Families and Friends of the First AIF in Forster, New South Wales | Cemetery

Families and Friends of the First AIF

Locality: Forster, New South Wales

Phone: +688 26270

Address: PO Box 4245, 2428 Forster, NSW, Australia

Website: http://www.fffaif.org.au

Likes: 1717

Add/Update information

Reviews

Tags

• Non-profit organisation
• Community organisation
• Cemetery

22.01.2022 A Family Story of Note! More information has been revealed about David Knight’s grandmother, mentioned in an earlier post: David Knight has generously provided the following photograph and information: ... My Grandma was stationed at Harefield and Dartford Hospitals (England) at various times during the Great War. Her name was Muriel Mathew Slater. She was later stationed in India, I think on her way back to Australia. At some stage she met my Grandfather, Tom Scholfield, who was in the 21st Australian Battalion AIF. This all sounds a bit vague, so I will get more details from my mother, Muriels daughter, and post more. I have now been able to locate further details relating to Muriel and her spouse. And David has posted a further comment below for us. Muriel is listed on the Ballarat Base Hospital roll of honour that records the names of women who trained to be World War One nurses and had previously worked in that capacity in the hospital in Ballarat, a provincial city in the state of Victoria. She was born in Melbourne, Victoria in 1892 and was single when she enlisted with the Australian Army Nursing Service on 24 April 1917 at the age of 25. Her unit embarked from Melbourne, Victoria, on board RMS Khiva on 29 May 1917. Her service during the war also included providing medical services aboard a variety of Hospital transport ships. Muriel returned home to Australia aboard the Karagola on 29 April 1919. She passed away in 1983. The Schofields had three children, including the girl who is David’s dear mother.. Note: Candidates for appointment in the Australian Army Nursing Service (AANS) had to have at least three years’ training in medical and surgical Nursing in a duly recognised hospital, be aged 21 to 45 years, and be either single or a widow. Muriel met all criteria. Tom Schofield wears the ribbons of the Military Cross (MC) and Military Medal (MM), awarded for gallantry under fire. He also wears the A cloth badge on his upper-sleeve indicating service at Gallipoli in 1915. Thomas Schofield later became a member of the Australian Federal Parliament for the United Australia Party between 1931 and 1940. Scholfield had enlisted in the AIF in January 1915 and initially served as a Private in the 21st Battalion. He was commissioned in July 1917 as a Second Lieutenant and later promoted in October 1917 to Lieutenant. Scholfield was awarded the MM in November 1917 and the MC for bravery at Mont St. Quentin in September 1918. His brother John was killed in action in April 1918. Thank you David, and we honour your family’s service in the Great War.

21.01.2022 David Knight’s grandmother served as a nurse at Harefield House in England. Thank you, David for attaching this wonderful studio portrait to a previous FFFAIF post. Harefield was the location of No. 1 Australian Auxiliary Hospital, treating Australian and New Zealand wounded. Many Australian families have an ancestor associated with this large facility built in England’s green and pleasant land during the Great War. The uniform details are interesting to see, particular...ly the sleeve badge: Circular cotton hand-embroidered Australian Army Nursing Service sleeve badge. The badge is of grey wool with white and red embroidery. At the centre is a red Cross of Geneva with embroidery between the arms. Outside the cross, in a circular frame, are the words, 'AUSTRALIAN ARMY NURSING SERVICE'. Outside this is a laurel wreath and above is a King's crown with red embroidery. The badge has a black silk backing. (AWM archive). P.S. A similar badge, the Repatriation Nursing Service badge was worn by the staff of Repatriation Hospitals - previously 'Base' Hospitals - in Australia during the 1920s.

21.01.2022 Remembrance Day, 2020. Today the FFFAIF Facebook page shares the following post from Gary Mitchell and the Sandgate volunteers in NSW. Along with Forgotten Diggers and the Tasmanian Headstone Project, and others, the volunteers go to exceptional effort to mark the graves of Australian Great War returned servicemen. Two brothers who served during The Great War are now resting peacefully at Sandgate Cemetery....Continue reading

19.01.2022 Two great countries who fought the good fight! Three young South Africans visit the South African National Memorial in the Somme Valley in 2016, and meet two new friends from Down Under. Three South African high school students, Wendy van Wyk, Meeka’eel Shaik Latiff, and Tyson Mtshali (on the right) meet two unidentified Australian students (on the left) whilst all were attending that year’s Centenary of the Battle of Delville Wood Service.... All were recipients of travel prizes won for submitting an outstanding essay on the subject of Remembrance as it affects the young. The South Africans look particularly smart in uniform! Lest we Forget.

18.01.2022 A new unit with a special role. The British Section of the New Zealand Expeditionary Force (NZEF) was raised in the United Kingdom around October 1914. Four men of the section are shown on a train arriving in London sometime in 1914. Several hundred New Zealanders visiting or resident in the United Kingdom in late 1914 and early 1915 enlisted into the so-called British Section of the NZEF. Their uniform consisted of unique collar and cap badges. The NZEF British Sect...Continue reading

12.01.2022 Which Picture? Three New South Wales posters issued by that State’s Recruiting Committee and the Win the War League in the Great War.These imagescare well known to Australians with a knowledge of the war. Harry John Weston (b.1874 in Hobart Tasmania, d. 1938?) was an Australian cartoonist and commercial artist. He worked as a sailor, store-clerk and lithographer before taking up teaching in northern Tasmania. He then travelled to Victoria where he established his own busin...ess as a commercial artist in Melbourne. By 1903 he had established himself as a leading poster artist. He also worked in Sydney and had previously designed posters with Blamire Young and Lionel Lindsay around 1893. He was a member of the short-lived Prehistoric Order of the Cannibals Club 1893-1896. Its other members included prominent artist and later official war artist Sir Auther Streeton. Weston was a contributor to 'The Bulletin', in its time Australia’s leading news and satirical weekly, where he worked as an illustrator in the Advertising Department. During the Great War, he was commissioned to paint a series of posters for the NSW authorities. Biographical details include material cited from The Australian Cartoonists Association.

11.01.2022 Baby steps! Shell-scrapes being dug by infantrymen of the Lincolnshire Regiment, before the Great War. The Regiment raised a total of 19 battalions and was awarded 58 Battle honours and three Victoria Crosses but lost 8,800 men who died during the course of the war.... Bound for the Front. Troops of the 8th (Service) Battalion, Lincolnshire Regiment marching through Leighton Buzzard 1914. Courtesy IWM.

10.01.2022 Before and After! This cameo shows two RAF aerial photographs taken seven weeks apart on the Western Front. It demonstrates the efforts taken by the enemy to camouflage defensive posts. By this stage of the war both sides had adopted defence-in-depth, whereby the Front-line was held by fewer combat units and the defence went back through other trench systems where the main battle would occur. Pill boxes, according to C. E. W. Bean a contraction of the colloquial and ear...lier term pillar box, anchored this layered defence system with strongpoints manned by teams with machine guns. Pill box hunting was a special skill of the BEF, the CEF, the AIF and the NZEF. A German pill box is pictured, one of several located in or around the Tyne Cot CWGC in Belgium. Pill boxes were extensively used by the Germans in the Passchendaele area because the water-table was so near to the surface. In these circumstances it was better to build above rather than below ground. The British however seldom constructed concrete pill boxes, on the basis that the war must be an offensive one. Olive Mudie-Cook sketched this Hun pill box at Passchendaele after the war. In 1916, she had served in France with the First Aid Nursing Yeomanry and also driven ambulances. In 1920 the British Red Cross commissioned her to return to France to record the activities of the Voluntary Aid Detachment units who were still providing care and relief there. This sketch probably dates from the time of that excursion.

09.01.2022 Are you interested in becoming a member of The Families and Friends of the First AIF (FFFAIF)? Are you interested in receiving our flagship quarterly magazine DIGGER and its occasional electronic companion COBBeR? Electronic copies of these are some of the benefits of FFFAIF membership. Others benefits include participating in commemorations and advocacy to preserve or enhance Digger heritage, participating in our Facebook group, meeting people with similar interests who can ...assist or collaborate with your interests and having access to research done by FFFAIF members through our web-site and back issues of DIGGER and DIGGER indexes downloadable from our web-site. We have 2 classes of membership: Plus Membership: is our premium membership for $65 per annum for Plus Members, Plus Corporate membership and $60 for Plus Concessional members (students, under 18s, seniors) and has all the benefits of e-membership PLUS: four printed copies of DIGGER each year, plus printed versions of the AGM materials (if you do not have a current e-mail address) . Select this option wish to maintain a library of DIGGER issues in hard copy form OR if you DO NOT have a current e-mail address. e-membership: e-members and e-corporate members pay $A40 pa and e-concessional membership (students, under 18s, seniors) pay $A35 pa for membership which includes: full membership rights including voting at AGM meetings, discounts on War Book Shop purchases, electronic invitations to the John Laffin Memorial Lectures, commemorations and other events, downloadable back issues of DIGGER and DIGGER indexes, invitations to participate in FFFAIF battlefield tours, access to the FFFAIF Facebook group and website, four searchable electronic issues copy of our flagship DIGGER magazine each year, e-mailed as a pdf and readable on PC and tablets; copies of our electronic COBBeR magazine electronic versions of the AGM materials, e-mailed to you. Select this option if you have a current e-mail address and a device on which to download, store and read DIGGER and you wish to reduce your cost of membership. Overseas membership welcome e-membership rates are the same as for Australian members but PLUS membership rates vary to reflect the additional cost of international postage please contact Membership Secretary for details. Membership group PLUS Members PLUS Concession PLUS Life & Veterans e-Member e-Concession 2020/21 Australian Membership fees $65 $60 $25 $40 $35 2020/21 Overseas Membership fees $95 $90 $55 $40 $35 Contact our Membership Secretary at [email protected] for more information or download an Application Form from the FFFAIF website fffaif.org.au and email to [email protected] or post it to : The Membership Secretary FFFAIF PO Box 4245 Forster NSW 2428

07.01.2022 New Zealand Tyne Cot Ceremony - 12th of October 2019. A wonderful photograph taken by one of the FFFAIF’s great supporters. Thank you, Pat Debaere. With thanks and acknowledgement.

07.01.2022 War winner! Diggers from the 28th Battalion AIF at a range practice with Lewis Guns in September 1917, somewhere in France. The Lewis machine gun became the standard platoon-level medium machine gun with the infantry battalions of the AIF. By 1916, sixteen Lewis guns were in the establishment of a battalion.... In 1917, in common with other British Empire forces, the platoon became the primary tactical element of the battalion. The battalion bombing and scouting platoons were broken up so that each rifle platoon now had a Lewis gun section, a bombing section, a rifle grenade section and a scouting section. The Lewis Gun section consisted of nine fully-trained Lewis gunners, mostly required to carry .303 ammunition and support the gun in action. The Australian War Memorial contains in its collection a damaged Lewis Gun carried by the men of the 27th Battalion AIF. In 1918, the weapon became indispensable in the highly mobile operations against retreating German forces. Soldiers of the Middlesex Regiment can be seen here bringing fire to bear against the enemy. The Lewis gun was highly versatile, and was even mounted on Fighter and scout aircraft for action against other aircraft and even balloons. It is shown here mounted in the forward cockpit of an FE2B scout.

05.01.2022 Head-dress for Heroes! The slouch hat and lemon-squeezer are, respectively, the very distinctive and recognisable headdress’ of the Australian and New Zealand Anzacs of the Great War. This Remembrance Day, the Families and Friends of the First AIF acknowledge the service and sacrifice of the men in the AIF and NZEF.... The Australian slouch hat shown was made from rabbit pelt by Charles Anderson & Co. Ltd at the Federal Hat Mills, Surry Hills, Sydney. It is part of the uniform worn by 918 Leslie John 'Jack' Roberts Jones (1886-1970), an air mechanic with No 4 Squadron, Australian Flying Corps in France. Images courtesy the AWM and NZ Army Museum.

05.01.2022 The Administrative Headquarters of the AIF had myriad responsibilities such as this notification booklet with a grave photograph. Services such as this were of comfort to many bereaved families. Another contemporary view of the makeshift Arno’s Vale Cemetery is next. The Purple square colour patch for Administrative Headquarters, AIF, with a light brown stripe diagonally across the centre, is shown next.... Finally, a duty pass for a representative of or a visitor to the HQ. Even in May of 1919, the work carried on! Inspired by a recent post by Cathy Sedgwick. Thank you.

02.01.2022 Three wonderful winter images of the Pheasant Wood CWGC and our Cobber at Fromelles from our good friend and member Carole. She sends her best wishes for the new year! Thank you and best wishes to all our supporters for 2021.

01.01.2022 A very Bearable form of Leave for a change!. Anzacs enjoy a YMCA excursion to London Zoo during a spot of Leave from the Front.