Author Topic: Link: Anzac soldiers who died in Weymouth  (Read 6059 times)

Offline Westy11

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Link: Anzac soldiers who died in Weymouth
« on: Monday 22 September 14 08:39 BST (UK) »
The following website may be of interest to those researching their injured ANZAC ancestors. 

The site notes "Following the landing of Australian & New Zealand troops, the Anzacs, at Gallipoli on 25th April 1915, casualties mounted rapidly and were initially transported to their base in Egypt, which was soon unable to cope, with wounded being sent to England. Here the troops found that there was no Australian base to which they could report once they had been discharged from hospital; what was needed urgently was a base in England where troops could be sent to convalesce. So on 31st May 1915 a command depot was set up at Monte Video House in Chickerell, some two miles from Weymouth."

Further that "The depot was the joint Australian and New Zealand depot until the NZ depot opened at Hornchurch in Essex in April 1916. Weymouth then became the Australian Imperial Forces (AIF) Command Depot No.2 which accommodated those men not expected to be fit for duty within six months, therefore, most of the Diggers repatriated as a result of wounds or sickness passed through Weymouth. During the years 1915-1919 over 120,000 Australian and New Zealand troops passed through Weymouth.".

Also "Unfortunately there is no central surviving database of all the 120 thousand or so sick and injured Anzacs who were sent to Weymouth. Their records are scattered among the Army service records at the National Archives of Australia. The only ones we are certain of are the 87 burials in our town cemetery, and it is mainly their stories that we are starting to reconstruct on these pages."

Westy11

http://weymouthanzacs.moonfruit.com/home/4575539384