Archibald John TYE

Regimental number3488
Place of birthRichmond, Victoria
SchoolState School, Victoria
ReligionChurch of England
OccupationAssayer
AddressNorseman, Western Australia
Marital statusSingle
Age at embarkation24
Next of kinMother, Mrs T M Scholey, Esperance, Western Australia
Previous military serviceNil
Enlistment date12 August 1915
Date of enlistment from Nominal Roll6 August 1915
Rank on enlistmentPrivate
Unit name11th Battalion, 11th Reinforcement
AWM Embarkation Roll number23/28/3
Embarkation detailsUnit embarked from Fremantle, Western Australia, on board HMAT A38 Ulysses on 2 November 1915
Regimental number from Nominal RollCommissioned
Rank from Nominal Roll2nd Lieutenant
Unit from Nominal Roll11th Battalion
FateKilled in Action 21 September 1917
Place of death or woundingMenin Road, Ypres, Belgium
Age at death27
Age at death from cemetery records27
Place of burialNo known grave
Commemoration detailsThe Ypres (Menin Gate) Memorial (Panel 23), 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
114
Miscellaneous information from
  cemetery records
Parents: Albert and Tabitha Marie TYE, Norseman, Western Australia. Native of Richmond, Victoria
Medals

Military Cross

'For conspicuous gallantry and devotion to duty. His courage and coolness in leading bombing attacks was most marked. He was wounded and cut off in an enemy counter attack, but fought his way back to safety with all his men. In doing so he received three bayonet wounds. He was brilliant in his disregard for personal safety.'
Source: 'Commonwealth Gazette' No. 189
Date: 8 November 1917

Other details

War service: Egypt, Western Front

Medals: Military Cross, 1914-15 Star, British War Medal, Victory Medal