Rookwood Cemetery Discoveries

  We are soon to commemorate the 108th anniversary of the Battle of Fromelles on the 19th of July and I wish to pay homage to all those that lost their lives. Today I will honour a local young man who displayed great courage, indicative of the thousands who took part. THOMAS PATRICK ELLIOTT Thomas was the eldest son of eleven children of Thomas Murray Elliott and his wife Mary Ellen and born in January 1894. All the sons were encouraged to have military service and Thomas enrolled as a Cadet at the Royal Military College in Duntroon in 1912. Thomas's potential impressed his superiors, and he was destined to succeed but his academic and sporting achievements were cut short due to the start of WW1. He enlisted on the 3rd of November 1914, at which time the family were living in Lidcombe very close to the cemetery and embarked with the 2nd contingent on the 20th of December that year as a temporary Captain. He fought at Gallipoli with the 7th Light Horse and was evacuated to Malta...

  I couldn't let the month of July pass without a tribute to some of those who gave their all on the battlefields on the Western Front in 1916. They never made it home to Australia but are remembered on family headstones scattered throughout Rookwood cemetery. After the horror of the Gallipoli campaign, many were patched up and sailed to France to join British and other Commonwealth nations troops for arguably worse horrors. The name Fromelles reminds many of the battle that caused the single the greatest number of dead Australian troops in the Great War. There were 5,533 casualties, including approximately 1,900 deaths. The number of dead included 15 sets of brothers and one father and son. The British Division suffered 1,547. The Germans around 1,500. All the more shocking when you find that this happened in one 24-hour period; 19th July 1916. If that was not bad enough, those that survived the bloodbath of Fromelles were then subjected to the Battle of Pozieres which ran f...

Many headstones and memorials throughout Rookwood Cemetery have dedications to the young men, and some woman, who enlisted, fought and died in WW1. Thousands have their name mentioned on the family plot and became a place to grieve the loss of these brave people who never came home. Over a thousand of these headstones have the word "ANZAC" engraved, hundreds have "POZIERES" and just a few actually list "FROMELLES". Today, the 19th July 2022, is the 106th anniversary of the Battle of Fromelles. It was the day that the troops of the 5th Australian Division stormed the German line which centred around the "Sugar Loaf" salient near the small French village of Fromelles. Trench during Battle of Fromelles - AWM image 4094545 The plan was concocted by Sir Richard Haking, of the British Army in response to calls for a diversionary action to prevent further German Forces being transferred to the Somme some 80 kilometres south. Others involved were Major G...