Service Details:

12 March	1915                      Blackboy Hill Training camp
9 June	1915                      Embarked from Fremantle
August	1915                      Embarked Egypt
10 Sept. – 12 Dec.	1915                      Gallipoli
21 March	1916                      France
6/7 June	1916                      Trench Raid
29 July – 27 Aug.	1916                      Pozieres (Sausage Valley)
4 August	1916                      Pozieres
6 September	1916                      Belgium
October	1916                      Ypres and Dernacourt
3 November	1916                      Battle of Ancres Heights & Fricourt
7 January	1917                      Sick to Hospital
5 November	1917                      Returned to Australia "Debility"
26 January	1918                      Discharged

 

 

Biographical Details:

Thomas Wilson was born into a family of farmers in Castlemaine Victoria in 1889. It is not known why he was in Western Australia when he enlisted in the 28th Battalion.  On his attestation papers he nominated a married aunt, living in Castlemaine, as his Next of Kin.
Thomas was a 28th Battalion original.  He was given training first at Blackboy Hill Training Camp, on board the Ascanius and finally in Egypt. His Battalion was sent to Gallipoli in September 1915.
While at Gallipoli Thomas was hospitalised with a toe injury and then Dysentery. On return to Egypt he was charged with being AWL and awarded 24 hours Field Punishment No. 2.
During the June 6/7th Trench Raid Thomas was designated a Spare Man.
In July, Thomas was awarded 168 hours FP No2 for falling out of line of March without permission. In September he was awarded another 90 days FP No. 2 for In the Field masquerading as a military policeman and using insubordinate language to his superior officer.
In January 1917 Thomas was hospitalised with influenza and then septic sores. He was transferred to England for treatment where, in June he was charged with breaking camp whilst in isolation. He was given more FP No. 2.
Thomas did not return to the field. In November he was returned to Australia for discharge with “Debility”. The debility was not recorded but presumably it was related to the influenza which saw him transferred to England and placed in isolation. He may have been among the first of those inflicted with the Spanish Influenza which killed approximately 21 million people from 1918 to 1920.
Thomas Wilson was discharged in Australia in January 1918. He remained single.  He eventually settled in Geraldton and died at Nazareth House in Geraldton in 1960.