George Henry ALLEN

Regimental number3006
Place of birthLilydale, Victoria
SchoolLilydale State School, Victoria
ReligionPresbyterian
OccupationLabourer
AddressCave Hill Road, Lilydale, Victoria
Marital statusSingle
Age at embarkation25
Height5' 6"
Weight140 lbs
Next of kinFather, Charles Allen, Lilydale, Victoria
Enlistment date21 July 1915
Date of enlistment from Nominal Roll20 July 1915
Place of enlistmentMelbourne, Victoria
Rank on enlistmentPrivate
Unit name24th Battalion, 7th Reinforcement
AWM Embarkation Roll number23/41/2
Embarkation detailsUnit embarked from Melbourne, Victoria, on board HMAT A73 Commonwealth on 26 November 1915
Rank from Nominal RollPrivate
Unit from Nominal Roll8th Battalion
FateReturned to Australia 21 May 1916
Place of death or woundingPasschendaele, Ypres, Belgium
Age at death27
Place of burialNo known grave
Commemoration detailsThe Ypres (Menin Gate) Memorial (Panel 7), 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
52
Miscellaneous information from
  cemetery records
Parents: Charles and Edith Elizabeth ALLEN
Other details

War service: Western Front

Taken on strength, 8th Bn, Zeitoun, 24 February 1916.

Embarked Alexandria to join the British Expeditionary Force, France, 26 March 1916; disembarked Marseilles, 31 March 1916.

Wounded in action, France, 26 July 1916; admitted to No. 5 General Hospital (gun shot wound, left buttock), Rouen, 26 July 1916; embarked Havre for treatment in England, 27 July 1916; admitted VAD Hospital, Birmingham, 28 July 1916.

Reported to No. 1 Command Depot, Perham Downs, from furlough, 29 August 1916.

Found guilty, 25 September 1916, of being absent without leave, 3.00pm, 13 September 1916 to 0900, 20 September 1916, Perham Downs: awarded 168 hours detention, forfeits 15 days pay.

Proceeded to France, 11 November 1916.

Rejoined 8th Bn, in the field, 23 December 1916.

Wounded in action, 29 April 1917; admitted to No. 5 General Hospital (gun shot wound, left arm), Rouen, 3 May 1917; embarked Havre for treatment in England, 13 May 1917; admitted Grove Military Hospital, Richmond, England, 14 May 1917; discharged to furlough in Britain, 5 June 1917; reported to Command Depot, Wareham, 20 June 1917.

Marched in, No. 4 Command Depot, Codford, 12 July 1917.

Proceeded to France, 26 July 1917.

Rejoined 8th Bn, in the field, 18 August 1917.

Killed in action, Belgium, 25 October 1917.

Buried at Map Reference D.17.c.9.9, Sheet 28 North East.

Medals: British War Medal, Victory Medal
SourcesNAA: B2455, ALLEN George Henry