| Regimental number | 2047 |
| Place of birth | Bundaberg, Queensland |
| School | State School, Brisbane, Queensland |
| Religion | Church of England |
| Occupation | Painter |
| Marital status | Single |
| Age at embarkation | 30.7 |
| Height | 5' 8.5" |
| Weight | 131 lbs |
| Next of kin | Mother, Mrs M.S. Olesen, 41 Queen Street, Ashfield, Sydney, New South Wales |
| Enlistment date | |
| Date of enlistment from Nominal Roll | |
| Place of enlistment | Sydney, New South Wales |
| Unit name | Light Trench Mortar Battery, 6th Reinforcement |
| Embarkation details | Unit embarked from Sydney, New South Wales, on board RMS Osterley on |
| An Embarkation Roll for the Light Trench Mortar Battery, 6th Reinforcement, does not appear on the AWM website. | |
| Rank from Nominal Roll | Corporal |
| Unit from Nominal Roll | 35th Battalion |
| Fate | Killed in Action |
| Age at death from cemetery records | 31 |
| Place of burial | No known grave |
| Commemoration details | The Ypres (Menin Gate) Memorial (Panel 25), 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 | 126 |
| Miscellaneous information from cemetery records | Parents: Thomas (d. 28 March 1912) and Maren OLESEN |
| Other details |
War service: Western Front Embarked Sydney, 10 February 1917; disembarked Plymouth, England, 11 April 1917, and marched in to No 3 Camp, Parkhouse. Transferred to 62nd Bn, Windmill Hill, 27 April 1917. Appointed Temporary Corporal, 26 May 1917. On Command, BF & PT School, 26 June 1917; rejoined 62nd, 7 July 1917. Promoted Corporal, 22 July 1917. Proceeded overseas to France, 23 August 1917; taken on strength, 35th Bn, in the field, 1 September 1917. Killed in action, 12 October 1917. Medals: British War Medal, Victory Medal |
| Sources | NAA: B2455, OLESEN Thomas Pallasen |
Postal Address:
Po Box 7916
Canberra BC 2610, Australia
Street Address:
Northcott Drive,
Campbell, ACT 2600
