, 24 August 1916; evacuated to England, 7 September 1916, and admitted to War Hospital Chichester, 8 September 1916; discharged to No. 1 Command Depot, 13 October 1916. Marched out to No. 4 Depot, Wareham, 1 November 1916.

Admitted to 1st Australian Dermatological Hospital, Bulford, 4 April 1917; discharged, 25 April 1917; total period of treatment for venereal disease: 22 days. Marched in to No. 2 Convalescent Depot, 30 May 1917. Found guilty of being absent with leave from Tattoo, 17 June, to Reveille, 18 June 1917: admonished and forfeited 1 day's pay.

Proceeded overseas to France, 9 July 1917; joined 9th Bn, 29 July 1917. To Lewis Gun School, 9 September 1917; rejoined Bn, 30 September 1917. Promoted Temporary Corporal, 20 October 1917.

Killed in action, Belgium, 3 November 1917.