Ernest Crego NEW

Date of birth30 April 1896
Place of birthAnnandale, Sydney, New South Wales
SchoolFort Street Boys' High School, Sydney, New South Wales
Other trainingPassed Junior Examination, Sydney University, 1910; Matriculation, March 1913.
ReligionChurch of England
AddressAusterlitz, Forest Street, Haberfield, Sydney, New South Wales
Marital statusSingle
Age at embarkation20
Height6' 1.5"
Weight151.5 lbs
Next of kinFather, E F New, Austerlitz, Forest Street, Haberfield, Sydney, New South Wales
Previous military serviceHe served in the 31st Infantry Regiment (St George's English Rifles), Citizen Military Forces, as Lieutenant.
Enlistment date6 September 1915
Rank on enlistmentLieutenant
Unit name17th Battalion, 7th Reinforcement
AWM Embarkation Roll number23/34/2
Embarkation detailsUnit embarked from Sydney, New South Wales, on board HMAT A29 Suevic on 20 December 1915
Rank from Nominal RollLieutenant
Unit from Nominal Roll17th Battalion
Other details from Roll of Honour Circular

He was the only son of Mr & Mrs E.F. New, of Haberfield, Sydney, and was born on 30/4/1896, at Annandale, Sydney. He passed his Junior University exam at the age of 14 and matriculated with honours when only 16. After holding his commission with E Coy Senior Cadet Trainees, Five Dock, and later with 31st Militia, Leichhardt (St George's English Rifle, Reg.) he enlisted in the A.I.F. for service abroad in August, 1915, when only 19. He opened, ...form the A.I.F. military camp at the Show Ground, winning special recommendation from the state Commandant for his work there. He left Sydney on 23/12/1915 ...with... to 17th Battalion A.I.F. after seeing service in Egypt and Salisbury Plains, he went to France, where he was wounded in November, 1916. He returned to England and was made adjutant, when only 20 of a Command depot at ... for his good work thHe was promoted to 1st Lieut after atremendous efforts on his part he rejoined the 17th Battalion France in June 1917 and was killed in the attack on Passenchdaele on 9/10/1917. he also held his certificates and medals for Life Saving. Prior to being killed he held the position of adjutant to his Battalion in France. (Charlotte Elizabeth New, mother)

FateKilled in Action 9 October 1919
Place of death or woundingBelgium
Age at death21.6
Age at death from cemetery records21
Place of burialNo known grave
Commemoration detailsThe Ypres (Menin Gate) Memorial (Panel 17), 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
83
Miscellaneous information from
  cemetery records
Parents: Ernest Festoon and Charlotte NEW, 14 Forrest Street, Haberfield, New South Wales. Native of Sydney, New South Wales
Other details

War service: Egypt, Western Front

Allotted to 5th Infantry Training Bn, Ismailia, 26 March 1916. Admitted to 3rd Australian General Hospital, Abbassia, 2 April 1916 (observation); discharged to duty, 11 April 1916. Admitted to hospital, 5 May 1916; discharged to duty same day. Admitted to No. 2 Australian Stationary Hospital, 6 May 1916 (pneumonia); transferred to Ras-el-tin Convalescent Depot, 20 May 1916.

Embarked from Alexandria, 29 May 1916; disembarked Plymouth, England, June 1916 (day not recorded).

Proceeded overseas to France, 7 November 1916; taken on strength, 17th Bn, 14 November 1916.

Wounded in action, 19 November 1916 (gun shot wound, right forearm); admitted to 2nd General Hospital, Havre, 21 November 1916; transferred to England, 23 November 1916, and admitted to 3rd London General Hospital; transferred to 5th Auxiliary Hospital, 30 December 1916; discharged to No. 1 Command Depot, Perham Downs, 1 February 1917. Promoted Lt, 17 January 1917. Marched in to No. 4 Command Depot, Wareham, 24 February 1917; proceeded overseas to France, 24 June 1917; rejoined Bn, 3 July 1917.

Admitted to 5th Australian Field Ambulance, 12 September 1917; transferred to 7th General Hospital, St Omer, 12 September 1917 (rinal calculus); discharged to duty, 20 September 1917; rejoined Bn, 21 September 1917.

Killed in action, Belgium, 9 October 1917. Killed by shell fire.

Medals: British War Medal, Victory Medal