John Donald CAMPBELL

Regimental number791
Place of birthMoonee Ponds, Victoria
ReligionPresbyterian
OccupationFarmer
AddressNorthcote, Victoria
Marital statusSingle
Age at embarkation37
Height5' 7.75"
Weight161 lbs
Next of kinMrs Mary Campbell, 21 Mitchell Street, Northcote, Victoria
Previous military serviceNil
Enlistment date8 January 1915
Date of enlistment from Nominal Roll18 January 1915
Rank on enlistmentPrivate
Unit name22nd Battalion, D Company
AWM Embarkation Roll number23/39/1
Embarkation detailsUnit embarked from Melbourne, Victoria, on board HMAT A38 Ulysses on 10 May 1915
Rank from Nominal RollLieutenant
Unit from Nominal Roll2nd Machine Gun Battalion
FateKilled in Action 9 October 1917
Place of burialNo known grave
Commemoration detailsThe Ypres (Menin Gate) Memorial (Panel 31), 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
177
Miscellaneous information from
  cemetery records
Parents: Alexander and Mary CAMPBELL, 228 Prospect Hill Road, Surrey Hills, Victoria. Native of Essendon, Victoria
Other details

War service: Egypt, Gallipoli, Western Front

Proceeded to join the Mediterranean Expeditionary Force, Gallipoli, 30 August 1915. Promoted Lance Corporal, 9 September 1915; Corporal, 21 September 1915; Temporary Sergeant, 8 December 1915. Disembarked Alexandria ex Mudros, 7 January 1916 (general Gallipoli evacuation).

Appointed 2nd Lt, 10 March 1916. Taken on strength, 6th Machine Gun Company, 10 March 1916.

Proceeded from Alexandria to join the British Expeditionary Force, 19 March 1916; disembarked Marseilles, 24 March 1916. Promoted Lt, 15 July 1916.

On leave to England, 19 January 1917; returned from leave, 9 February 1917.

Admitted to 6th Field Ambulance, 17 February 1917 (gonorrhoea); transferred to 8th General Hospital, Rouen, 20 February 1917; to 39th General Hospital, Havre, 21 February 1917; discharged to duty, 30 May 1917; marched in to Machine Gun Corps Base Depot, 5 June 1917; rejoined 6th Machine Gun Company, 19 June 1917.

On leave to England, 22 August 1917; rejoined unit from leave, 7 September 1917.

Killed in action, Belgium, 9 October 1917.

Medals: 1914-15 Star, British War Medal, Victory Medal