The AIF Project

James Arthur CHALKLEY

Regimental number2000
Date of birth1892
Place of birthRockhampton, Queensland
SchoolRockhampton State School, Queensland
ReligionMethodist
OccupationCarpenter's labourer
AddressRockhampton, Queensland
Marital statusMarried
Age at embarkation24
Next of kinWife, Mrs Nellie Chalkley, 250 Bolsover Street, Rockhampton, Queensland
Enlistment date7 February 1916
Rank on enlistmentPrivate
Unit name47th Battalion, 3rd Reinforcement
AWM Embarkation Roll number23/64/3
Embarkation detailsUnit embarked from Brisbane, Queensland, on board HMAT A46 Clan Macgillivray on 1 May 1916
Rank from Nominal RollPrivate
Unit from Nominal Roll42nd Battalion
Other details from Roll of Honour CircularWounded on two occasions in Messines sector - 9 June 1917 and 25 June 1917.
FateKilled in Action 4 October 1917
Place of death or woundingBroodseinde, Passchendaele, Belgium
Age at death26
Place of burialNo known grave
Commemoration detailsThe Ypres (Menin Gate) Memorial, 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
135
Other details

War service: embarked for overseas service from Brisbane, 1 May 1916.

Embarked for the British Expeditionary Force per H.T. 'Megantic' from Alexandria, 6 August 1916. Marched out from 3rd Division to the 12th Training Bn, No. 2 Camp, 24 September 1916; taken on strength, 42nd Bn, 30 September 1916, in England. While at Larkhill, on 30 October 1916, he neglected to obey Company orders in that he came on Parade without his rifle: awarded two days' confinement to barracks.

Proceeded overseas to France from Southampton, 25 November 1916. To hospital (sick), 5 January 1917; admitted to 10th Australian Field Ambulance, 17 January 1917 (congested feet); transferred to Divisional Rest Station; admitted to 11th Australian Field Ambulance, 25 January 1917 (bunions and inflamed chilled feet); discharged to duty. Admitted to 9th Australian Field Ambulance, 24 February 1917 (septic bunion); transferred to Divisional Rest Station. To hospital (sick), 16 March 1917; rejoined unit, 13 April 1917. Transferred to reinforcements camp, 16 April 1917.

Wounded in action, 15 June 1917; admitted to 10th Australian Field Ambulance, 17 June 1917 (gun shot wound to forefinger); discharged to unit.

Wounded in action (2nd occasion), 30 June 1917; admitted to 9th Australian Field Ambulance, (gun shot wounds, both hands); transferred to 53rd Casualty Clearing Station, then to the 18th General Hospital, Camiers; transferred from hospital to convalescent depots; transferred to Brigade Details, 26 July 1917. Rejoined unit, 24 August 1917. Reported as Missing in Action, 27 October 1917. Court of enquiry determined on 7 May 1918 that Pte Chalkley was killed in action in Belgium.

Medals: British War Medal, Victory Medal.

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